Foresight in Organizations

Methods and Tools

Patrick van der Duin

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9781317543145
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Previsioni
• Index: Business

Foresight for Organizations will acquaint the reader with various foresight methods and tools, to show the reader how these methods are used, what the pitfalls are and how the methods relate to each other. This innovative volume offers the reader the ability to carry out a study of the future by him- or herself and apply the results in a decision-making strategy process.

The author addresses the following methods: scenarios, trend analysis, the Delphi method, quantitative trend extrapolation, technology assessment, backcasting and roadmapping; the most relevant and popular methods that also cover the range of approaches from predictive, via normative to explorative. Every chapter also contains references to additional literature about the methods being discussed.

This book is essential reading for researchers, academics and students in the areas of Community Development, Sociology of organizations, Change management, Social entrepreneurship, Sustainable development and participative planning.

1
Introduction

Patrick van der Duin

Introduction

This book is meant for everyone who is interested in looking at the future. For everyone who thinks the future is important, perhaps even more important than the past. And many people are involved with the future. Whether you are a student, a civil servant at a government ministry or in a small municipality, a politician, a techno-starter or an innovation manager at a large company, for many people the future is an important playing field. This book is meant to familiarize the reader with a number of different methods that can be used to look at the future, and the tools that can be employed in doing so. And although, strictly speaking, this book is not a handbook, we do hope that, after reading this book, the reader is able to carry out a study of the future independently and to apply the results in the decisions being made. And if there are good reasons to outsource the futures study, this book is meant to provide enough information to make it possible to assess the quality and usefulness of the results of such an outsourced study.

In light of the scope of foresight, this book cannot possibly include every single method. And because the future keeps changing, new methods will doubtlessly be developed in years to come. However, we are of the opinion that we provide a good sample of the main methods available. A number of chapters also offer reading tips for those who want to know more about the method in question.

Looking at the future has a long history and, as mentioned above, almost everybody is involved with the future. Having said that, when you introduce yourself as a foresight professional or futurologist, you are often met with a suppressed snigger and a raised eyebrow. It would seem that people see looking at the future as a precarious undertaking that is reserved for present-day Don Quixotes. How can anyone take that seriously? But the raised eyebrow has to be taken seriously, because it is often followed by claims that “the future does not exist” and “it is impossible to predict the future.” Many foresight professionals agree with the former statement. The future does indeed not exist, because each person imagines and interprets the future differently. What may fill some people with hopeful optimism, may be a deeply depressing prospect to others. While some people focus on technological developments, others look at demographic shifts. Incidentally, the claim that the future does not exist as an entity is incorrect (Van der Duin, 2014). What that means is that the future may not exist as a “physical entity” (in the way that a car does), it does exist as a “social construct.” The mere fact that people think about the future and, in doing so, give direction to their decisions and actions in the present, makes the future real and relevant. And even if the prediction of the future is incorrect (which is often the case with predictions), it can still affect the actual future situation. To some extent, this is comparable to when people used to believe that the Earth was flat and were consequently afraid to venture too far out to sea, because they were scared they would fall off the edge of the world. … So what is not real has an effect on reality, in the same way that what does not yet exist has an effect on what already does exist. Or, to quote the sociologist W.I. Thomas: “If men define things as real, they are real in their consequences.” The future as a “social construct” is an important explanatory factor for the behavior of people and organizations and in that area competes with history in terms of what has the greatest effect on the present. Someone who is obsessed with and ascribes predictive powers to history will not care very much about the future. But someone who suspects that tomorrow and the day after may be different from yesterday and today, will look for inspiration in the future.

It appears that, in recent years, more and more people are interested in the future. Abrupt social changes and new disruptive technologies have made the future a lot more interesting and relevant again. And even in science, there is an increasing appreciation for knowledge about the future, to the extent that there seems to be a futuristic change from “past-oriented sciences towards primarily future-oriented ones” (Poli, 2014, p. 15), and the knowledge about the future is even necessary for survival and reproduction (Seligman et al., 2013, p. 120). And we may assume that this knowledge about the future benefits from more knowledge about methods of foresight.

Approaches to the Future

The future can be approached in different ways. Different time preferences are reflected in three different approaches to the future: predictive, explorative and normative (Vergragt and Quist, 2011; Börjeson et al., 2006). The predictive approach to the future leans heavily on historical data and projects historical patterns onto the future, while the explorative approach assumes that the future is not an automatic continuation of the past and focuses more on what could happen in the future. The normative approach to the future is dissatisfied with the current state of affairs and sees the future above all as a possibility to fix things.

These three approaches are not separate entities, but are connected cyclically (see Figure 1.1). This cyclical loop can start in the past, with, for instance, predictions about the future being based on the past (forward loop). As mentioned above, the idea people have about the future then affects their thoughts and actions in the present. On the basis of that, they often look at the past differently as well (backward loop). But the cyclical loop can also start in the future. Based on a foresight study, people’s thoughts and decisions in the present change (backward loop), after which it is possible that the past is seen in a different light. The normative approach to the future above all relates to the cyclical loop (backward and forward) between the present and the future, whereby the proposed future leads to a variety of possible roadmaps or transition trajectories that start in the present and envisage the realization of the proposed future.

Figure 1.1 The past, present and future interconnected in a cyclical way.

An example to illustrate the cyclical interaction between past, present and future is the emergence of social media like Facebook and Twitter, which can be seen as a continuation of a historical pattern, with communication becoming ever more interactive and individual. Based on that, one can think about possible future forms of (social) media. For instance, the trend called “the Internet of things” means that not only do people send tweets, but that “objects” (like cars or copy machines) also send tweets about their maintenance status or about data they need to function properly. This image of the future in turn has an impact on the present, because businesses have to think about how to incorporate these future functionalities in their existing innovation processes. Finally, the image of the future also has an impact on how people look at the history of media, not so much in the sense that modern media show us how limited media were in the past, but above all in light of the fact that the highly networked nature of the new media offers an interesting perspective for looking at the history of media. For instance, traditional media (radio, TV, newspapers) are considerably less network-oriented and based primarily on broadcasting. This way, the past, present and future are connected cyclically and thereby inextricably.

The aim of connecting the past, present and future like this is to show that the predictive, explorative and normative approaches are both separate approaches and can be connected. Having said that, the modern history of looking at the future (say, after World War II) shows a shift away from the predictive toward the explorative and the normative.

The predictive and explorative approaches tell us something about how people can approach the future and what value they attach to the extent to which “the” past is seen as shaping “the” future. These two approaches are the best known approaches, but they are complemented by the normative approach, which is not based on what the future looks like or may look like, but what one wants the future to look like. What it has in common with the explorative approach is that there is a broad variety of possible futures. Whereas, in the case of an explorative approach, there can be many imaginable futures, in the case of the normative approach, there are many imaginable futures that one wants to realize. As a result, the difference between the two approaches is that the explorative approach has no value judgment about the quality or positivity or negativity of the future vision, while the normative approach results in a predominantly positive outcome. After all, it is a future that one desires, which means that it is normative. That also establishes the link to the predictive approach, because that also has but one future. Again, the normative approach yields a positive or desirable result, while that is not necessarily the case with the predictive approach. However, an important difference between, on the one hand, the explorative and the predictive approach and, on the other hand, the normative approach, is that the first two approaches are usually future visions of the environment of the subject (in most cases an organization), while the normative approach says something about the desired state of the subject itself. This leads to (yet) another difference, namely with regard to the decision that is made on the basis of the foresight study. In the case of the explorative approach, different decisions or strategies are linked to different future visions. In the case of the predictive approach, it is very difficult to establish a link between the future vision and a possible decision, because the predicted future is fixed and can no longer be influenced. And in the case of the normative approach, there are various possible decisions or strategies, but they all have to lead to the same future vision: all roads lead to Rome. As such, the normative approach can also be seen as a mix of the explorative and predictive approaches: the singular future vision is predictive in nature and the various ways in which it can be realized matches the explorative approach.

Foresight Methods

An approach to the future is no more than an approach unless it is worked out further. Between an approach and a study of the future, and the decision or action that follows, there is a no-man’s land that needs to be worked out in greater detail. Between the approach to the future and the eventual futures study, there are various methods of foresight. It is the foresight method that makes the approach to the future concrete. The predictive approach is accompanied by a predictive method, the explorative approach is accompanied by an explorative method and the normative approach is accompanied by a normative method.

Figure 1.2 shows how the approach to the future leads to the choice of a foresight method, which then results in a futures study, on the basis of which a decision is made or action is taken. This path does not have to be linear in nature. It is quite possible that, on the basis of the preliminary results of a futures study, additional research is necessary using a different foresight method or a foresight method that is used in a somewhat different form. It is also possible to decide in advance what type of decision or action is needed. For example, if a company wants to decide in which technology it should invest, it makes more sense to use an explorative approach and method than to use the road-mapping method in which one more or less knows what the intended point in the future is.

Figure 1.2 From approach to the future, via foresight method and study, to decision or action.

Determining which approach is the right one is not all that easy. In fact, a futures study is needed to determine which approach to the future to use! After all, the assumption is that the future is so uncertain that an explorative approach is needed, is in itself a prediction, as is the notion that the future is relatively certain, which means that a predictive approach can be used. To determine which approach is valid requires a kind of pre-foresight or metaforesight. One way to determine which approach is useful is to determine the time horizon. The more distant the future under examination is, the more sense it makes to explore the future. In the shorter term, it is possible to make unequivocal statements about the future, but, in the longer term, there is too much uncertainty and it is better to include various possible futures. I think that the normative approach lies somewhere in between, because the time horizon lies also somewhere in between: a longer time horizon does not match the predictive side of the normative approach, while a shorter time horizon does not provide enough time to realize the (challenging) normative vision of the future.

In this book, we describe seven foresight methods:

1. Scenarios
2. Delphi method
3. Trend analysis
4. Technology forecasting: quantitative trend extrapolation
5. Technology assessment
6. Backcasting
7. Roadmapping.

These seven methods can be linked to the three approaches to the future: predictive, explorative and normative (see Figure 1.3). The scenario method, for example, is meant to explore the future by setting up different possible futures, while technology forecasting can be used to predict the (technological) future, and backcasting and roadmapping are normative in nature.

It is important to emphasize that one cannot argue that one foresight method is better than another, because every method has a more or less different objective. The scenario method is designed to provide different images of the future and to give an organization insight into developments and events it had not previously considered but that can be very relevant to its organization and strategy. In the case of technology forecasting, and in particular quantitative trend analysis, the aim is not to identify multiple possible images of the future, but to predict the course of a technological development.

Figure 1.3 Foresight methods on the continuum from exploring to predicting.

The criteria for the application of foresight methods vary on the basis of the type of method, which means that, when selecting a method, it is important to keep in mind what the aim of the futures study is. Scenarios are suitable for “expanding” thought patterns, while technology forecasting is suitable for gaining insight into the development of a new technology. As such, there is no one size fits all, but there is a contingency principle. That is to say that the best method has to be chosen depending on the situation. In this context, the term situation refers to the goal and application of the futures study, the available data, the type of organization and sector, the specific questions that need to be answered, etc. So the success of a method not only depends on its actual application, but also on the question whether or not the method is suitable to the specific situation.

The foresight methods listed above have been chosen because they are the methods that are being used most frequently, although there are, of course, some similarities and even overlap. As far as their popularity is concerned, the scenario method has the best score. A study conducted in 2009...