227/08 Social challanges s the basis for foresight - Gaia

Another important area is the support for commitment
and the group dynamics. This requires
first of all that there is adequate number of people
in each panel to secure sufficient participation (at
least 7–8 people) in each meeting. The initial
group that is invited should hence be even up to
15 people, depending on the level of commitment.
Concerning the commitment, enough time
should be allocated to the first panel meeting in
order to allow panel members to become better
acquainted with each other and to commit them to
the process.
In the Finnish process the utilization of the
mini-Delphi survey turned out to be challenging.
In Japan, there is a consistent tradition of
Delphi-surveys, but the Finnish survey was not
sufficiently integrated into the process. The panel
members should have had a more active role in
formulating the Delphi statements and the areas
in the Delphi survey should have been selected
only when the main solutions for each theme had
been identified in panel meeting 3. In this way the
Delphi work would have better supported the
roadmap work.
During the foresight process a cross-comparison
between themes could be valuable. In this case
such a comparison was done between panel
chairmen only during the report writing phase.
This meeting aimed at identifying links between
the themes and recommendations. However, this
could have been a planned procedure from the beginning
so that it would have supported the work
in the panels. Hence sufficient resources should
be allocated to this kind of comparison in case the
thematic areas have linkages like in this case.
Furthermore, a comparison also between Japanese
and Finnish results could have produced
new insights. In general, more co-operation with
the Japanese would have been productive.
Finally, it is important to keep in mind that this
kind of foresight project is an individual-centered
process. The results of the process can be potentially
dominated by the chairman or individual
panel members, and this should be taken into notice
when assessing the results and utilizing them.
Particularly, this is a challenge when the results are
intended to be used in the actual strategic policy
making to decide on R&D funding allocation. Far
reaching and important decisions cannot be based
on the opinions of few individuals given in the
context where the participants themselves perhaps
do not realize the intended use of the results. On
the other hand, the surprise elements and capability
of the foresight process to create new ideas suffer
if the process is focused only on the consensus
opinions validated with a large group of individuals.
In planning the foresight one should pay attention
in using methods which enforce panel members
to participate equally so that also the more silent
ones get their voice through and which also
vary and force the participants to look at issues
from various different points of view. Last but not
least, it should be kept in mind that foresight is intended
to support the strategic decision making but
not to replace it.
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