Thursday evening Dan Pink, author of A Whole New Mind and Free Agent Nation, gave a rocking presentation at IDEO in Palo Alto.

“The last few decades have belonged to a certain kind of person with a certain kind of mind – computer programmers who could crank code, lawyers who could craft contracts, MBAs who could crunch numbers. But the keys to the kingdom are changing hands. The future belongs to a very different kind of person with a very different kind of mind – creators and empathizers, pattern recognizers and meaning makers. These people – artists, inventors, designers, storytellers, caregivers, consolers, big picture thinkers – will now reap society’s richest rewards and share its greatest joys."

Creator, empathizer, artist, inventor, designer, big picture thinker: that's my self-image. That's why the counselors at Harvard B-School told me, "You're not like the other MBA students. You're smarter but you think entirely differently." If Dan has this right, little wonder that I had a quarter-century of discomfort in my career until I found my groove five or six years ago -- I was born thirty years ahead of my time.

"We are moving from an economy and society built on the logical, linear, computer-like capabilities of the Information Age to an economy and a society built on the inventive, empathic, big picture capabilities of what’s rising in its place, the Conceptual Age. A Whole New Mind is for anyone who wants to survive and thrive in this emerging world – people uneasy in their careers and dissatisfied with their lives, entrepreneurs and business leaders eager to stay ahead of the next wave, parents who want to equip their children for the future, and the legions of emotionally astute and creatively adroit people whose distinctive abilities the Information Age has often overlooked and undervalued."

What's going to be important in the Conceptual Age?

• Design
• Story
• Orchestration
• Empathy
• Play
• Meaning

Hanging chad. The Sputnik-level consciousness-raiser: bad design gets the wrong guy elected president. "We all must be designers."

Dan's daughter inquires about "story," asking why everything at Whole Foods comes from a family farm.

Dan, soon to catch the red-eye back East. I've already Amazon'd my copy of A Whole New Mind.

Hooray for the Right Brain!

Dan's blog.

Revenge of the Right Brain (Wired)