There’s no such thing as a “typical day” for social mood researcher Leena Ilmola, whose chance meeting with John Casti led to a collaboration that has produced groundbreaking work for governments around the world.
History is riddled with unintentional encounters that ignited major developments: from Watson and Crick to Lennon and McCartney, a happenstance rendezvous can spark substantial progress.
In a moment that could be pulled straight from a sitcom, researcher Leena Ilmola describes how she met John Casti:
I had done a lot of foresight and qualitative research earlier and developed some tools for that. I had an opportunity to do a major study about globalization for a global futures forum in which I used one of John Casti’s frameworks related to social mood. It happened to be that he was sitting in the audience — luckily I didn’t know that beforehand! So that was how our collaboration started.
Ms. Ilmola will speak at the Socionomics Summit in Atlanta on Saturday, April 14 to share the latest results from the social mood research that she and Casti are conducting. She says:
We have established a new research institution called The X- Center, dedicated to extreme events, anticipation of external shocks, and for social mood studies.
What we have learned is that social resilience is really an important resource for the national economy and national competitiveness…I have to say, this work we are doing is really fascinating.
At the Socionomics Summit, I will discuss qualitative methods, because most of the audience (especially researchers and analysts) who are attending are experts in the quantitative area. But what I have done is work with qualitative means. I will present the results of a pilot study we made for Finland about social mood, and especially about our social mood indicator.
Ilmola has several projects in the works for policymakers in Finland, Scotland, and South Korea; (read her bio here>>), and she promises to discuss details about her cutting-edge approach.
She joins 11 other speakers from around the world to present the latest in social mood research at the upcoming Social Mood Summit at the Georgia Tech Conference Center this weekend.
The one-day event is your opportunity to meet like-minded attendees and mingle with the accomplished presenters. Experience engaging presentations at an invigorating pace, and take advantage of your chance to participate in live Q&A sessions with speakers.
Time is running out — there are only a few days left to reserve your seat to the 2012 event.
