Remembering Charles Perrottet, 1944-2025

2025 begins for us on a very sad note, since we will have to carry on without a great and useful colleague, friend, and human being, Charles Perrottet, who passed away January 3. 

Charles was a founding partner of the Futures Strategy Group, bringing decades of corporate and consulting experience to us. He was also a Member of the Millennium Project Board of Directors from its beginning, and a “node” of the Project for decades (even attending a Planning Committee meeting in Monterey, Mexico in September 2024, where his indomitable character concealed his very serious medical condition from many). Charles worked closely with Ted Gordon, founder of both the Millennium Project and The Futures Group, our predecessor organization, for decades. 

Charles was one of a kind. And “kind” would have to be one of the top adjectives when describing him. “Cheerful” and “positive” as well. “Creative,” “inspiring,” “generous”… so many positive adjectives come to mind, and no negative ones.

Flash Forward

He grew up in New Jersey, where his nickname was “Flash,” not for his speed of foot, but because he enjoyed photographing every event he attended. He also took prodigiously long bicycle treks with friends across the Northeast. He went on to graduate magna cum laude from Lehigh University, where he was a member of an elite wrestling program. He served in the U.S. Army in the 1960s; this was mostly spent in Germany, after his older brother had died while flying a mission during the Vietnam War. He got an MBA from the University of Chicago and a M.Sc. from the London School of Economics, and began a two-decade career in corporate strategy (from which the Futures Strategy Group benefited enormously).

His subsequent work with Pfizer, Hasbro and Toro was particularly outstanding. Just one example: the Toro “Snow Risk” program, where buyers of Toro snowblowers were guaranteed a rebate or full refund if winter snowfall fell below certain benchmarks (the program gained Toro 22 points of market share). 

Cherished Colleague

With the Futures Group, Deloitte Consulting, and the Futures Strategy Group, as Founding Principal Peter Kennedy recalls, “Charles’ real-life corporate experience gave us a credibility with clients that some of us ‘pointy-headed academics’ could never have achieved on our own. He kept cool and calm in high-powered client engagements, and had a very natural, gentle way of handling sometimes sizable client egos.”

As well as our own. As our Founding Principal Charles Thomas says, “During internal company conversations, Charles would encourage caution by leaning back, steepling his fingers together and saying, ‘Careful.’ Just that…’Careful.’ Over the years, it became an almost trademarked contribution…one that eventually always brought a smile to all our faces. We just KNEW he was going to say it. Now, I shall have to make it part of my internal dialogue, and I’m sorry that is the case.”

Peter Kennedy recalled another Perrottet trait. “Charles, being the irrepressible optimist he was, effectively challenged us with his thoughts about what could actually go right in future scenario worlds. He would sometimes preface his point with, ‘I know this may sound Panglossian…’ But it wasn’t.  The point he was making was invariably well-reasoned. And more often than not he had identified a flaw in the group’s collective thinking. Our scenario work was all the richer for Charles’s bright, upbeat insights.” 

Robert Avila was an economist with the Futures Group in the 1990s; he recalls Charles’ thoughtful nature. “At one point in my initial interview I said something such that Charles lapsed into total silence as he mulled over in his brain what I had said.  ‘Wow,’ I thought to myself, ‘out of the park!’  What I didn’t realize was that Charles was probably the most thoughtful person I’d ever met.  He was not a man of impulse; rather, he was someone who thought carefully and deeply about all the flood of information that washed over us at TFG, even if that thought necessitated a long pause in the conversation.  If nothing else, those thoughtful pauses gave one time to prepare for the critical questions which were likely to follow.”

Sarah Stone represents the many younger people who worked with Charles in an early part of their careers, but whose memories of his influence have lasted for decades. “Charles hired me in 1993 to be a junior member of the Corporate Studies group at TFG and I am deeply grateful.  Thirty years later, I still hold that experience, and my then-colleagues, close to my heart. Charles was the glue, and ran the scenario shop with kindness and humor and a level of classiness that made us all look good. I miss those days; the memories always make me smile. Thank you, Charles.”

Lasting Impressions

His creativity did not go unnoticed by others with whom he worked. Dr. Jerome Glenn, Executive Director of the Millennium Project, said, “Charles was an excellent futurist, for the past decades working mostly on geopolitical strategy and security issues; but above all, he was a real gentleman, a great thinker, a walking encyclopedia, and a person of impeccable ethics.”

One potentially difficult scenario planning engagement was an in-house exercise with our then-parent organization, Deloitte. As former Deloitte partner Peter Dixon writes, “Charles kept his cool all the way through the work, which really reached a ‘crescendo’ in a long weekend for about 60 people in New York. His support and counsel was brilliant. Deloitte moved to become probably the best professional firm in the world in the following 25 years, and I think the work we did together gave this progress a great start.”

Dr. Liam Fahey, founder of the Leadership Forum, recalls: “Charles Perrottet was that rare individual who knew that thinking deeply and comprehensively about both the short-term and long-term future was the only way we could fully understand the current state of the world and the immediate future. Even more importantly, his thinking was always driven by raising and addressing the questions that most others avoided, and was always informed by a sharp wit. Engaging with Charles always brought me down intellectual pathways that opened my mind to new possibilities about the future. I will miss his wit and insight; the future will be less interesting in his absence.”

Alan Windsor, currently of the U.S. State Department, remarked, “Few possessed the creativity, intelligence, and genuine kindness of Charles Perrottet. He was a true gentleman, and his passion for his work was only surpassed by his love for his family. He will be missed immensely.

Tom Buckley, former FSG principal and currently chief of staff at Deloitte Consulting writes: “Charles lived youthfully, through his active mind, his challenging conventional wisdom, through his morning physical regimen, and the ease with which he broke out into laughter.  Charles had this quality even in his advanced years, and he lived as a model for those around him to live actively with vigor.  He was an inspiration to me.” 

Sam Neill, formerly of the Coast Guard, and now Senior Advisor to the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, writes, “Charles was a thought leader in an amazing team of thinkers. He shaped the way I look at things to this day. And how I react to those with different views. He was, as Alan notes, a gentleman.”

A Great Life

Charles also had a singular ability to make and keep interesting friends, which made any Perrottet gathering a real event. You never knew who you would meet – a Catholic school headmaster, a former U.S. Treasury official, a European banker, Marine Corps officers, a 91 year-old Greek lady – you name it. But you knew it would be a great party – and Charles would be on the dance floor.

And he was just such a good man. Friend, father, husband, grandfather. 

One thing that has surprisingly recurred over and over as we have been discussing our remembrances of Charles was a letter that his father wrote to him before he went to college. Charles showed it to at least five of us. It was exactly the sort of letter you would want to have received from your own father – a thoughtful rumination on the changes about to occur in Charles’ life, discussion of some options he might want to consider, an obvious pride and concern for his offspring, but no prescription of what Charles must do. There was no sense that Charles was trying to guide those of us to whom he showed this letter; perhaps it was his way of trying to show us more about himself. Amazing to think of the multi-generational effects on so many of a single letter – maybe this was the germ of his concern to help others prepare for an uncertain future. 

And Charles paid his father’s love and concern forward to his own son and daughter, of both of whom he was inordinately proud. 

As his son wrote:

“My father never told me how to live. He simply lived his life with purpose, and I learned by watching him do it. His unique blend of humility, approachability, credibility, and relentless optimism will undoubtedly be the foundation of his enduring legacy. …He once told me that as a futurist, the only thing he was absolutely certain of about the future was that death is 100% inevitable. Well, Dad – joke’s on you. You’ve been immortalized. The values, love, and lessons you left behind are alive in those who knew you best and will continue to be passed on to future generations.”

We cannot top this. 

Deepest condolences to our friend, his wife, Peggy; their daughter, Jacqueline Perrottet, startup founder of Hoopla; and their son, Colonel Michael Perrottet, USMC; as well as their grandchildren.  

And to all of us: “Careful…”