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Futurists have tended to take little interest in the hard work of implementing changes necessary to reach particular futures. This paper aims to argue that the field should pay more attention to these issues, and to use the challenge of weight loss to illustrate how tools can be developed to help both individuals and organizations deal with futures. It also aims to argue for the importance of mindfulness in managing long‐term futures challenges.

The paper describes how the author applied concepts outlined in Futures 2.0 to his own program of weight loss, and lost 50 pounds (22.7 kilograms).

The paper shows how futurists could use concepts from behavioral economics and design in personal futures and futures work more generally. It also suggests that mindfulness – a concept borrowed from Buddhism and other contemplative practices – can give perspective necessary see the long‐term consequences of decisions they face in the present, and the self‐discipline necessary to make good choices.

The paper argues that futurists should not just focus on helping clients see unexpected trends or wild cards, or thinking about the future in new ways, or reframing their underlying strategic assumptions. Complex, intractable futures subvert the best efforts of rational actors; clients are most interested in getting help on the problems they are least likely to solve.

More value for clients can be delivered by helping them understand common roadblocks and designing the means to reach long‐term future goals.

For a profession accustomed to thinking about big issues and megatrends like nanotechnology and global warming, losing weight may seem trivial and beneath its interest. But by any objective measure, in much of the developed world obesity is a substantial public health problem: it affects the lives of tens of millions of people, increases chronic diseases like hypertension and diabetes, and costs governments hundreds of billions of dollars. More generally, weight loss is a microcosm of the kinds of problems that can only be managed through the collective action of large numbers of people.

The paper is a contribution to the literature on personal futures, and to the ongoing discussion of the scope and methods of futures.

This study aims to examine the relationship between human resource management (HRM) practices and informal workplace learning.

Data were collected from a sample of 381 employees working as heads of the department of branches in private commercial banks of Bangladesh. Hypotheses were tested by using structural equation modelling-partial least square.

Findings of the study revealed that HRM practices such as selective hiring, extensive training, performance appraisal, compensation practices, empowerment and information-sharing, significantly positively related with informal workplace learning.

Based on the situated learning and organizational support theory, this study is empirically testing how HRM practices influence informal workplace learning.

This chapter provides an insider perspective on the Quantified Self (QS) community. It is argued that the overall approach and methods used in the QS community have not been adequately described. Consequently, the aim of the chapter is to give an account of the work performed by self-trackers in what we coin the 1-Person-Laboratory (1PL). Additionally, the chapter describes other aspects of the 1PL, for example the methods, procedures and instrumentation that are being used and the knowledge sharing taking place in the QS community. With a point of departure in empirical cases it is demonstrated how QS self-trackers put their own questions, observations and subjective experience front and centre by using their own instrumentation and data sets in their personal laboratories. In the 1PL, the causalities that are looked for are not aimed at generalisation to an entire population; on the contrary, the causal connections on the level of the person are essential for discovery by the individual.

Figs. 2 and 3 illustrate the impact of different cues-in-contexts affecting the implicit thinking and sensemaking of the observer (e.g., researcher) to the emic story being told in the visuals. The creation of Figs. 2 and 3 rests on a theoretical platform of Carl Jung's (2009) archetypal theory and method of decoding his own dreams. Jung's (2009) paintings of his dreams to enable conscious interpretation of his conversations within the collective unconscious inform a call for creating visual narrative art to inform meanings of personal and collective unconscious relating to stories consumers tell about buying and using brands.The collective unconscious contains the wisdom and experience of untold ages and thus represents an unparalleled guide for explaining the meaning of what is happening and what will happen. “Active imagination” and “self-experimentation” are terms Jung refers to in his use of paintings and sculpture to create dialogues between “directed thinking” (conscious thinking or what in the 21st century is referred to as “system 2 thinking”) and fantasy thinking (personal and collective unconscious, what is similar to “system 1 thinking,” see Evans, 2003). (Woodside, Megehee, & Sood, 2011).

How is understanding built? This chapter operationalizes the discussion from the previous chapters to offer some design strategies for creating information systems that promote the building of understanding. These strategies are, namely, multiple perspectives, slowness, and intentional struggle. Examples of and existing literature on these design strategies are discussed.

The purpose of this paper is to study engagement of employees in informal learning behaviors (ILBs) and to understand the role of workplace support (organizational support, supervisor support and job support) in facilitating such behaviors.

The study uses descriptive design with data collected through voluntary non-probability sampling method of 58 employees from India and the USA through Amazon Mechanical Turk.

Preliminary findings suggest that 81% of the employees are likely to engage in ILBs and 65.5% agreed to have received workplace support. Employees from India rate their workplace support as higher and are more likely to engage in ILBs than those from the USA.

This study contributes to workplace informal learning literature and highlights the need for more studies on workforce ILBs across multiple countries and job role variations.

The purpose of this paper is to explain the mediation effect of affective commitment on the relationship between human resource management practices and informal workplace learning.

This paper develops a conceptual framework along with propositions by integrating comprehensive literatures, in the field of human resource management, affective commitment and informal workplace learning. Through the review of detail literature and based on the situated learning theory (Lave and Wenger, 1991) and organizational support theory (Eisenberger et al., 1986; Rhoades and Eisenberger, 2002; – and Eisenberger, 2006), it is proposed that eight human resource practices could affect informal workplace learning. Moreover, it is also argued that affective commitment could mediate the relationship between HRM practices and informal workplace learning.

This paper provides a conceptual framework on human resource management practices and informal workplace learning which is mediated by affective commitment.

None of the models presented in the literature details the mediation of affective commitment on the relationship between human resource management practices and informal workplace learning which is mediated by affective commitment as indeed the most recent research on the subject envisages.

The purpose of this study is to discuss conditions in support of a Competent Self in the broader process of the school‐work transition, particularly regarding early school‐leavers.

A total of 233 early school‐leavers were followed in innovative and successful vocational training courses. Using a “quali‐quantitative” research model, longitudinal and multilevel, the comparison between contexts (previous/current school attended) and experiences (school failure/success) was adopted as the basic unit of analysis and considerable attention was given to the personal reflexivity stimulated by the transition undertaken.

The successful vocational training experience allowed the students to demonstrate commitment, competence and mastery motivation supported by the perception they were part of a project that was credible, shared and focused on a mutual investment in learning a job. The commitment and availability of the teachers and the testing of the “learning by doing” were the aspects that most strongly supported the construction of a Competent Self, in contrast with what the students perceived in the schools they had left.

The findings support the relevance of studying school‐failure by valorising the perceived quality of the school experience especially in relation to the teaching‐learning models adopted.

Emphasis was placed on the conditions that could contribute to coping with the school failure phenomenon (especially regarding vocational school paths).

The theoretical‐methodological measures adopted contributed to overcoming some ambiguities that characterised the research on school failure, questioning the supposed weakness of the early school‐leavers and highlighting school factors that contributed to students' engagement/disengagement, making the “school” (not only the students) “protective” or “at risk”.