Flagship method / 01
Threat and opportunity forecasting
A structured process that takes a leadership team ten years into the future, gets specific about what it finds there, and works backwards to the decisions and indicators that matter now.
Two applications. Fault Line looks at what could break. Frontier looks at what could open up. Most organizations need both, and most start with the second.
10 YEARS
CLASS OF FUTURES
8 YEARS
EARLY COMMITMENTS
4 YEARS
CAPABILITY MOVES
NOW
DECIDE
Work backwards / act forwards
Application / Opportunity
What valuable future could become possible, and what should you do now to help create it?
Frontier is the opportunity application of Futures to Action. It identifies a positive future and asks how the business positions itself to be there when it arrives.
Robotics is one possible frontier. The upside of quantum computing is another. The method works from the question the organization needs to answer.
Application / Risk
What could break something you value, and what should you do before it does?
A fault line is the thing inside an organization, or across a sector, that could impose serious risk later. Fault Line finds them and plans for them. It is resilience planning.
If the fault line cracks, the thinking is already done. You understand the risk, you have found ways to mitigate it, and you are not meeting the problem for the first time on the day it arrives.
Method / 08 coordinates
01 / Frame
Everything depends on it. Not a topic, a question.
02 / Develop
Relevant experience is brought into the forecast before the room starts building futures.
03 / Develop
Drawn from social, political, economic, military and technical trends.
04 / Develop
Ten years is the sweet spot. It is past what people can comfortably picture, which is the point.
05 / Develop
The future becomes specific enough to examine, question and use.
06 / Develop
The hidden condition, force or change that makes the scenario consequential.
07 / Develop
What should be done now, in four years, in eight?
08 / Watch
Observable signals that show which class of futures is starting to arrive.
The room
A future arrives at a whole organization. A room drawn from one function will miss much of what matters, so the strongest work brings different forms of judgment together.
Output / Action
01
Specific enough to examine, challenge and use.
02
Observable signals showing which future is beginning to form.
03
A short list worth taking regardless of which scenario arrives.
Next question / Now
Contact / 01
Tell me what you are working on and I will tell you whether I can help.