I love the analogy of a journey to consider the future. We travel to the future in our imagination, see the new world there and come back to this current land with insights and guidance, with both hopes and fears. And then we make plans and pack provisions to go to this new place, and to take our people with us. Whether they are your family and your children, or your team or company, you as the leader, must lead them into an uncharted land, past hazards and monsters, collecting tools and talismans to complete the journey.

The first step though, is your willingness to leave this current place, this known, familiar and comfortable place to journey to a land of unknowns. We don’t have data about the future. There is no complete map, and the directions provided may be wrong. We scale a mountain only to see a new vista of ever higher mountains before us. Our courage flags. Our confidence dips. We doubt that we are up to the task, but it is essentially our willingness to take the journey that qualifies us to lead others. It is our courage to overcome our fear and uncertainty that makes us the best option to start this grand adventure.

And make no mistake, if we do not risk this adventure, then we risk something way more scary and far more certain. If we do not explore the future and prepare for it, then we will become increasingly irrelevant and obsolete in a world that is accelerating past us.