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    Watching for the Future: Techniques for Seeing the Days Ahead
    Watching for the Future: Techniques for Seeing the Days Ahead
    Watching for the Future: Techniques for Seeing the Days Ahead
    Ebook44 pages24 minutes

    Watching for the Future: Techniques for Seeing the Days Ahead

    By John Orndorff

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    About this ebook

    Watching for the Future was originally a presentation John Orndorff made to a symposium of first responders and emergency planners. Like the original presentation, this booklet provides readers with a basic familiarization of futurist techniques to understand ways we can know what to expect in the future. Following this overview the author goes into more detail on scenario building. Orndorff notes that the United States economy and social order are two important uncertainties for the future. He uses these to build four distinct scenarios for the future of the United States, which go from a best case scenario to a worst case. After developing the scenarios, he provides a brief overview of the “sign posts,” or recent news items and government data that indicate which future scenario we appear to be moving toward. The author then presents what he believes would be a practical response to that potential future.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherJohn Orndorff
    Release dateAug 26, 2012
    ISBN9781476038797
    Watching for the Future: Techniques for Seeing the Days Ahead
    Author

    John Orndorff

    John C. (Chris) Orndorff is a retired Air Force Lieutenant Colonel and Special Agent with the Air Force Office of Special Investigations. He began his military career serving four years during the Vietnam era as a Navy Hospital Corpsman working in neuro-psychiatry. In the Air Force he served in a number of positions ranging from administrative officer, commander, special agent academic instructor and acquisition officer. As a faculty member at Air Command and Staff College he was broadly published in the military community, and taught futurist techniques. Chris has also done future related research for the Air Force and emergency planners. He has consulted for industry and worked with the US State Department providing antiterrorism support for US Embassies in over 30 countries. Based on his antiterrorism experience, he has designed and presented training on techniques to prevent high school violence. Chris is now retired after teaching Air Force Junior ROTC for twelve years. He and his wife Debi have been married 40 years and have three children and five grandchildren. His website is http://johncorndorff.com. His books are: Prince Michael and the Dragon Prince John's Quest Princess Mary and the Prophet How Have the Mighty Fallen Terrorists, Tornados and Tsunamis: How to Prepare for Life's Danger Zones The Gilgamesh Epic Watching for the future The Enduring Art of War: A Paraphrase and Commentary on Sun Tzu From the Mouths of Babes: Growing Closer to God Through Children

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      Book preview

      Watching for the Future - John Orndorff

      Watching for the Future:

      Techniques for Seeing the Days Ahead

      By

      John Christian Orndorff

      Watching for the Future: Techniques for Seeing the Days Ahead

      By John Christian Orndorff

      Published by Smashwords

      This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be resold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

      Copyright 2012, by John Christian Orndorff

      Cover design by John Christian Orndorff

      TABLE OF CONTENTS

      INTRODUCTION

      THE DESIRE TO KNOW

      PLANNING VERSUS THE FUTURE

      HOW TO THINK ABOUT THE FUTURE

      SCANNING

      TRENDING

      POLLING

      BRAINSTORMING

      MODELING

      GAMING

      VISIONING

      HISTORICAL ANALYSIS

      SCENARIO BUILDING

      CONTINUED NORMALCY

      ORDERLY RETREAT

      RESTLESS RECOVERY

      ORDERLY RETREAT

      INTO THE ABYSS

      SIGN POSTS

      A PRACTICAL RESPONSE TO THE WORST CASE

      ABOUT THE AUTHOR

      INTRODUCTION

      The following is a presentation I made to a symposium of emergency planners and first responders in July, 2009. I had been a regular speaker at this symposium for several years. Naturally, because of my background in law enforcement and antiterrorism, I normally spoke on topics relating to preventing terrorist attacks and public/school safety. At the time I felt like any presentation on these topics would merely be more of the same. For this reason I chose to fall back on another skill I had learned while on active duty.

      In addition to my operational experience while serving in the Air Force Office of Special Investigations (AFOSI), I taught techniques for analyzing future possibilities at Air Command and Staff College. I went on to use these techniques to look at future

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