We’re all time travelers into the future and we cannot predict what will happen. Looking out from the present moment, we can see that many futures are possible. Where would you like to arrive? If you want to be ready for the future(s) – join our Foresight & Futures community.
Strategic Foresight & Futures
Strategic Foresight is the practice of identifying, analyzing, and anticipating future trends, uncertainties, and opportunities that may impact an organization’s strategy.
You can use a variety of tools, such as scenario planning, trend analysis, and the three horizons of change. When you understand possible futures you can make informed decisions about the present.
Strategic Foresight helps organizations prepare for uncertainty, improve their resilience, and gain competitive advantage by staying ahead of changes.
Foresight learns from Futures studies: the academic, interdisciplinary exploration of possible, probable, and preferred futures as well as the worldviews that underlie them.
Next to Foresight at work, becoming aware of possible futures as a person increases your preparedness, resilience, and agility. The UNESCO has deemed “futures literacy” one of the most important individual capabilities for the 21st century. This entails improving your skills to use and imagine multiple futures for different purposes and in different contexts. You can become an agent for a future where you want to live and work.
Why does Strategic Foresight matter?
- There are multiple futures, or possible options. We can’t be sure of what happens until “the” future happens and becomes the present.
- Our world is non-linear, so we might be overwhelmed and unprepared if we’re not aware of this.
- We need a systems-thinking approach as many factors interact in complex ways to create surprising futures.
- It’s wise to challenge mental models and replace obsolete assumptions about the futures so we can anticipate and prepare.
- We can learn more about the present through the lens of the futures, instead of limiting the futures from the perspective of the present.
- We need to adapt our strategies as we see changes coming: this goes for both people and organizations! Increase your preparedness, resilience, and agility.
Prepared organizations outperform the others
Researchers at the Aarhus BSS Strategic Foresight Research Network (SFRN) developed a model that empirically evaluates a firm’s future preparedness. Their research (2018) indicates that future preparedness is a powerful predictor for organizations in becoming an outperformer in their industry.
Futures-prepared firms turned out to be 33% more profitable than the average. The researchers suggest that “many firms are not future-prepared to the right level for the pace of change in and around their industry”. How prepared is your organization? How ready are you, as a person and as a professional?
Why start now?
- Ecology: The climate and biodiversity crises
- Geopolitics: New wars and tensions
- Politics: The breakdown of the social contract
- Technology: The accelerating digital storm
- Economy: Economic stress and transformation
- Urban: Massive demographic transformation ahead
- Culture: Social fractures caused by acceleration, fake truths, and bubbles
The poly-crisis
Organizations and people are searching for effective responses to this poly-crisis. How will this affect your strategy and goals? How will this impact your life?
We see automatic responses like fear, anger, grief, worry, or denial while several systems are starting to falter.
- Some wait until “they” fix it.
- Some blame “the system”.
- Some accuse “the others”.
Are you looking forward to the future?
Many people dread it.
Many organizations hang on to the status quo as long as they can.
Meanwhile, the future that will come true depends on what we’re doing today.
Who are we?
We are Marcella Bremer (consultant, author, and former top-30 global culture guru) and Marcel Lamers (coach, tech-wizard). We’ve worked on organizational development, leadership, and culture for almost 30 years. We founded OCAI online (the online organizational culture assessment, © Kim S. Cameron), the Positive Culture Academy, and the former Leadership & Change Magazine.
Strategic Foresight and strategy were always part of our consulting work: where does an organization want to go? What do you need to learn to thrive in the preferred future state? What to change? How to lead and develop a learning, agile culture?
We help people and organizations explore, envision, prepare, and create a livable future.
As the poly-crisis deepens, we need to explore the futures, prepare for change, and envision and create a future where we want to live and work.
The Foresight & Futures community is the learning space we co-create with you.
We want to see a world where people and organizations envision their future options, and where they prepare and learn to co-create the future they prefer. We believe:
- We have to go through a transition of systems, thinking, and doing
- That there’s a livable future if we make a successful transition
- In exploring possible futures to prepare ourselves for change
- In learning foresight & change theory and tools
- In upgrading our resilience and agility
- In bridging differences and finding what we have in common
- In crafting a shared, actionable vision
- In co-creating a livable future by taking action and contributing!
Are you ready for the futures?
Join the Foresight & Futures community when:- You want to feel ready for possible futures
- Your organization or client organization needs to prepare for possible futures.
- You want to upgrade your knowledge and skills in foresight, resilience, and change.
- Your organization or client organization needs to develop resilience and agility.
- You want to learn from and with others and other organizations
- You are a leader, consultant, coach, or team member
What is the free Foresight & Futures community?
- Become a member and get access to the member area
- Learn from a collection of short videos, articles, and some exercises
- Stay updated on the futures
What is the paid Foresight & Futures community?
- Become a member and meet the others in the member area
- Learn from in-depth videos, articles, and a toolkit of exercises
- Stay updated on the futures
- Apply futures thinking, and more tools and skills to your (organization’s) situation.
- Join the group video call every Thursday to tap into our collective wisdom.
- Learn from each other’s cases and advice
- Get help with your projects
- The more you engage the more you get out of this group!
- We engage with the topics and the community
- We’re respectful and open to new ideas
- We stay for a minimum of 6 months to develop supportive relationships
- We keep the dialogues in the community confidential
- We’re willing to share our ideas, cases, questions, and more
- We co-create a safe learning culture in the community
- We co-create more topics as we evolve
Strategic Foresight & Futures topics
Let’s learn more about the topics below. We’ll add more content on a regular basis.
Understanding the present poly-crisis
The current mega-trends
The big uncertainties
Detecting thinking biases
Systems thinking and change
Futures theory and tools
Working with scenarios
Preparing for turbulence
Organizational resilience and learning
Personal preparation
When do we start?
We’re currently preparing the content and building the member area. Send us an email and we’ll let you know when we open the Foresight & Futures community!