September 11, 2025
Futurist, businessman, and global speaker Daniel Burrus spoke at the Ethel Brownstone Center for the Arts at Pearl River Community College on Tuesday, Sept. 9. The presentation educated and motivated the students and community members in attendance. He shared a few of his approaches to predicting trends and explored the role Artificial Intelligence (AI) can play. Prior to the main event, Burrus spent time with Dr. William Lewis Honors Institute students for a Q&A session.
The Honors Institute Lyceum Lecture Series seeks to host speakers who engage, challenge, provoke, and change lives. A generous sponsorship from the Lower Pearl River Valley Foundation makes hosting high-caliber speakers possible.
“Mr. Burrus challenged our students to create, innovate, and most importantly, be extraordinary,” said Executive Vice President for Planning and Accreditation/Dean of Honors Institute Jennifer Seal. “He went on to explain the difference between success and significance, encouraging students to choose significance because it affords the opportunity to positively affect others.
“We are thankful for the generous sponsorship of the Lower Pearl River Valley Foundation which makes a quality Lyceum Lecture Series possible.”
Honors Institute Q&A
Burrus began the Q&A by walking students through a brief tour of his life trajectory. This began with his time as an undergraduate student looking for a way to be more extraordinary than his peers to his current role as a consultant and speaker for global companies. He also wove in stories of different things he spent time learning as part of his quest to learn one new thing (e.g., making movies) each year.
“Most people never tap into all the things there are,” said Burrus. “I want to strengthen and dimensionalize the future you. Extraordinary people are not born. They choose to be extraordinary every day.”
Honors students were treated to a brainstorming session by Burrus as he walked through potential innovations that would tie with hard trends and needs that could arise from them. He specifically talked about aging Baby Boomers, sharing the fact that an average of 10,000 people in the United States turn 70 years old every day.
“Lots of future facts create opportunities,” said Burrus. “You can make things better with plenty of room for us to find solutions.
“You can do more than you think. It’s about managing your time. The calendar is my most important piece of software. Things don’t get done if I don’t put it in.”
Austin Lucas-Aultman, a freshman from Sumrall and a member of the Honors Institute on the Forrest County Campus, is a pre-engineering major.
“Mr. Burrus’ presentation makes you think of yourself,” said Lucas-Aultman. “The presentations were very mindset-oriented. He encouraged us to start thinking about yourself today, yourself in the future, and how they both are affected by each other.”
Lucas-Aultman is one of several honors students who are not active users of AI.
“He got me thinking about all the opportunities that using AI can bring and all the shortcuts you can get from it,” said Lucas-Aultman.
Main Presentation
With the Brownstone main floor holding hundreds of students, Burrus dove into his presentation titled, “Anticipatory Leadership: Using Hard Trends and AI to Accelerate Innovation & Growth.” He launched with the idea that the students can view school as a place where they discover their future selves. While taking classes, they can think about the opportunities available to them and areas they might explore.
“How you view the future affects how you act in the present,” said Burrus. “Adopt an anticipatory mindset instead of a reactionary one. Start with the certainty as that leads to confidence.”
Burrus spent time teaching the process he uses for predicting trends. Hard trends are ones that can become a pathway to innovation. Soft trends are based on assumptions that may no longer be valid. Burrus sprinkled in examples of each and how there are three main hard trend categories: demographics, government regulation, and technology.
AI was mentioned as a new technology that is here to stay. He shared how a human using AI can be better than either AI or a human on their own. We can choose to use the technology for good and improve lives, allowing us to focus on higher levels of thinking instead of memorizing facts.
“Impossibility is a mindset,” said Burrus. “A change in mindset changes your life. Sometimes the right question can lead to amazing things.”
He closed the evening encouraging the audience to consider what are hard trends and how they can use that knowledge to move forward in life.
“Live a significant life,” said Burrus. “It will be all about others, yet ends up creating more success than if you focused on a successful life.”
Nick Smith, a freshman from Hattiesburg and a member of the Honors Institute on the Poplarville Campus, is studying English with a career goal of teaching. With dual credits earned in high school and a full course load, Smith plans to graduate from PRCC in one year.
“I was really interested in the beginning of his talk,” said Smith. “His accomplishments are very impressive. He was very compelling when encouraging us to think of things ahead of time and make predictions.”
About Daniel Burrus
Burrus is considered one of the world’s leading futurists on global trends and disruptive innovation who, over the past thirty years, has established a worldwide reputation for his exceptional record of accurately predicting the future of technology-driven change and its direct impact on business and the military.
He is a founding member of the Department of Defense Joint Service Provider Futures Group, and serves as a strategic advisor to top executives from Fortune 500 companies. His client roster includes the Department of Defense, Lockheed Martin, Raytheon, Leidos, Microsoft, and Google, among others. He works with leaders to develop game-changing strategies using his proven methodologies for anticipating and capitalizing on technological innovation.
A recognized thought leader in Al and other strategic technologies, Burrus has been consistently ranked among the top experts in the field. He is the author of seven books, including Flash Foresight, a New York Times and Wall Street Journal bestseller, as well as his latest bestseller, The Anticipatory Organization. The New York Times has also named him one of the top three business gurus.
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Article and photography by Laura O’Neill.
