TED演讲：如何面越来越不确定的未来？
2020年，我们见证了许多的不可能，许多人的生活也由此改变，正如一句话所言，这个世界唯一确定的就是变化。在不可抗拒的变化浪潮中， 我们该何去何从？
企业家Margaret Heffernan在演讲中探讨了生活的不可预测性，挑战了技术决定论，她认为我们越依赖令我们高效的技术，我们就越难以应对意外事件。她鼓励我们更多依靠一些人性品质及技能，如联盟建设、想象力、实验、勇气等去解决问题。
演讲者：Margaret Heffernan
作家，企业家。五家公司的前首席执行官，她探索了导致组织和管理者误入歧途的人类思维模式
Recently, the leadership team of an American supermarket chain decided that their business needed to get a lot more efficient. So they embraced their digital transformation with zeal. Out went the teams supervising meat, veg, bakery, and in came an algorithmic task allocator.
最近，一个美国连锁超市的领导团队决定，他们的业务需大幅提高效率，所以，他们热情地接受了数字化转型，原先的团队对肉类、蔬菜、烘焙的管理，而今被一个任务分配算法取而代之。
Now, instead of people working together, each employee went, clocked in, got assigned a task, did it, came back for more. This was scientific management on steroids, standardizing and allocating work. It was super efficient.
现在，大家不再是一起工作，而是每个员工到公司打卡、领任务，完成任务后，再回来领更多任务。这类似于对类固醇的科学管理，将工作标准化后进行工作分配，它非常高效。
Well, not quite, because the task allocator didn't know when a customer was going to drop a box of eggs, couldn't predict when some crazy kid was going to knock over a display, or when the local high school decided that everybody needed to bring in coconuts the next day.
不过也不完全是，因为任务分配器不知道客户何时会把一盒鸡蛋掉到地上，也无法预测哪个皮孩子会在何时撞翻展示架，或者哪天当地高中会决定第二天让每人带椰子去学校。
Efficiency works really well when you can predict exactly what you're going to need. But when the anomalous or unexpected comes along -- kids, customers, coconuts -- well, then efficiency is no longer your friend.
当你能准确预测出自己会需要什么时，效率非常重要。但是，当异常或意外出现时——如孩子、顾客、椰子——那么效率就不再是你的朋友了。
This has become a really crucial issue, this ability to deal with the unexpected, because the unexpected is becoming the norm. It's why experts and forecasters are reluctant to predict anything more than 400 days out. Why?
这种处理意外的能力就变得非常关键了，因为意外情况会成为常态。这就是为什么专家和预测人员不愿意预测任何超过 400 天的事情。为什么？
Because over the last 20 or 30 years, much of the world has gone from being complicated to being complex -- which means that yes, there are patterns, but they don't repeat themselves regularly. It means that very small changes can make a disproportionate impact. And it means that expertise won't always suffice, because the system just keeps changing too fast.
因为在过去的20 或 30 年里，世界上的许多地方已经从繁杂变为复杂——这意味着，模式虽然存在，但它们不会经常重复。这意味着，非常小的变化可能会产生巨大影响；专业知识也许总是不够，因为系统变化太快。
So what that means is that there's a huge amount in the world that kind of defies forecasting now. It's why the Bank of England will say yes, there will be another crash, but we don't know why or when. We know that climate change is real, but we can't predict where forest fires will break out, and we don't know which factories are going to flood.
也就是说，世界上有大量的东西现在无法预测。这就是为什么英格兰银行会说，“是的，会有另一次崩盘，但我们不知道为什么或何时发生。”我们知道气候变化是真实的，但我们无法预测哪里会有森林火灾，也不知道哪些工厂会发生洪涝。
It's why companies are blindsided when plastic straws and bags and bottled water go from staples to rejects overnight, and baffled when a change in social mores turns stars into pariahs and colleagues into outcasts: ineradicable uncertainty. In an environment that defies so much forecasting, efficiency won't just not help us, it specifically undermines and erodes our capacity to adapt and respond.
这就是为什么当一夜之间，塑料吸管、塑料袋和瓶装水从生活必需品变成人人喊打的产品，制造公司却会感到不知所措；当社会动荡的变化将明星变成贱民、同事变成被驱逐的人时，他们会感到困惑：不可避免的不确定性。在令众多预测无效的环境中，效率不仅无法帮助我们，反倒会破坏和削弱我们的适应和应对能力。
So if efficiency is no longer our guiding principle, how should we address the future? What kind of thinking is really going to help us? What sort of talents must we be sure to defend?
因此，如果效率不再是指导原则，那么，我们该如何应对未来呢？什么样的思考才能真正帮到我们呢？我们必须要捍卫什么样的才能？
I think that, where in the past we used to think a lot about just in time management, now we have to start thinking about just in case, preparing for events that are generally certain but specifically remain ambiguous.
过去我们经常思考“及时管理”，现在，我认为我们必须开始考虑“以防万一”，为一般情况下虽然很确定，但仍不能完全掌握的情况做准备。
One example of this is the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness, CEPI. We know there will be more epidemics in future, but we don't know where or when or what. So we can't plan. But we can prepare.
其中一个例子是流行病预防联盟，即 CEPI。我们知道将来会有更多流行病，但不知何地、何时、是哪种流行病。所以我们根本无法计划，但我们可为此准备。
So CEPI's developing multiple vaccines for multiple diseases, knowing that they can't predict which vaccines are going to work or which diseases will break out. So some of those vaccines will never be used. That's inefficient. But it's robust, because it provides more options, and it means that we don't depend on a single technological solution.
因此，CEPI 正针对多种疾病开发疫苗，他们知道，无法预测哪种疫苗会起作用、或者说，哪种疾病会爆发。因此，一些疫苗将永远用不到。这样做的效率很低，但它很强大，因为它提供了更多选择，这意味着我们不再依赖于单一的技术解决方案。
Epidemic responsiveness also depends hugely on people who know and trust each other. But those relationships take time to develop, time that is always in short supply when an epidemic breaks out. So CEPI is developing relationships, friendships, alliances now knowing that some of those may never be used. That's inefficient, a waste of time, perhaps, but it's robust.
对流行病的响应能力很大程度上取决于相互了解和信任的人。但建立这些关系需要时间，当流行病爆发时，时间总不够用。因此，CEPI 眼下正在建立关系、友谊、联盟，深谙其中一些可能永远用不到。这可能效率低、浪费时间，但这种做法十分稳妥。
You can see robust thinking in financial services, too. In the past, banks used to hold much less capital than they're required to today, because holding so little capital, being too efficient with it, is what made the banks so fragile in the first place. Now, holding more capital looks and is inefficient. But it's robust, because it protects the financial system against surprises.
在金融服务中，你也能看到稳健性思维。在过去，通常银行持有的资本远远少于今天所需的资本，因为持有如此少的资本、过于高效的做法会首先使银行变得很脆弱。现在，持有更多资本看起来效率低，也确实效率低。但它很稳健，因为它可以保护金融系统免受意外。
Countries that are really serious about climate change know that they have to adopt multiple solutions, multiple forms of renewable energy, not just one. The countries that are most advanced have been working for years now, changing their water and food supply and healthcare systems, because they recognize that by the time they have certain prediction, that information may very well come too late.
对气候变化非常认真的国家知道，他们必须采用多种解决方案、多种形式的可再生能源，而不仅仅是一种。最先进的国家多年来一直致力于改变水和食品供应和医疗保健系统，因为他们认识到，就算他们预测到了，到那时候再搜集这些信息可能就太晚了。
You can take the same approach to trade wars, and many countries do. Instead of depending on a single huge trading partner, they try to be everybody's friends, because they know they can't predict which markets might suddenly become unstable.
同样的方式也可以用来应对贸易战，许多国家也是这样做的。与其依赖一个强有力的贸易伙伴，不如试图成为每个人的朋友，因为他们知道无法预测，哪些市场可能会突然变得不稳定。
It's time-consuming and expensive, negotiating all these deals, but it's robust because it makes their whole economy better defended against shocks. It's particularly a strategy adopted by small countries that know they'll never have the market muscle to call the shots, so it's just better to have too many friends.
所有这些交易的谈判耗时又昂贵，但它很稳定，因为它使整个经济体能更好地抵御冲击。小国家尤其喜欢采用这样的策略，他们知道靠自己的市场力量永远不可能做主，所以拥有朋友越多越好。
But if you're stuck in one of these organizations that's still kind of captured by the efficiency myth, how do you start to change it? Try some experiments.
但如果你陷入其中一个依然崇尚效率神话的组织里，你又如何开始改变呢？尝试一些实验吧。
In the Netherlands, home care nursing used to be run pretty much like the supermarket: standardized and prescribed work to the minute: nine minutes on Monday, seven minutes on Wednesday, eight minutes on Friday.
过去在荷兰，家庭护理业的运作非常像超市：标准化和规定的工作量化到分钟：周一 9 分钟、周三 7 分钟、周五 8 分钟。
The nurses hated it. So one of them, Jos de Blok, proposed an experiment. Since every patient is different, and we don't quite know exactly what they'll need, why don't we just leave it to the nurses to decide?
护士们讨厌这些，所以其中叫乔斯·德·勃洛克（Jos de Blok）的人提议做一个实验。由于每个患者都不同，我们并不确切知道他们需要什么，为何不让护士来决定呢？
Sound reckless?
听起来很鲁莽吗？
In his experiment, Jos found the patients got better in half the time, and costs fell by 30 percent.
在实验中，乔斯发现，只需原来一半的时间，患者反而恢复得更好了，成本还下降了30％。
When I asked Jos what had surprised him about his experiment, he just kind of laughed and he said, "Well, I had no idea it could be so easy to find such a huge improvement, because this isn't the kind of thing you can know or predict sitting at a desk or staring at a computer screen."
当我问乔斯，实验的哪个部分让他感到惊讶时，他只是笑了笑，说道：“我没想到这么容易就做出了如此巨大的改进，因为这不是你坐在办公桌前或盯着电脑屏幕就能了解或预知的事情。”
So now this form of nursing has proliferated across the Netherlands and around the world. But in every new country it still starts with experiments, because each place is slightly and unpredictably different.
“所以，现在这种形式的护理已在荷兰和世界各地蔓延开来。但在每个新的国家，它仍然从实验开始，因为每个地方都有所不同，而且无法提前预测。
Of course, not all experiments work. Jos tried a similar approach to the fire service and found it didn't work because the service is just too centralized. Failed experiments look inefficient, but they're often the only way you can figure out how the real world works. So now he's trying teachers. Experiments like that require creativity and not a little bravery.
当然，并非所有实验都有效。乔斯尝试了类似的消防服务方法，发现它没什么用，因为服务过于集中。失败的实验看起来效率低下，但它们往往是弄清现实世界如何运作的唯一方法。所以，现在他正在教育行业尝试。像这样的实验需要创造力，而不是单单一点勇气就可以的。
In England -- I was about to say in the UK, but in England --
在英格兰——我正准备说在英国呢，其实是在英格兰——
In England, the leading rugby team, or one of the leading rugby teams, is Saracens. The manager and the coach there realized that all the physical training they do and the data-driven conditioning that they do has become generic; really, all the teams do exactly the same thing.
在英格兰，领先的橄榄球队，或领先的橄榄球队之一是撒拉逊人（Saracens）。球队的经理和教练意识到，他们做的全部体能训练和数据驱动训练已变得通用化；实际上，所有球队都做同样的事情。
So they risked an experiment. They took the whole team away, even in match season, on ski trips and to look at social projects in Chicago. This was expensive, it was time-consuming, and it could be a little risky putting a whole bunch of rugby players on a ski slope, right?
所以，他们冒险做了一个实验。即使还在赛季中，他们依然带领整个团队去滑雪，并观察芝加哥的社交项目。这些活动费用很高，又耗费时间，让全队的橄榄球运动员待在滑雪坡上，可能还是有点冒险的吧？
But what they found was that the players came back with renewed bonds of loyalty and solidarity. And now when they're on the pitch under incredible pressure, they manifest what the manager calls "poise" -- an unflinching, unwavering dedication to each other. Their opponents are in awe of this, but still too in thrall to efficiency to try it.
但他们发现，回来之后，球员们更加忠诚、团队关系更坚固了。而现在，当他们在球场上面临令人难以置信的压力时，他们能做到经理所说的“镇静”——一种彼此间坚定不移、毫不动摇的奉献精神。他们的对手对此感到敬畏，但又太被效率所束缚而不敢尝试这种方式。
At a London tech company, Verve, the CEO measures just about everything that moves, but she couldn't find anything that made any difference to the company's productivity.
伦敦有一家名叫沃吾（Verve）的科技公司，他们的首席执行官量化了一切工作量，但她找不到对公司生产力产生关键影响的东西。
So she devised an experiment that she calls "Love Week": a whole week where each employee has to look for really clever, helpful, imaginative things that a counterpart does, call it out and celebrate it.
因此，她设计了一个她称之为“爱之周”的实验：整整一周，每个员工必须寻找队友所做的非常聪明、有益、富有想象力的事情，说出来，并赞美它。
It takes a huge amount of time and effort; lots of people would call it distracting. But it really energizes the business and makes the whole company more productive.
这需要大量的时间和精力；很多人会称它分散注意力。但它确实为企业注入了活力，使整个公司的生产力大幅提高。
Preparedness, coalition-building, imagination, experiments, bravery -- in an unpredictable age, these are tremendous sources of resilience and strength. They aren't efficient, but they give us limitless capacity for adaptation, variation and invention. And the less we know about the future, the more we're going to need these tremendous sources of human, messy, unpredictable skills.
准备就绪、联盟建设、想象力、实验、勇气——在不可预测的时代，这些都是坚韧和力量的巨大来源。虽然它们的效率不高，但它们为我们提供了无限的适应、变化和创新能力。我们对未来的了解越少，就会越需要这些人类所拥有的杂乱的、不可预测的技能的巨大来源。
But in our growing dependence on technology, we're asset-stripping those skills. Every time we use technology to nudge us through a decision or a choice or to interpret how somebody's feeling or to guide us through a conversation, we outsource to a machine what we could, can do ourselves, and it's an expensive trade-off. The more we let machines think for us, the less we can think for ourselves. The more --
但是，随着对技术的日益依赖，我们正在削减这些技能。每次我们使用科技来推动做出决定或选择时、或者用科技来解读人的感受、或用科技引导我们完成对话时，我们是在将本来应该自己做而且能做的事情外包给机器去完成，这是一项昂贵的交换。让机器为我们思考得越多，我们就越不能为自己思考。越多的——
The more time doctors spend staring at digital medical records, the less time they spend looking at their patients. The more we use parenting apps, the less we know our kids.
医生看数字医疗记录的时间越多，他们用来问诊病人的时间就会越少。育儿应用程序用得越多，我们对孩子的了解就会越少。
The more time we spend with people that we're predicted and programmed to like, the less we can connect with people who are different from ourselves. And the less compassion we need, the less compassion we have.
花费在预测我们会喜欢，或计划喜欢的人的时间越长，我们就越不会和与自己不同的人联系。我们需要的同情越少，我们的同情心就会越少。
What all of these technologies attempt to do is to force-fit a standardized model of a predictable reality onto a world that is infinitely surprising. What gets left out? Anything that can't be measured -- which is just about everything that counts.
所有这些科技都在试图用可预测现实的标准化模型去强制适应一个给你无限惊喜的世界。我们遗漏了什么？我们遗漏了所有无法衡量的东西——几乎都是非常重要的东西。
Our growing dependence on technology risks us becoming less skilled, more vulnerable to the deep and growing complexity of the real world.
我们对科技的日益依赖使我们面临自身技能变差的风险，使我们更容易受到深层和日益复杂的现实世界的影响。
Now, as I was thinking about the extremes of stress and turbulence that we know we will have to confront, I went and I talked to a number of chief executives whose own businesses had gone through existential crises, when they teetered on the brink of collapse.
当我想到我们必须面对的极端压力和动荡时，我曾找过一些首席执行官谈话，他们自己的企业都经历过生存危机，那时他们曾濒临崩溃的边缘。
These were frank, gut-wrenching conversations. Many men wept just remembering. So I asked them: "What kept you going through this?"
这些是坦诚而痛苦的对话，很多男子汉回顾往事都不禁潸然泪下。我问他们：“是什么让你克服了危机？”
And they all had exactly the same answer. "It wasn't data or technology," they said. "It was my friends and my colleagues who kept me going."
他们都有完全相同的答案。“不是数据或科技，”他们说。“而是我的朋友和同事们支持着我继续前进。”
One added, "It was pretty much the opposite of the gig economy."
其中一位补充说：“这与临时工性质完全相反。”
But then I went and I talked to a group of young, rising executives, and I asked them, "Who are your friends at work?" And they just looked blank.
后来我又去和一群年轻新晋高管交谈，我问他们：“工作中有谁是你朋友吗？”他们看起来很困惑，
"There's no time."
“没时间交朋友。”
"They're too busy."
“他们太忙了。”
"It's not efficient."
“交朋友效率低下。”
Who, I wondered, is going to give them imagination and stamina and bravery when the storms come?
我想知道的是，当暴风雨来临时，谁去赋予他们想象力、毅力和勇气呢？
Anyone who tries to tell you that they know the future is just trying to own it, a spurious kind of manifest destiny. The harder, deeper truth is that the future is uncharted, that we can't map it till we get there.
任何试图告诉你他们知道未来的人，他们只是试图拥有未来，这是一种虚假的天定命运。更难、更深刻的事实是，未来是未知的，在它来临前，根本无法知晓。
But that's OK, because we have so much imagination -- if we use it. We have deep talents of inventiveness and exploration -- if we apply them. We are brave enough to invent things we've never seen before. Lose those skills, and we are adrift. But hone and develop them, we can make any future we choose.
但那没关系，因为我们有很多想象力——如果我们肯去想象的话。我们有创造和探索的深厚才能——如果我们肯应用这些才能的话。我们足够勇敢去发明以前从未见过的东西，同样，要是失去这些技能，我们只能随波逐流。但是，磨练和发展这些技能，我们就可以创造出我们选择的任何未来。
Thank you.
谢谢！
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