What's Next: The Experts' Guide: Predictions from 50 of America’s Most Compelling People

by Jane Buckingham

What will the next ten years look like? In her role as founder and president of The Intelligence Group, a consulting and trend-spotting company at the forefront of predictions about the ever-elusive youth and consumer market, Jane Buckingham spends her days looking for the telling details in today's culture that give clues about what our future holds. What's The Experts' Guide is the result of her conversations with dozens of fascinating people in a wide range of industries, all giving their highly individual perspectives on the world as they know it. From education to the environment, from robotics to drug policy, with an emphasis on up-and-coming industries and news-making topics, some of the most compelling and timely matters of our era are addressed by dozens of contributors, Filled with surprising insights and details, What's The Experts' Guide also shows how these leaders work, what they believe will be important, and what they think is not worth our time. In a world that seems to be changing faster than ever, What's Next offers intriguing insights into how we can keep up—and stay ahead.

Genres: Nonfiction

304 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2008

About the author

Jane Buckingham is an American author and marketing expert. She is the founder and President of Trendera, a boutique marketing firm specializing in trend forecasting, brand strategy and generational research.

Reviews

[Ms · Rating 1 out of 5]

2019 College admissions fraud scandal alleged participant listed as Jane Buckingham: https://www.cnn.com/2019/03/13/us/wha...

[Marissa Morrison · Rating 3 out of 5]

First off, I'll admit I didn't read every section, including "on Sports," "on Video Games," "on Yoga," etc.

The problem with having a leader in a particular field say what's going to become popular in that field is that the person has a limited scope and most likely an interest in the outcome. A lot of what is written in this book is basically self-affirmation. The fellow who writes about robotics is the founder of iRobot, and he says that the future holds more interest in robots that do housework. Judith Martin ("Miss Manners") says that people will become more concerned with manners, and the woman who founded iVillage says women will flock to online communities. In "on Children and Early Education," Nancy Schulman, who directs an early education program, says that little children need to go to preschool to learn how to get along with others. Felicity Huffman (writing in "on Entertainment") thinks TV will have more clever writing like that found on "Desperate Housewives." The marketing manager for Hasbro predicts that the future of toys will be whatever electronic gadgets Hasbro develops, plus old Hasbro favorites like Candy Land.

One of the more thoughtful pieces is "on Dating" by Joy Browne. She's worried about technology isolating people more and more, more babies being born to young unmarried women, and people "needing" a relationship rather than viewing it as the "sprinkles on top of the whipped cream, on top of the fudge, on top of the ice cream on the cake." John Gottman's predictions on marriage are also thoughtful, though more positive and prescriptive (i.e. "I think the single most important thing to improve a relationship is honoring your partner's dreams").

I almost skipped the essay on plastic surgery, but it turned out to be a good read. Dr. Robert Rey says, "Going down to the soup kitchen at Christmastime makes you beautiful. When nobody is looking, helping that mom with two kids at the grocery store--that's what makes you beautiful...When you're beautiful on the inside, I can make your outside beautiful; but if you are dark on the inside, I can't make you beautiful, no matter what I do."

[Anne · Rating 4 out of 5]

I am speaking from reding the uncorrected proof. The book is due out in 2/08

Most of the book is "of the moment." Snapshots of what the experienced and/or experts in diverse fields see coming in the near future. Topics range from professional sports to the environment to bartending to politics to the latino population. Tony Hawk addresses skateboarding, Amy Ziff talks about travel and Liz Smith even talks about the future of gossip. Reza Aslan's commentary on Islam is very insightful and timely for US residents. Buckingham's introduction encourages the reader to look to his or her own learning and experience to take responsibility for the future we want. Recommended for those responsible for the immediate planning of popular services and the perpetually curious.

[James · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting, if uneven. Some of the subject matter experts the authors interviewed were pretty banal in their forecasts, while others had clearly given the future of their fields a lot of thought and had come to striking opinions.

I felt the book was weakened by the intermingling of serious, important subjects, like the future of education, agriculture, and demographic trends, with self-referential fluff like fashion design, that really seems likely to be carried along by other changes and not to shape them.

[Francine Apollo · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is great for high school and college students to help them exercise their critical thinking skills. It's also great for adults who are looking for interesting, current thinking on some very important questions in American society. The author of the essay on Politics, Joe Trippi, got the election results of 2008 wrong but many of the authors seemed to be right on track. Published in 2008, it was a nice mind exercise to reflect on how the predictions measured up to 2013 reality.

[Cynthia · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is a collection of essays by the author du jour in each subject area. The authors seem to have been chosen by perusing the recent best-seller lists. In some cases, they don't really seem to be true experts, but just someone who has written something recently on the subject. Some of the predictions are quite interesting and some are not so interesting.

[Mary Jo · Rating 2 out of 5]

There were topics I found of interest. However I thought the subject area was too wide. I had expected trending leading to a theory of the future (more like John Naisbitt or Greening of America). I was disappointed with the banality of some of the chapters.

[Butch Campbell · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fun book, easy read. Nothing earth shattering but intersting to see opinions of leaders in different industries discuss what they think the future holds for their fields.