The Future is a Process
It’s not a place. It’s something we create.
My 8 year old brought up the most interesting dinner conversation the other day.
He said, “Daddy, do you know why we can’t predict the future”?
“That’s a really interesting question! Why can’t we predict the future”, I asked.
“Because we’re all creating it together, all the time”.
“🤯”
Ok. Whoa. Now I’m not certain but I have a hunch that this is a concept most adults don’t really understand.
My dear friend Beth Lyons recently introduced me to Deem Journal. The home page displayed an interview with Collective Future’s Ronni Kimm and Eric Holdener that I highly recommend. They parallel my son’s perspective nicely: “the future is a process, not a place”.
From deterministic to anticipatory
At the first Policy Community Conference, Policy Horizons’ Senior Foresight Analyst Steffen Christensen stated something along the lines of: ‘Most policies and programs have one fatal flaw built into them: they assume that tomorrow looks like today’. This statement has stuck with me in such a profound way.
If this is true, what can we do about it? We certainly can’t predict the future. A belief, even subtly, in the ability to predict the future, would in some way imply that the future is determined. Like my son understands, the future is something that is emerging from our collective actions, and there are many plausible futures.
We can’t predict the future but we can anticipate different futures. We can be prepared for likely scenarios. This is where the practice of strategic foresight comes in.
According to Policy Horizons:
the objective of foresight is to explore plausible, alternative futures and identify the challenges and opportunities that may emerge. Foresight helps us understand the forces shaping a system, how the system could evolve and what surprises could arise. This analysis provides a valuable context for the development of policies and strategies that are robust across a range of plausible futures. It also provides a solid foundation for vision-building.
Here’s a bonus: Policy Horizons makes all of their resources freely available. So if you are working in government (or any organizations really) and want to build your organization’s foresight capacity, there’s an easy way to start.
We. Need. To. Do. This. Work.
When we are not seriously thinking about the future we are simply muddling through. When we are muddling through we end up reacting to changes in less than productive ways or painting ourselves into corners. From this disposition, tied to legacy decisions and sunk costs we see changes as barriers or threats rather than opportunities.
In the next phase of our work at the Government of New Brunswick’s Innovation and Design Services team we are developing foresight capacity and working to help our colleagues become more literate in Strategic Foresight. To start, thanks to our colleagues at Policy Horizons, we will be hosting Impact board game lunches and hosting scanning clubs. This is a start. Complementing our innovation work, we are making an effort to build our foresight literacy in GNB in order to better prepare for the future. But being prepared isn’t everything.
From reacting to making
Reacting to changes is one, less desirable thing. Anticipating and being prepared for changes is a better thing. Co-creating the future is a much preferred thing. This is the mindset shift we need to make. We are not passive agents; especially as public servants. We have a lot of influence over how the future unfolds. A shift from a deterministic worldview to one that recognizes our agency in change means we can begin to act as co-creaters of possible futures.
Christian Bason hits the nail on the head in his powerful book Leading Public Design: We need to see ourselves as future makers. We need to help each other better navigate uncertainty and reframe our roles. How might we begin to see our roles in the public service as future makers, rather than only decision-makers reacting to changes?
