W: Mr. Saffo, you’ve been called a "futurist," but you say you hate that term. Talk about that.M: Mm I dislike the term because it’s not an accurate description of what I do. For me, futurists are people who’re excited about the future. They usually have an agenda of some sort. But what I am is something more boring. That is, I just forecast, I don’t predict. I am a technology forecaster, and I spend most of my time looking at electronic technologies. So, I’m looking at information technology very largely, and typically out 5 to 10 years, sometimes as long as 30 years, depending on the project.W: who pays you to de this Do you work for companies who need this informationM: The Institute for the Future is a non-profit foundation that does work for private companies and government agencies. A whole variety of different folks pay us to help them understand things, and we also do free work. Being a non-profit foundation, our basic mission is to encourage people to think systematically about the long-range future. The heart of what we try to do is convince people that it is a meaningful exercise to think systematically about the long range future.W: What are the personal qualities that make you good at what you doM: Mm, curiosity, er, what else Being flexible. Because forecasting is really nothing more than applying common sense. The qualities that make for a good forecaster are the same qualities that make one successful in anything—being flexible, being curious, and being open to change.W: You’ve mentioned that your organization wants to stay small, whyM: It has to do with community. Our unit of work is the team, and you need to have high levels of trust and cooperation among team members. People need to really like and trust each other. The Institute believes that to think systematically about the long-range future is().