Futures Tools: Exploring Possibilities and Implications 28 August 2010 Dr. Wendy L. Schultz Director, Infinite Futures Fellow, World Futures Studies Federation Fellow, Royal Society for the Arts Scanning, Futures Wheels (basic and augmented) and Verge (Ethnographic Futures Framework) Monday, 30 August 2010
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Futures Tools: Exploring
Possibilities and Implications
28 August 2010Dr. Wendy L. SchultzDirector, Infinite Futures
Fellow, World Futures Studies FederationFellow, Royal Society for the Arts
Scanning,Futures Wheels
(basic and augmented)and
Verge(Ethnographic Futures
Framework)
Monday, 30 August 2010
local; few cases; emerging issues
3rd horizon
Mapping a trend’s diffusion into public awareness from its starting point as an emerging issue of change.
Pockets offuture found
In present Time
“present” “future”
Number of cases; degree of public awareness
global; multiple dispersed cases; trends and drivers
scientists; artists; radicals; mystics
specialists’ journals and websites
laypersons’ magazines; websites; documentaries
newspapers; news magazines; broadcast media
institutions and government
system limits; problems develop;
unintended impacts
Monday, 30 August 2010
Scanning+ the 3rd Horizon
Scanning provides a starting point to monitor possible transformative / disruptive changes.3 Horizons let us organise and consider the interplay of trends and emerging changes.Uses:
Challenge system robustness;Enable plausible provocative scenarios;Get beyond incrementalism.
3
TIMELINESSYSTEMS MAPS
HORIZON SCANNINGTREND FORECASTSIMPACT MAPPING
USED & DISOWNED FUTURESFUTURES TRIANGLE
SCENARIOSINFLECTION POINTSDECISION HORIZONS
• How will emerging change affect people’s lives, lifestyles, belongings, houses, pets, communities, work, retirement, and investment patterns?
• How will different emerging changes intersect with each other to either amplify or constrain their related impacts?
Monday, 30 August 2010
“3 Horizons” and Horizon Scanning
CURRENT TRENDS & DRIVERS
STATUS QUO, MOMENTUM, INERTIA
EMERGING ISSUES OF CHANGE
1st horizon
2nd horizon
3rd horizon
Time
Dominanceof paradigm / worldview
Pockets offuture found
In present
“present” “future”
Fading paradigms & technologies
Transition paradigms & technologies
Invent, Develop, Deploy
Research,Demonstrate,
Disrupt
Envision, Explore, Embody
Monday, 30 August 2010
Futures WheelsMonday, 30 August 2010
Futures Wheels: Origins
Jerome C. GlennInvented futures wheels in 1971 as a method for policy analysis and forecastingAlso called Implementation Wheels, Impact Wheels, Mind Mapping, and Webbing.Reference: Jerome C. Glenn, “The Futures Wheel,” in The Millennium Project Futures Research Methodology 3.0 (CD)
Joel Barker“Cascade thinking:” go out at least three orders of implications to find big surpriseshttp://strategicexploration.com/implications-wheel/
Monday, 30 August 2010What are the first effects you can extrapolate would emerge from this shift in the computing infrastructure – and everything connected to, or depending upon, it? For example:•working – and education – environments noisier;•nobody needs to remember passwords anymore;•precipitous drop in incidence of work-related carpal tunnel syndrome;•market emerges for ”great voice” modules to personalize computer speech.These are just a few examples of primary effects. If your thinking gets stuck, look at the subdivisions in the futures wheel. These effects address the areas of work, education, daily life, health, and the economy – what about hobbies? our homes and family life? the arts? etc.Next, take each of these primary effects, one by one, and ask what effects they in turn will have on our lives:•working – and education – environments noisier:
•wireless ”earbud” headphones/microphones to communicate with your computer;•development of ”workpod” office and schoolroom furniture, with built-in sound barriers:
•people in the same room conversing through their computers’ wireless network;•”visual display” goggles for silent response, eye movement navigation through menus:
•accelerated development of augmented reality.While listing the secondary effects of the chosen primary effect, tertiary effects also emerged, as the indented, italicized items illustrate.
Augmented Futures Wheel
Monday, 30 August 2010What are the first effects you can extrapolate would emerge from this shift in the computing infrastructure – and everything connected to, or depending upon, it? For example:•working – and education – environments noisier;•nobody needs to remember passwords anymore;•precipitous drop in incidence of work-related carpal tunnel syndrome;•market emerges for ”great voice” modules to personalize computer speech.These are just a few examples of primary effects. If your thinking gets stuck, look at the subdivisions in the futures wheel. These effects address the areas of work, education, daily life, health, and the economy – what about hobbies? our homes and family life? the arts? etc.Next, take each of these primary effects, one by one, and ask what effects they in turn will have on our lives:•working – and education – environments noisier:
•wireless ”earbud” headphones/microphones to communicate with your computer;•development of ”workpod” office and schoolroom furniture, with built-in sound barriers:
•people in the same room conversing through their computers’ wireless network;•”visual display” goggles for silent response, eye movement navigation through menus:
•accelerated development of augmented reality.While listing the secondary effects of the chosen primary effect, tertiary effects also emerged, as the indented, italicized items illustrate.
Enter your assigned change in the inner circle of your worksheet.
Everyone take five minutes by themselves to imagine the possible impacts of this change.
Share your individual lists within your group. Which of these are immediate, or primary, impacts? Immediate primary impacts are the direct caused by the change. Write those down next to the appropriate “spoke”.
Some of the impacts on your lists may actually be the result of a primary impact, or occur after a primary impact - draw a line from the relevant primary impact, and write the suggested secondary impact in a circle at the end of that line.
Now consider each primary impact, one by one. Brainstorm two or three impacts it will have, and map those, connecting each to its primary impact.
Futures Wheels: Instructions
Monday, 30 August 2010Let’s create a futures wheel from the statement, ”By 2010, we talk to our computers, they talk back, and recognize us via biometrics.” This statement is a vivid way of expressing several related trends: 1) increasing multiplicity of input and display devices for computers, with consequent decline in use of keyboards; and 2) increasing use of “biometrics” – identifiers based on unique characteristics of living organisms, like our fingerprints, retinal patterns, blood type, or DNA.
secondary effects
work?
hobbies?
education?home/families?
travel?
communications?
economy?
environment?
primary effects
impact
impact
impact
criticalemerging change
Futures Wheel
Monday, 30 August 2010What are the first effects you can extrapolate would emerge from this shift in the computing infrastructure – and everything connected to, or depending upon, it? For example:•working – and education – environments noisier;•nobody needs to remember passwords anymore;•precipitous drop in incidence of work-related carpal tunnel syndrome;•market emerges for ”great voice” modules to personalize computer speech.These are just a few examples of primary effects. If your thinking gets stuck, look at the subdivisions in the futures wheel. These effects address the areas of work, education, daily life, health, and the economy – what about hobbies? our homes and family life? the arts? etc.Next, take each of these primary effects, one by one, and ask what effects they in turn will have on our lives:•working – and education – environments noisier:
•wireless ”earbud” headphones/microphones to communicate with your computer;•development of ”workpod” office and schoolroom furniture, with built-in sound barriers:
•people in the same room conversing through their computers’ wireless network;•”visual display” goggles for silent response, eye movement navigation through menus:
•accelerated development of augmented reality.While listing the secondary effects of the chosen primary effect, tertiary effects also emerged, as the indented, italicized items illustrate.
secondary effects
work?
hobbies?
education?home/families?
travel?
communications?
economy?
environment?
primary effects
impact
impact
impact
work noisier
“earbud” headphones to talk to/hear computer
office sound barriers
silent, eye-tracking menu navigation goggles
developed
voice input / output, biometric passwords
Futures Wheel
Monday, 30 August 2010What are the first effects you can extrapolate would emerge from this shift in the computing infrastructure – and everything connected to, or depending upon, it? For example:•working – and education – environments noisier;•nobody needs to remember passwords anymore;•precipitous drop in incidence of work-related carpal tunnel syndrome;•market emerges for ”great voice” modules to personalize computer speech.These are just a few examples of primary effects. If your thinking gets stuck, look at the subdivisions in the futures wheel. These effects address the areas of work, education, daily life, health, and the economy – what about hobbies? our homes and family life? the arts? etc.Next, take each of these primary effects, one by one, and ask what effects they in turn will have on our lives:•working – and education – environments noisier:
•wireless ”earbud” headphones/microphones to communicate with your computer;•development of ”workpod” office and schoolroom furniture, with built-in sound barriers:
•people in the same room conversing through their computers’ wireless network;•”visual display” goggles for silent response, eye movement navigation through menus:
•accelerated development of augmented reality.While listing the secondary effects of the chosen primary effect, tertiary effects also emerged, as the indented, italicized items illustrate.
secondary effects
work?
education?
travel? economy?primary effects impact
impact
impact
work noisier
“earbud” headphones to talk to/hear computer
office sound barriers
silent, eye-tracking menu navigation goggles
developed
voice input / output, biometric passwords
Futures Wheel
market for “great voices”
no passwords required drop in carpal tunnel
syndrome
increase in worker productivity
decline in worker compensation costs
collapse of keyboard wrist
rest market
new licensing opp’ty for
popular singers and actors
pirate market: great voices
“napsterized”
rather talk to your machine
than you…
home/families?
Monday, 30 August 2010What are the first effects you can extrapolate would emerge from this shift in the computing infrastructure – and everything connected to, or depending upon, it? For example:•working – and education – environments noisier;•nobody needs to remember passwords anymore;•precipitous drop in incidence of work-related carpal tunnel syndrome;•market emerges for ”great voice” modules to personalize computer speech.These are just a few examples of primary effects. If your thinking gets stuck, look at the subdivisions in the futures wheel. These effects address the areas of work, education, daily life, health, and the economy – what about hobbies? our homes and family life? the arts? etc.Next, take each of these primary effects, one by one, and ask what effects they in turn will have on our lives:•working – and education – environments noisier:
•wireless ”earbud” headphones/microphones to communicate with your computer;•development of ”workpod” office and schoolroom furniture, with built-in sound barriers:
•people in the same room conversing through their computers’ wireless network;•”visual display” goggles for silent response, eye movement navigation through menus:
•accelerated development of augmented reality.While listing the secondary effects of the chosen primary effect, tertiary effects also emerged, as the indented, italicized items illustrate.
Verge: an ethnographic futures framework
Michele Bowman and Richard LumFormulated in response to frustrations with STEEP/PESTE scan taxonomiesFocus on people and society: define; relate; connect; create; consume
Wide applicabilityas a taxonomy for scanning: organises emerging change by point of impact on people, rather than by point of originenriches futures wheels, strengthens scenarios, deepens vision, adds specificity to strategy.
Monday, 30 August 2010
Verge: how does change affect human experience?
“Human history can be dissected (and sometimes understood) as a series of eras or epochs – the Agricultural Era, the Industrial Era, the Information Age. Common to each of these eras or ages is a set of culture points which define and shape each era and which are common to all of human experience. For instance, while the role (and even the flavor) of religion has changed throughout time, the common need of humans to have a framework for understanding their world has not. Likewise, while our weapons, our choice of foods and structure of our families may change throughout time, the need for them does not.” Michele Bowman
Monday, 30 August 2010
The processes and technology through
which we create goods & services
The goods & services we create, and the ways in
which we aquire and use them
Social structures & relationships which link
people and organizations
The concepts, ideas and paradigms we use
to define the world around us
The technologies used to connect people, places and things
Verge in brief
Monday, 30 August 2010
The Ethnographic Futures Framework - VERGE - was developed by Kaipo Lum and Michele Bowman of Global Foresight Associates, and any use of it should cite them as authors / designers.
Use it with futures wheels: brainstorm by Verge category
secondary effects
consume?connect?
define? relate?
create?
primary effects
impact
impact
criticalemerging change
impact
Enter your assigned change in the inner circle of your worksheet. Use the following questions to help you imagine possible impacts of this change over the
next twenty years: DEFINE: How will this driver affect the concepts, ideas and paradigms we use to define ourselves and the world
around us? RELATE: How will we live together on planet Earth? CONNECT: How will this driver affect the technologies / techniques we use to connect people, places, and things? CREATE: How will this driver affect the processes and technologies we use to produce goods and services? CONSUME: How will this driver affect the kinds of goods and services we create, and how we acquire them, use
them, and destroy them?
Map potential impacts outward as with an ordinary futures wheel.