From the second chapter of "Thinking about the Future," a book co-edited by Social Technologies' Andy Hines and futurist Peter Bishop, comes this entry: ADOPT A GLOBAL PERSPECTIVE

Here's why: Strategic foresight needs to consider what is happening in other parts of the world. No situation or system is immune to events and forces elsewhere. Consider changes around the world and how they relate to the client’s overall business as well as to the issue under study. Thinking about the rest of the world should be prominent in research, analysis, or discussion--literally in all aspects of an activity. Modeling this thinking approach will influence colleagues and collaborators to think this way as well.

Key steps: There is no single way to embrace a global perspective. But it is critical to build one into processes specific both to the work and to the larger organizational culture. Ways to do this include:

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Since 2007, we've been publishing segments from the first chapter on FRAMING from "Thinking about the Future," a book co-edited by Social Technologies' Andy Hines and futurist Peter Bishop.

May 6 marked the final entry from that chapter, and today begins the next section of the book on SCANNING, which Hines defines as “Breadth + Depth = Foresight with Insight.” 

Hines explains the concept ike this:

Once the team is clear about the boundaries and scope of an activity, it begins to scan the internal and external environments for information and trends relating to the issue at hand. Internally, the team wants to learn the organization’s experience with the issue. Externally, the team immerses itself in what’s going on regarding the issue. The goal is to come up with a mix of basic driving forces that suggest the most likely future, and some insight into potential change-drivers that may lead to alternative future outcomes. In scanning parlance, this involves identifying the macro-trends that will form the basis of the baseline forecast (or “most likely future”) and the weak signals that may portend discontinuities that drive alternative futures.

Recent advances in the art of environmental scanning have emphasized the need to go beyond the strictly empirical and incorporate more intuitive sources of information. Related to this is an emphasis on expanding the breadth and depth of the scanning activity to include a wider range of sources and to probe more deeply into their potential implications for the activity. It’s less about finding a piece of information that no one else can find--since information is so freely available--and more about understanding and acting upon that information more quickly and creatively than competitors.

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From Andy Hines and Peter Bishop's book, Thinking About the Future, comes this advice: focus on outcomes, not outputs.

Every organization has a mission to reach certain outcomes--for which society, through its external stakeholders, provides resources and holds it accountable. In fulfilling its mission, the organization engages in activities that produce outputs or results.

Outcomes can be clearly and obviously good in themselves. In the case of schools, this would be student learning. With such outcomes, no one has to ask, “What is that good for?” These are the ultimate purpose of the organization.

Outputs, on the other hand, are the tangible results of the organization’s activities, but they require justification in terms of a higher purpose (the outcomes). They are not intrinsically understood as goals in themselves. An output for schools would be the number of students graduated. While graduation is clearly good, it is a result of the students having learned enough to earn the graduation and be prepared for the next step in their lives.

Analysts need to keep the higher purpose--the outcomes--firmly in mind throughout the activity, to ensure relevant and actionable outputs that truly benefit the client.

Key steps: One approach to focusing on outcomes is to take a step back and question the very existence of the organization. Most people take the value of their organization for granted; for them, it is such an obviously good thing that no one can question it. But question it they should: “Just why are we here?”

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From Andy Hines and Peter Bishop's book, Thinking About the Future, comes this advice: encourage experiments and prototypes.

There is no single best approach to preparing organizations for the future. Choosing the right approach requires getting a sense of all the options--which in turn can be generated by experiments and prototypes.

Key steps:  Ways to encourage experimentation and prototyping are legion. Creativity guru Edward de Bono (1996) recommends first acknowledging that the way things are currently done in the organization is just one way. The current approach may have been the best at the time it was implemented, but circumstances change with time. There is always the opportunity to rethink how things could be done better.

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From Andy Hines and Peter Bishop's book, Thinking About the Future, comes this advice: Create an environment conducive to open an uninhibited thinking.

Strategic foresight requires creative and innovative thinking, which is best stimulated in an environment of openness. The ideal physical space is open, comfortable, and full of stimulus, encouraging the free flow of ideas, risk-taking, and out-of-the-box thinking.

Key steps: Choosing a physical space can be straightforward. In the best case, creativity-inducing spaces will be widely available. Some organizations set up dedicated creativity or ideation spaces. Others have futures rooms, e.g., General Motors and Alticor. Some hire outside experts in creative-space design to customize a venue. In the more usual case, analysts will either have to search for or create the space they need. A space that is a bit isolated, away from the daily hubbub, is advisable. Often, some unused, less-desirable space can be claimed and revamped. One optimal solution is a war room--a dedicated space where team members can congregate and work together for the duration of an activity. They can customize the room to the needs of the activity. Most end up covering the walls with relevant charts, graphs, diagrams, or useful stimuli.

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From Andy Hines and Peter Bishop's book, Thinking About the Future, comes this advice: Include people who do not agree.

Disagreements arise from two sources--differences in information and knowledge and differences over fundamental assumptions or values. Both are important sources of new learning. Including people with access to different information expands the pool of ideas to draw upon. Including people with different assumptions or values expands the range of perspectives that can be accessed. Including both lessens the chances of overlooking a key piece of information or making an assumption that will be at odds with the organization’s value system.

Key steps: The purpose of involving people who disagree is to enable the best possible decision-making. Therefore, include people who can express dissenting views yet work towards a common objective. The first step is to establish an atmosphere in which legitimate disagreements are allowed to flourish, as long as they are confined to the objective at hand. Make it clear that the disagreement is being carried on within the context of a specific objective and timeframe, in order to make the ultimate decision more robust.

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From Andy Hines and Peter Bishop's book, Thinking About the Future, comes this advice: Make strategic foresight as immersive and interactive as possible.

Strategic foresight can tend to be esoteric or intellectual. It involves a lot of conceptual and strategic thinking. It emphasizes future possibilities and what they mean for the present. If the analyst is not careful, it can remain abstract and impractical. A solution is to make the activity immersive and interactive. In other words, make the conceptual and abstract as tangible and concrete as possible. Have participants “get their hands dirty” in order to get to concrete possibilities.

Key steps:  Once the team is set, the choices made early about how to conduct the activity will set the tone for the rest of the activity. A team-building activity early on, for example, sets the tone of participation. Frequent updates and communication sessions will also build in the wide variety of perspectives essential to strategic foresight. Setting a regular communications schedule and keeping to it is a way of keeping participants updated and involved, which in turn increases the likelihood they will be fully engaged.

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From Andy Hines and Peter Bishop's book, Thinking About the Future, comes this advice: Recognize that Strategic Foresight is a Team Sport

A strategic foresight activity will benefit more if it gathers input from a team than from individuals. An interacting team provides diverse perspectives and enriches both the quality and quantity of the ideas considered.

A typical strategic foresight activity involves, from the very beginning, a core team that remains together throughout. The core team should include representatives from key stakeholder groups where practical, and can be enhanced by adding temporary members depending on the activity’s status and what kinds of expertise are needed. Thus, the size and composition of the team will likely fluctuate as the activity progresses, with the core members keeping the key learning intact.

Key steps: An initial consideration in putting together a team is the right size. Research by Richard Hackman (2002) suggests that for a core team, no more than six members are optimal. Once it grows beyond six, the productivity of the group begins to decline. Large groups are not well-suited to reaching closure and delivering an end product. Moreover, since individual contributions are usually less well-recognized in a large group, many people will not see the value of investing their time and effort in the activity if the group is too large. It is best to add and subtract people on an ad-hoc basis.

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From Andy Hines and Peter Bishop's book, Thinking About the Future, comes this advice: Work in multiple time horizons.

Opportunities or challenges in strategic foresight are typically complex. They need to be studied from different perspectives and viewpoints, including their evolution over time. Thinking through the time perspective will bring richness and depth to the activity and could lead to insights that would escape a more traditional “snapshot” approach.

Opportunities or challenges in strategic foresight are typically complex. They need to be studied from different perspectives and viewpoints, including their evolution over time. Thinking through the time perspective will bring richness and depth to the activity and could lead to insights that would escape a more traditional “snapshot” approach.

The timeframe should be negotiated with sponsors as part of the initial chartering in order to properly manage expectations. In most cases, analysts will want to look further into the future than the organization does. Analysts are usually more comfortable with a longer timeframe, and more skilled at identifying the longer-term possibilities and their implications for decision-making today. The organization, however, will often be skeptical of the long view and seek to shorten the timeframe.

Key steps: One way to allay concerns about the long-term timeframe is to talk about the time ecology of the issue: how issues change over time. Effective strategic foresight is not simply a matter of studying the present and/ or the long-term future; it also means studying the issue at points along the way. Different issues are embedded in different systems, which in turn have different relevant timeframes. The computer chip industry, for example, operates on a far more compressed timeframe than the automobile industry.

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From Andy Hines and Peter Bishop's book, Thinking About the Future, comes this advice: define objectives that can be measured.

Strategic objectives entail bringing a greater understanding of the future to bear on current decisions. Often, they can turn into something of a fishing expedition, looking for possibilities, opportunities, or threats. Even in cases where the objectives are very broad, it is possible to set criteria that can be used to guide decisions and evaluate success. An activity that looks to identify opportunities, for example, could include a criterion that at least twenty-five opportunities will be identified.

The objectives and criteria should be defined during the initial chartering process with sponsors. Since defining objectives and criteria can be a complex process, it is not always possible to accomplish it in one meeting. It usually takes some back-and-forth discussion. Even after the objectives and criteria are agreed upon, the team should remain open to adjusting them during the process based on what they learn. Any proposed changes should be brought to the attention of the sponsors and negotiated with them.

Key steps: The objectives of a foresight activity can be defined in several ways. Hines (2003) suggests that, to choose the best approach, analysts need to first understand that there are three different kinds of foresight activities. Each has its own set of appropriate foresight tools--and its own set of traps:

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From Andy Hines and Peter Bishop's book, Thinking About the Future, comes this advice: be skeptical of the diagnosis the organization provides. Executives often feel they need to speak with certainty about issues on which they may not truly be authorities.

Furthermore, the organization’s own diagnosis can be a hindrance to defining the focal issue because the “presented” problem may be more acceptable to the organization than the real problem. For example, it may be more politically palatable to blame onerous regulations for a problem than the ineffectiveness of the management team.

Key steps: The first step is to question reality as perceived. The reality that counts is that of the decision-maker who can turn thumbs up or thumbs down on the results of the activity. Questioning this person’s perceived reality may suggest a different problem statement.

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From Andy Hines and Peter Bishop's book, Thinking About the Future, comes this advice: balance exploration with exploitation. This is from the chapter entitled "Understand the Rationale and Purpose," and is important to the framing phase of the six phases of strategic foresight: framing, scanning, forecasting, visioning, planning, and acting.

Here's why: Analysts need to help organizations account for both the near-term and longer-term effects of a decision. It is tempting for organizations to spend a lot of time strategizing, hypothesizing, and engaging in the “blue-sky” thinking of exploration. Alternatively, it is easy for organizations to get mired in day-to-day crisis management. Exploration is associated with the longer term; exploitation with the now. Balancing exploration and exploitation is essential for the analyst, since the two kinds of thinking feed one another and impact each other’s success.

Key steps: There are a number of ways to incorporate balanced thinking into day-to-day activities.

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From Andy Hines and Peter Bishop's book, Thinking About the Future, comes this advice: Seek to improve the mental model of decision-makers. This is the next step in the chapter entitled "Understand the Rationale and Purpose," and is important to the framing phase of the six phases of strategic foresight: framing, scanning, forecasting, visioning, planning, and acting.

Here's why: Mental models are the deeply ingrained assumptions, generalizations, or images that influence how one makes sense of and responds to the world. They are usually biased towards the past, and are often vague or based on faulty assumptions about the future. The mental models of key decision-makers should be assessed as early as possible in a strategic foresight activity--and continually reassessed. The aim, according to Wack (1984), “is to change the decision maker’s assumptions about how the world works and compel him to change his image of reality.”

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From Andy Hines and Peter Bishop's book, Thinking About the Future, comes this advice: Explore the future to influence the present. This is the first step in the chapter entitled "Understand the Rationale and Purpose," and is important to the framing phase of the six phases of strategic foresight: framing, scanning, forecasting, visioning, planning, and acting.

Here's why: The purpose of looking to the future is to understand the possibilities ahead in order to make more informed decisions in the present. Good futures work reduces the risk of being surprised or blindsided. It can build momentum towards more favorable pathways and away from unfavorable ones.

In some cases, a specific decision will clearly be the endpoint: should we invest in a new plant in a new location? In other cases, the exploration will be more open-ended and geared towards learning: is this rising market a potential new area of business for us? Even in the latter case, however, the learning must ultimately tie to a decision or action if it is to be useful. Failing to tie future insights to the present--whether for actual decisions or for learning that will eventually inform decisions--renders the activity an interesting intellectual exercise without practical value.

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From Andy Hines and Peter Bishop's book Thinking About the Future comes this advice: don't try to make clients into foresight professionals. This is important to the framing phase of the six phases of strategic foresight: framing, scanning, forecasting, visioning, planning, and acting.

Here's why: Don’t argue with the focus of clients: accommodate it. It is not necessary to make clients into foresight professionals. Too many analysts promoting strategic foresight want to reform or transform the clients they are working with. It won’t work. Most clients in organizations have a dedicated focus on their issues and areas of expertise for good reason--they are paid for it--and they stray from it at their peril.

For example: In working with a client in an international organization, it became clear that the very idea of foresight and exploring change was alien. Nearly everyone had a program-focused way of thinking. They needed to understand if a proposed program was a good idea or not, and to envision not so much its future, but its success.

One approach might have been to try to get them to explicitly explore the future of the programs in the countries they were targeting. But the client organization’s norms and culture just wouldn’t tolerate that. The consultant was literally told not to use the “F” word--future. The solution was to get the clients to explore change and future possibilities with the techniques that foresight practitioners use, including scenarios and cross-impact analysis, but to explain them as tools for broadening thinking--for better brainstorming. Feeling safe and with their norms kept intact, the organization had a powerful foresight experience.

Key steps: Rather than trying to convert clients to futures approaches, a more effective tactic is to raise awareness of the different perspectives present, with the analyst seeking to stretch the participants’ thinking. While accommodating the client’s perspective is the typical approach, some cases call for shaking up the status quo. In these cases, it is best to be upfront about the goal of trying to change perspectives, and acknowledge everyone involved.

Define roles and expectations clearly, e.g., “I see my job here as to bring in new ideas that may challenge our thinking and at least briefly shift our focus to new possibilities. I know your job is to keep an eye on your product line and your bottom line. But bear with me for a little while so we can explore some new ideas and check our assumptions about the next few years.” It may make sense to repeat this message from time to time and let clients express their views about it--or vent their frustrations, since this approach may be seen as too high-level or theoretical.

Conversely, sometimes the organization, or some members participating in the activity, will be very enthusiastic about using foresight and will push to take on roles that are best performed by the analyst. It can be difficult to maintain focus and distinguish clearly what the analyst brings to the activity and what the best interests of the organization are. The best suggestion is to acknowledge and applaud this enthusiasm. Suggest training opportunities that can be explored after the current activity is completed.

Check our ChangeWaves blog nex week for another selection from the book, on finding out ways to explore the future to influence the present.

Who should buy the book? Thinking about the Future: Guidelines for Strategic Foresight, co-edited by Social Technology’s Director of Consulting Andy Hines and University of Houston Futures Professor Peter Bishop, is an essential reference guide for executives, educators and analysts. With input from 36 senior foresight professionals, the 231-page book is a powerful tool that analyzes the six phases of strategic foresight: framing, scanning, forecasting, visioning, planning, and acting. Order your copy.