Teaching for uncertain futures - Neville Freeman Agency

6INTRODUCING SCENARIO BUILDINGFutureimperfectEngaging with the future is engagingwith a slippery customer – futureimperfect if you will.Many things contribute to thisimperfection.The future is unknowable. It is notuntil the future becomes the presentthat I can say, ‘Ah of course, now Iknow.’ The trouble is it’s no longerthe future and the ‘next’ futureremains as elusive as ever.The future is unpredictable. It cannotbe predicted in a foolproof way.The future is also uncertain, whichmeans there is the potential for anyone of many different futures tocome into being.The crucial skill is not to attempt topick which of these different futureswill actually be the one that happens– to guess the ‘right future’. Ratherthe aim should be to ‘imagineinto being’ and then explore acomprehensive set of plausiblefutures.The ‘content’of the futureForesight looks at the content of thefuture in three ways.Some aspects are wild cards: thingswhich are genuinely surprising, suchas earthquakes and tsunamis,whatever hindsight might later say.Others are definite possibilities – theimpact of technology on teachingfor example – but are criticaluncertainties: important influenceswhich are foreseeable but whoseoutcomes cannot be predicted.And yet others seem bound to happen– predetermined elements likethe demographics of Australia overthe next five years – however nervouslysuch views are shared with others.ThetroublesSo far so good. But the complicationsof engaging with the future andlearning from it are furtherconfounded by a long list of difficultissues and questions. Theuncertainty of the future is one. Addto this the contestability of questionsasked about the future and theresponses to them; the complexityof the hundreds of influences thatare shaping future environments; thedynamics of power and politics; andthe impact of diverse world views.Thenew wayThe troubles are not to be put to oneside. What is needed is a processthat will accommodate the difficultiesand transcend them. That process isbroadly described as scenario building.The ‘wild cards’, ‘criticaluncertainties’ and ‘pre-determinedelements’ encountered above areall part of the scenario builder’sarmoury. It is the criticaluncertainties that combine to createalternative future scenarios.When we embark on a scenariobuilding exercise, the ways in whicheach of us sees the world becomesexplicit rather than assumed.The value of scenario building isbased on the creation of a sharedexperience which openly questions theassumptions each of us brings to thetable and drives the creation of newworld views and collaborative actionplans for the future.Engaging with the future does nottake place in the future; it takes placein the present. Having a future focuschanges the way we see the present,so much so that we ‘reperceive’ thatpresent and its strategic requirements.Learning from the future is excitingand challenging because it changes,forever, the way we engage withthe present.Oliver Freeman