In order to negotiate the questions about tomorrow in a accessible and comprehensive way, a basic understanding and a method is needed - scenario planning. This method is an important part of our approach, and underlies the design of our future experiments.
The desire to know what the future holds is as old as mankind itself.
Ute von Reibnitz
Quantitative data sets are often insufficient
In conventional forecasts of the future, quantitative factors are recorded and a forecast is made from these. Factors that cannot be measured are not included in the forecast. However, developments such as digitalisation are so complex and far-reaching that they cannot be predicted on the basis of quantitative data alone. Other external influences, such as the corona virus pandemic for example, cannot be taken into account by statistical forecasting methods. But such disruptions can completely change society within a short time. Conventional forecasting methods therefore often walk backwards into the future.
Back from the future
In scenario planning, a cut is deliberately made between the past and the future then working backwards. A desirable scenario is defined in the future and then steps are planned from there back to the present. In the end, not only a desirable scenario is created, but also recommendations on how to get there.
Workflow of scenario planning
1. Problem analysis and business environment
The first step is to define and structure the field of analysis as well as to describe the actual situation. What is the problem and what affects it? What are possible influencing factors that will affect the field of interest in the future? This way it is also possible to define what is and what is not the subject of the analysis.
As an example: How will digitalisation in the private environment develop? (field of interest). Influencing factors could be: 5G radio standard, data protection, home office...
2. Drawing projections and assumptions
In this step, based on the influencing factors, projections and assumptions are developed for the targeted year. These are sorted, bundled and weighted on an axis between dystopia and utopia.
As an example: The 5G radio standard (influencing factor) will completely wipe out the home internet market (assumption).
3. Scenario development and interpretation
Various utopian, desirable as well as dystopian projections and assumptions are now woven into holistic desirable "future scenarios". Stories, daily routines or collages of different futures are created. The different scenarios are again placed on the axis between dystopia and utopia in a participative and deliberative process.
4. Formulating the conditions for success
The last phase serves to create the conditions for success, which serve to make the desired development of the scenarios negotiable. Possible steps are defined that can be used to bring a scenario to reality. In this way, scenario planning not only enables creative thinking about alternative futures, but also provides recommendations for action that pave the way to them.
What are the benefits of a scenario workshop?
Work together to develop a basis for your mission statement or vision. Recognise and question your own ideas about the future, values and beliefs. Think about new futures and use them to create opportunities for action in the present.
In a one-day workshop with the "Greater Zurich Area" we used scenario planning to negotiate the future of location marketing and business development. We developed projections, scenarios and conditions for success over the next 20 years. As preliminary work, the GZA has already prepared the problem and business environment analysis and the influencing factors.
Digital democracy
On behalf of the Stiftung für Technologiefolgen - Abschätzung (Foundation for Technology Assessment), the Dezentrum develops scenarios of a digital democracy. In this context, the individual steps outlined above are all carried out several times and as full-day workshops.
In a digital workshop with CooperativeSuisse, the Dezentrum collected projections with experts and participants to develop scenarios on the question of who owns digital space and what the future of digital public infrastructure and space might look like.
Group work at the Social Design Days in Nürnberg (Photo: Sven Stolzenwald)
Run a scenario workshop
Would you like to conduct a scenario workshop with your company? We organize scenario workshops both off- and online.
Speculative objects translate future scenarios into tangible forms. They serve as conversation starters, challenge habitual patterns of thinking and encourage discussion about possible developments. Their sensory presence opens up access to complex questions and new perspectives.
Future experiments test possible scenarios in the here and now. They create empirical values and open up spaces for joint design with different perspectives. When future scenarios are tried out, reflected upon and further developed, lively learning fields emerge for organisations and society.
Scenario workshop with the Parliamentary Services of the Canton of Zurich
Selected Case Studies
Parliamentary Services Canton of Zurich
Collaborative future scenarios for the parliamentary services
What will our work look like in the future? The Parliamentary Services team developed various scenarios to answer this question. Some cautious, some radical. They familiarised themselves with various methods from futures thinking and explored their own assumptions about the future. The all-day scenario technology workshop led to a wealth of insights - which are now being used to develop a new mission statement.
SECO’s unemployment insurance compensation office is working on major projects to modernise the IT infrastructure of the unemployment insurance as well as public employment service. The efforts represent the beginning of a comprehensive digital transformation. To get it rolling, digitalisation related to the unemployment insurance compensation fund have been discussed. There was broad agreement on the need for cultural change. It shall be clarified though, to what extent the federal enforcement autonomy can be reconciled with the process harmonisation at national level.
GZA
Evaluation of the Greater Zurich Area's Development Potential
How will the Greater Zurich Area develop as a location and economically? This question was explored in a workshop using the scenario technique. In the end, various future scenarios for the growth of the GZA were developed.
TA-SWISS
Digital futures of democracy
The future must be actively negotiated and shaped - and in a democratic way. For the Foundation for Technology Assessment, the Dezentrum developed three future scenarios for a digital democracy in the year 2050. In a participatory and interdisciplinary process, three short stories were created, each illustrated by a speculative object.
On behalf of CooperativeSuisse, we conducted a workshop on the question of "Who owns digital space?" as part of the "Property of the Future" series of events. The participants developed desirable future scenarios of what public space and public infrastructure might look like in 2030.
Shaping Futures worth Living
Experiments with Reduced Working Hours
In the midst of climate and health crises, a shortage of skilled workers and fears of globalisation and digitalisation, Switzerland is facing major challenges. Could fewer working hours be the answer?
