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Strategic Foresight by Future Thinking

If you want to be prepared for the future, strategic foresight is a crucial tool to assist your strategy. It is a systematic procedure made to direct your decisions going forward. It enables you to assess possible dangers before they materialise into issues.

Importance of strategic foresight

One essential tool for assisting firms in navigating the complex global environment is foresight. It can help you restructure your business, find new markets, and look into novel goods. Any form of planning or business initiative can benefit from using a strategic foresight methodology. It is a terrific approach to strengthen your competitive advantage, though.

strategic foresight

Foresight helps you plan for the worst-case scenarios and assists with your long-term strategy. For instance, if you are a corporate manager, you might discover that housing costs will rise and that your team needs to be ready. As an alternative, if you are a teacher, you will pay attention to changes in the labour market, the economy, and the educational system. You need to instil a culture of planning and critical thought to prepare for the future properly.

Planning

Scenario planning is one of the most often used tools in strategic foresight. This strategy entails updating current mental representations in light of conceivable futures. You must look for patterns that could impact the future and consider how factors will interact to accomplish this. The objective is to create believable scenarios that let you draw a map of your area in a world that is always changing.

Horizon scanning

Horizon scanning is another tactic used to aid with strategic planning. Horizon scanning is a method for assessing the potential effects of change drivers on scenarios in the future. Demographics, financial limitations, and the accessibility of competent labour are a few of these drivers. You can create a more successful strategy when you comprehend these trends.

Based on various approaches

Strategic foresight is built on the principles of participatory futurology and “horizontal” policymaking. These strategies are the end product of post-World War II research. Researchers concerned about how the United States could meet the needs of a post-World War II atomic age,  formed the RAND Corporation, a research group in the United States. You can find weak signals and deep patterns by using a futures-based strategy. You can create more potent plans and protective actions using these techniques.

futures-based strategy

Consider the 4 Ps

Consider including the four Ps while creating your own strategic foresight procedures. The four Ps are probable, plausible, preventable, and preferred futures, respectively. There will be a separate set of activities needed for each P. Generally, desirable futures will be established, preventable futures will be avoided, probable futures will be calculated, potential futures will be explored, and avoidable futures will be examined.

Your leaders will eventually be evaluated based on how effectively they plot their future trajectories. They won’t be able to safeguard their company from issues in the future if they can’t think forward. You can keep your services current and move in the correct direction by taking a forward-thinking attitude.

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