Life Versus Lifestyle – Approaching Life AfterLockdown

It seems that one way or another, Victoria is going to pop out of #Lockdown. Probably not in the way we would have hoped. And so for everyone pushing for #AfterLockdown in Victoria and for the wider society, there are two questions you must confront: One –

‘What do you feel is an acceptable level of Preventable Infections you are willing to live with, before being forced BACK into #Lockdown? and
Two –

What is an acceptable level of Preventable Deaths you are willing to live with?

Because that’s ultimately what we’re looking at here. And the degree to which you will accept more infections or more deaths is going to be almost wholly influenced by your current living conditions. If you are without income, struggling to pay rent or a mortgage, or worried about being able to feed yourself or your family. you will choose ‘survive now’ over ‘survive later. That’s the very difficult choice you are confronted with and I fully understand why you would choose ‘survive now’. That’s a Life decision.

If however you are confronted with a Lifestyle challenge – not able to go out and entertain or catch-up for parties with friends or take your (insert favourite toy here) out for a ride, then that’s much more difficult to justify. Your choice could be framed in the following way ‘It’s not fair that more people aren’t willing to die so that I’m allowed to take my yacht out with friends’. Because that’s what it is.
The #AfterLockdown Victoria (and other parts of Australia and the world) is going to be very different. If as a society we’re willing to pay the costs of a healthcare burden that will continuously come back to bite us, then the question starts to shift – if we want to pay for the healthcare costs and risks, what will we stop funding instead?

Life versus Lifestyle – #Afterlockdown

Social Issues Hackathon co hosted by Casey and Dandenong

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Most people who’ve been involved in planning and strategy development will have heard of VUCA – Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous. Emerging out of the US War College in 1987, it’s come to be more widely used by consultancies aiming to at least ‘sound smart’. But that’s not the main problem with its usage   Instead…

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Is Manufacturing Output Data a Reliable Indicator of Economic Activity

Mar 19, 2019

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The Drive to Make Futures Thinking Pragmatic

Mar 13, 2019

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Australia, We Are Killing Ourselves

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Every where we look we are being given clear signs of the blatant stupidity and arguably outright criminality of a toxic system of decision making. The Menindee Lakes and Darling River disaster is one example   A couple of years ago I was invited to speak at a Private Equity conference at a lovely resort…

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2019 The International Year of the Cooperative

Dec 30, 2018

Every year I aim to identify what I think a major focus of the upcoming year will be and in that light I’m declaring 2019 the International Year of the Cooperative. I’m prompted by a multitude of signals that my daily research has uncovered, many of which will be familiar to you – Cost of…

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Can the United States Survive the Childish Tantrums of an Incompetent President?

Dec 23, 2018

Here we are with the last posting of the year looking at the potential for wide ranging strategy for a country like the United States. Arguably the United States is undergoing its own version of #Brexit though without the vote of the people. Instead the dictatorial nature of what I see as an incompetent strategic…

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When will the next Federal Election be held in Australia?

Dec 3, 2018

I’m reluctant to make predictions but am getting a few calls so: My tip is on a March 2019 election – the 9th or 16th But that will be an attempt to protect the existing NSW Government hoping that voters will have sufficiently vented. That said though, it also required a Federal Minoroty Government to…

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Asia on the Rise – why Australia’s Neighbours Will Leave us Behind

Oct 30, 2018

The Asian Productivity Organisation has shifted gears from being a centre for member countries to talk about productivity, to one that now wants to upskills its member countries. We’ve just completed the first chunk of helping National Productivity secretariats to ready their staff for a more proactive, future facing approach to their Country’s development  …

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10 years on from the Australia 2020 Futurists Summit

Oct 18, 2018

The question is, ‘how does the thinking inside this document stack up?’ Turns out, pretty good. What we spotted and what problems we said we’d have to watch out for, are just about spot on   When it was discovered that the then Prime Minister Kevin Rudd was going to hold the Australia 2020 Summit,…

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