Phil Balagtas

Phil Balagtas is a design leader, strategist and futurist based in Barcelona, Spain. He has over 20 years of experience designing digital products, services and strategies for a variety of devices and platforms for business operations (B2B) and customer-centric (B2C) solutions. Within the last decade he has served as Design Director for General Electric’s Digital Aviation group and an Experience Design Director at McKinsey & Company working across industries such as airlines, retail, hospitality, utilities, oil and gas, transportation, nonprofits and government institutions. As a thought leader, facilitator, and design and futures expert, he has worked closely with Fortune 500 companies to transform their operations, enhance their digital services, and build more innovative and responsible products for the future. He is also the founder of the Design Futures Initiative, a nonprofit dedicated to the advancement and education of Futures Thinking and a global community of chapters in over 90 cities. Today he is a professor of research and Futures Thinking at Elisava University in Barcelona, Spain for the Masters in Innovation and Design program. He leads his own Futures Thinking consulting and training firm called HABITAT working with public and private sector organizations.