London Futures Symposium: #2 Scenarios

Yesterday, I reviewed Stephen Aguilar-Millan’s opening presentation - ‘Introduction to Futuring’ - and this was followed by Adam Gordon (Future Studio) offering a full and comprehensive review of scenario development methodology.

I’ve previously trained in scenario development so while a large part of the presentation was familiar to me, a couple of things caught my interest.

Firstly, I was reminded how for the newcomer (and equally any potential business-client), their first exposure to the concept and underlying process of scenario development could lead them to a daunting conclusion; it’s too much of complex and time consuming process. As such, how we engage and educate clients about both tools & process remains important (and also a consistently undervalued component of most of the project and programme work I’ve been involved with over time).

Secondly, that we should re-visit our own ideas and understanding of uncertainty; what it is, what its role is, what dynamics it exhibits and what its impact can be.

Guided by the definitions originally presented by Hugh Courtney in his work on “Strategy under uncertainty” (PDF), Adam eloquently described how our interpretations of uncertainty can be too ‘flat’; lacking appropriate characterisation based on both its specific context and the nature of the surrounding environment within which the uncertainty is occurring.

Courtney offered a four-level framework of uncertainties based on interpreting - what he described as - ‘residual uncertainty’ (the uncertainty that remains after the best possible analysis has been undertaken) and described by Adam as (#1) Certain future, (#2) Choice of Outcomes, (#3) Bounded Uncertainty and (#4) High Ambiguity.

From this, Adam offered a number of key observations on the relationship between uncertainty and the use of scenarios as a foresight tool:

1 - We incorrectly identify most strategic problems. That is, he asserts, we interpret them as representing uncertainty types #1 and #4, when they should be more accurately understood as uncertainty types #2 and #3. A useful heuristic to check our practical work against?

2 - In relation to uncertainty levels, we should always give primacy to issue-specific problems rather than industry-specific ones.

3 - It is the level of uncertainty that should actually drive the foresight tool selection process.

Lastly, editions of Adam’s new book were also available. Titled “Future Savvy” Adam’s key aims were to provide “… a hands-on approach to judging predictive material of all types” via “… a single template that allows managers to apply systematic “forecast filtering” to reveal strengths and weakness in the predictions they face.”  A full description and chapter guide is available.

More from the Symposium on Sunday.