History as a launch pad for foresight:

1. Timelines and the Future • History as a launch pad for foresight: • Robert Textor, Ethnographic Futures -- the rubber band effect. • Paul Saffo, Technological Forecasting -- twice as far back as forward. • Layering history of different sectors: • Analysing different patterns of change. • Identifying different speeds of change. www.samiconsulting.co.uk

2. Timeline layers: Differentials www.samiconsulting.co.uk

3. Time “present” “future” Horizon scanning Mapping a trend’s diffusion into public awareness from its starting point as an emerging issue of change. system limits; problems develop; unintended impacts global; multiple dispersed cases; trends and drivers Number of cases; degree of public awareness 3rd horizon institutions and government newspapers; news magazines; broadcast media laypersons’ magazines; websites; documentaries local; few cases; emerging issues www.samiconsulting.co.uk Pockets of future found In present specialists’ journals and websites scientists; artists; radicals; mystics

4. Horizon scanning • Beginning of research, not the end; • “N of 1”; • Unearths contradictions; • Subjective, not objective; • “Unscientific” sources; • Systems-based; • Unfamiliar concepts. • Primary futures tool for identifying and monitoring emerging change. • Related to issues management and competitive intelligence. • ”Environment” refers to the information environment – all media – and ”scanning” to logically structured, continuous monitoring of data sources. • High quality scanning: • identifies an emerging issue that is objectively new even to experts, • confirms or is confirmed by additional scan hits, and • has been identified in time for social dialogue, impact assessment, and policy formation. www.samiconsulting.co.uk

5. Scanning + 3 Horizons • Scanning provides a starting point to monitor possible transformative / disruptive changes. • 3 Horizons helps us organise and consider the interplay of trends and emerging changes. • Uses: • Challenge obsolescing assumptions; • Spot emerging constraints / opportunities; • Get beyond incrementalism. www.samiconsulting.co.uk

6. The 3 Horizons framework Three Horizons Framework for Layering Change Life-cycles B Sharp, T Hodgson, A Curry www.samiconsulting.co.uk

7. Origins of 3 Horizons framework • UK Foresight Intelligent Infrastructure Systems (IIS) Project • Perspective: long-term time horizon • Need: technology road-mapping that reflects generations of technological innovation • Researchers: Bill Sharpe, Tony Hodgson, Andrew Curry • Publications and articles: • IIS Technology Forward Look; Sharpe and Hodgson • Seeing in Multiple Horizons: Connecting Futures to Strategy; Curry and Hodgson • Method now in wide use, book collecting case studies being developed www.samiconsulting.co.uk

8. Differences in the 3 Horizons Three Horizons: Functional differences Dominance of worldview B Sharp, T Hodgson, A Curry Horizon 2: Entrepreneurs Horizon 3: Visionary Leaders Horizon 1: Managers Incremental adaptation & innovation Status quo, momentum, inertia Emerging change & visions www.samiconsulting.co.uk Pockets of the future found in the present

9. Questions for each horizon • What are the current working assumptions and systems of production and marketing? What are you taking for granted when you make management decisions (horizon 1)? • What changes are emerging as completely new paradigms and means to understand and undertake various human activities (horizon 3)? What are visionary leaders saying? • Which of the immediate changes you see represent a transition or accommodation for evolving tensions as current assumptions and work patterns obsolesce, and transformative changes erupt into possibility (horizon 2)? What opportunities do you see? What are entrepreneurs building? www.samiconsulting.co.uk