IMCORE ProjectIMCORE Project

Scenarios Workshop

Guide

Centre for Research in Futures and Innovation, University of Glamorgan

TABLE OF CONTENTSTable of Contents

INTRODUCTION............................................................................................................................................ 4

WHY THIS GUIDE?.................................................................................................................................................4WHAT ARE “SCENARIOS”?.......................................................................................................................................4WHO SHOULD PARTICIPATE?....................................................................................................................................6

CONDUCTING EXPLORATORY SCENARIO WORKSHOPS..................................................................................7

STAGE 1: DRIVER AND ISSUE IDENTIFICATION/SCOPING.................................................................................................7Seven Questions............................................................................................................................................7

STAGE 2: SCENARIO WORKSHOP.............................................................................................................................8

EXPLORATORY SCENARIO PROCEDURE TEMPLATE.......................................................................................10

STAGE 3: FEEDBACK DEVELOPED SCENARIO NARRATIVE AND SEEK FURTHER INPUT............................................................13CONDUCTING NORMATIVE SCENARIO WORKSHOPS...................................................................................................15

Backasting..................................................................................................................................................15

NORMATIVE SCENARIO PROCEDURE MODEL...............................................................................................16

TIPS..................................................................................................................................................................17Preparation.................................................................................................................................................17Implementation..........................................................................................................................................18On the day..................................................................................................................................................18Image of timeline........................................................................................................................................18After............................................................................................................................................................18

HINTS, TIPS AND INSPIRATIONS.................................................................................................................. 19

SUPPLEMENTARY TECHNIQUES AND DEFINITIONS......................................................................................25

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Introduction

Why this Guide?

This guide is intended to be a straight forward step by step guide for Expert Couplets Nodes holding scenarios workshops in one of the seven IMCORE Project study sites.

The EU Interreg IVB IMCORE Project (2008-2011) partnership is promoting a trans-national, innovative and sustainable approach to reducing the Ecological, Social and Economic impacts of climate change on the coastal resources of North West Europe. This approach has been adopted to enable stakeholders to think more creatively about the future, encouraging more proactive attitudes to adaptation as well as enhancing appreciation of the interconnectivity of processes and stakeholders operating at different scales. The use of integrated participatory scenario building at local level is still rare and it is thus hoped that it will benefit from greater capacity building and practice offered by the IMCORE futures work which it is hoped will also contribute significantly to the literature and the development of coastal scenario building techniques.

The 3rd Work Package of this project is dedicated to the examining the use of future scenario building in the context of ICZM and climate change adaptation in the IMCORE study sites. A desktop study Scenarios Review has therefore already been composed as a first phase in this process, in order to help develop a common methodology for scenario development, using case studies from North West Europe and other parts of the world. This document can be downloaded from the project website: URL the second phase of the workpackage consists of this handbook and attendant materials destined to help those holding the futures scenarios workshops.

What are “scenarios”?

Thinking about the future is something that we all do as individuals, citizens, policy makers or politicians – and as coastal management practitioners. Thinking about the future can however be difficult, confusing and, often, frightening. Futures tools such as scenarios help us to organise and interpret our thinking about the future and to understand how to create the conditions in which our desired futures can be achieved.

Scenarios are essentially special stories that portray plausible futures. Their purpose is to systematically explore, create, and test both possible and desirable future conditions. They can help generate long-term policies, strategies, and plans, which help bring desired and likely future circumstances in closer alignment. They can also expose ignorance; show that we do not know how to get to a specific future or that it is impossible. Although scenarios can take advantage of quantitative forecasts and projections, scenarios are not designed to predict the future per se, but rather to develop capacity to consider a range of possible futures, developed from the interactions between important variables.

Scenarios have specific advantages for ICZM practitioners and planners faced with climate change adaptation. They

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a) are the analytical tool most favoured for climate change adaptation planning e.g. IPCC, UKCIP Socio-economic Scenarios 2001, UKCIP 09. By contrast traditional and many current coastal planning processes are perceived as being unable to cope with long term changes or exceptional events and challenge us to innovate in the way we make decisions.

b) set out a common language and comprehensions – across disciplinary, departmental and institutional silos

c) support decisions in coastal management are more likely to be implemented successfully. Scenarios permit stakeholder inclusion in an integrated decision-making process that ensures buy-in and support form those upon whom such decisions impact. Long term decision making about the coast these days also needs consideration of the uncertainties and complexities of climate change as well as the various levels of stakeholder support.

d) use more effective tools to support decision making processes avoids cognitive complexity for those obliged to make the decisions and is less opaque.

e) fit naturally with innate human ways of processing and interpreting complex knowledge through stories/narrative.

f) Help organisations adopt strategies less prone to failure as a result of unforeseen events. g) support communities which lack internal cohesion or agreement by enhancing their ability to

reach consensus since individuals are enabled to concur on near-term actions without having to sign up to longer-term expectations.

When scenarios are developed in coastal management they are necessarily complementary to pre-existing plans and policies e.g. regional climate change adaptation strategy, regional spatial plans etc. Realisable scenarios can only be created in the available predetermined policy space or framework – which is itself a driver taken into account in the scenario development process of course. The case study section (Appendix 3) includes examples of the fit between scenarios and the broader institutional and policy regional contexts.

Scenarios can be predictive, exploratory or normative or a combination of these approaches or types.

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Figure 1: Scenario types

1. Predictive scenarios i.e. ‘‘What will happen?’’ these provide some of the most rigorous scientific attempts to estimate direct climate changes (expressed in ranges of temperatures, sea-level rises etc, including their perceived secondary impacts – such as the IPCC reports or UKCIP09) and will be familiar to many ICZM practitioners. These are based on standard predictive forecasting models traditionally used by DEFRA etc

2. Exploratory scenarios describe events and trends as they could evolve based on alternative assumptions on how these events and trends may influence the future. i.e. “What can happen?” These are based on a different paradigm and exploit new technologies. The exploratory scenario type provides a plurality of plausible alternative futures, in which active strategies to adapt (or not) have been pursued e.g. UK Government report Future Flooding 2004 (See Case Studies).

3. Normative scenarios describe how a desirable future can emerge from the present. i.e. ‘‘How can a specific target be reached?’’ . They describe a pre-specified future - a world achievable (or avoidable) only through certain actions. They Include "worst case" scenarios and "target-based" scenarios. The normative scenario is less prominent in futures practice but can also play an important role in adaptation since framing a preferred future can be very useful in revealing pathways and decision points to achieve the desired state. Backcasting, a normative scenario technique which works ‘backwards’ from a normative future is especially effective.

This handbook provides guidance on how to conduct exploratory and normative scenario workshops

Who should participate? Scenario exercises are more effective if key stakeholders and policy-makers are directly involved in developing them. Main impacts such as awareness raising, reconsideration of the validity of policy assumptions etc are often due more to the process of scenario development than the published record disseminated when the process ends (see Box pages 12-13 above.)

Scenario development originally focussed on using specialists in niche fields. Climate change adaptation, however, calls for a broader constituency of participants. In addition to environmental scientists, policy-makers (at several levels) and specialist consultants, stakeholders need to be actively engaged in the process. Civil society groups and businesses need to be part of the strategic conversation that will ultimately lead to explicit adaptation strategies (and tacit knowledge in anticipating change). Skill sets within environmental scenarios are broad, and will benefit from techniques and insights gained from futures and, more broadly, social science methods (see figure X).

The literature on developing predictive scenarios for use in ICZM and climate change adaptation is great and relatively well understood. This document

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Conducting Exploratory Scenario Workshops

Exploratory scenarios describe how the future might unfold based on known processes of change and extrapolations of past trends. These include "business-as-usual" scenarios, but can also describe bifurcations or other assumptions about regulation or adaptation as outlined below. Please refer to Scenarios Review for a fuller explanation and description of the exploratory scenarios building process.

Exploratory scenario building can be an involved and complex activity so to get maximal stakeholder participation you may have to hold a number of workshops across several months. If this is the case the workshops can be structured according to the following sequence:

Stage 1: Driver and issue identification/scopingThis can be conducted using a group of experts panel – see east of England case study in Scenario Review or the results of the issue workshops etc. Should this assessment of drivers reveal no uncertain and high impact possibilities – then scenarios do not need to be developed and more predictive and strategic tools should be used instead?

An “expert” should be defined as anyone with a relevant input, knowledge and experience of a particular topic. A panel of such experts is useful for the diversity of opinion they bring to bear thus minimising the possibility of overlooking some obvious facet of a question.

Some IMCORE partners expressed the need for “softening” up personal contact with significant stakeholders in the study zone which could also adduce greater clarity as to the critical drivers likely o be clustered and incorporated within the development of the scenario narratives – plus get more buy-in form them. One interview technique technique that could be used very effectively in so doing is the Seven Question approach.

Seven Questions“A technique used to draw information from key individuals, such as senior managers and decision makers, regarding the future. The seven open-ended questions cause the interviewee to pause, think out loud and to place themselves in the future. The seven questions are designed to explore information that the interviewee may have about the future, but which they may not have expressed yet……

1. The Vital Issues (the Oracle)

Would you identify what you see as the critical issue for the future? (When the conversation slows, continue with the comment) Suppose I had full fore-knowledge of the outcome as a general clairvoyant, what else would you wish to know?

2. A favourable outcome

If things went well, being optimistic but realistic, talk about what you would see as a desirable outcome.

3. An unfavourable outcome

As the converse, if things went wrong, what factors would you worry about?

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4. Where culture will need to change

Looking at internal systems, how might these need to be changed to help bring about the desired outcome?

5. Lessons from past successes and failures

Looking back, what would you identify as the significant events which have produced the current situation?

6. Decisions which have to be faced

Looking forward, what would you see as priority actions which should be carried out soon?

7. If you were responsible

If all constraints were removed and you could direct what is done, what more would you wish to include? (The 'Epitaph' question.)

There is always scope to modify or reword the questions to suit the project, but this general outline is maintained. This method is a good way to involve people who may not be able to participate in workshops or other futures activities, gains their support and engagement. Interestingly, seven question interviews, can quickly uncover a large percentage of the key strategic issues that the project faces – up to 70% in some cases.

[Source: UK Horizon Scanning Centre Toolkit]

Stage 2: Scenario Workshop

Consider the following before entering starting this stage as to the appropriateness of the participants and stakeholders you might invite – these could be

• The various interest groups within the study area and without (nationally and internationally) of relevance to those policy issues and contexts at issue.

• pre-existing institutional systems and structures of authority/power • extant networks of stakeholders (or the non-existence of them)• Combinations of these networks (or the non-existence of them) that have influence on the

various choices of policy outcomes.

Drivers previously identified in Stage 1 are presented. The drivers are identified within a wider set of acting forces and then reduced in number by ranking, discussion, selection, de-selection and other methods discursive analytical methods. When they have been reduced to a group of the most critical drivers, these can be assessed in greater detail with respect to their impact and uncertainty. At this stage if the drivers’ analysis reveals no uncertainty or high impact possibilities which are essential for scenario building, then more predictive and strategic tools should be used instead of exploratory scenarios.

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The scenario frame can begin to be built by identifying the axes of the scenario matrix - it is crucial that they are independent of each other. Critical uncertainties (high impact and high uncertainty) must then be clustered (5-10 per cluster). This clustering is typically done by the facilitator of the exercise – in the case of IMCORE professionals of the Expert Couplet Nodes themselves or their contracted experts– in consultation with the stakeholders, of course. Each driver cluster should be given a name and its importance assessed. Typically the more important clusters – ones seen to be the most relevant to the subject or topic – supply the axes. It is necessary however to test a number of other axes too to ascertain if they fit. Frequently, where policy areas are in question, the two axes of the 2x2 matrix relate to a trait of governance and some societal perspective e.g. Figure 7.

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Figure 7: 2X2 explanatory scenario matrix

Source: Powering our Lives: Sustainable Energy Management and the Built Environment

(DIUS 2008)

Exploratory Scenario Procedure Template

Optimum number of stakeholder participants per workshop group – maximum of 20? The timings below are only suggestions – the workshop facilitators should naturally be

responsive to participant attitudes and feedback, and adapt to them accordingly to obtain the most useful results.

TIME ACTIVITY

30 minutes Preparation of seminar room

Arrange tables for discussion groups of 6-8 (cabaret style)

Stick large sheet of white paper to the wall

Spray paper with glue

15 minutes [During coffee break] Complete preparation of the seminar room

Distribute 8 cards and a marker pen per table

Start workshop

15 minutes Allow participants to settle down

5 minutes Facilitator’s introduction

Note that this is going to be a rapid scenario process to explore how adaptation to climate change might look for the workshop theme; that the workshop is going to be highly participative and challenging

10 minutes Ice Breaker – personal view of the theme

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50 minutes Driving forces

Present scoping results of previous scenario build phases deriving from expert panels etc. Delegates will have received these in advance by email with sufficient time for preparatory reading.

OR

In groups, identify and agree

‘4-5 drivers of change in adapting X to climate change in the time period to 20XX’ as the workshop theme.

Facilitator to refer to PESTLE categories (Political, Economic, Social, Technological, Legislative, Environmental) as a guide although emphasise that they should not follow it rigidly.

10 minutes Collect and understand drivers

Facilitator to collect cards from each group. Facilitator to read out cards and check with authoring group what they mean. This should be a quick process e.g. 15-20 seconds for each card. After the cards are read, the facilitator puts them on the sticky paper on the wall. As the facilitator works through the cards, he/she should try to group them as far as possible. Again, this is a quick process and the aim is to group cards with clear linkages.

Mid-Workshop Break (optional)

Lunch? If time is limited this should be avoided and the participants.

Fed in situ in the workshop space. Ditto re tea and coffee AM and PM.

Facilitators to draw 2 X 2 matrix on the paper.

Prepare cards with ‘Importance’ and ‘Uncertainty’ written on them. Place ‘Importance’ on the top of the vertical axis and ‘Uncertainty’ on the right hand side of the horizontal axis. Where there are duplications in the cards i.e. same drivers nominated, leave only one of them to reduce the total number of cards

Resume Workshop

20 minutes Group drivers by importance and uncertainty

Facilitator to take cards individually and to ask whole group to rank them according to importance and uncertainty. Facilitator to place them on the matrix accordingly.

The facilitator needs to go through the cards rapidly – spend no more than 30-40 seconds on each

10 minutes Select 2 critical drivers

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Concentrate on the most important and uncertain drivers– which should be the top right quadrant. If there are 2 obvious candidates, select these and confirm with group that these are the 2 critical drivers. Facilitator to check with the group which 2 drivers is the most important/uncertain relative to each other (in the top right quadrant). If the group disagree/are unsure, facilitator to use a simple voting round – show of hands for each of the important/uncertain drivers that are discussed. Facilitator to total scores for each driver voted upon. Facilitator selects the two critical important/uncertain drivers

Re-position all cards (with the exception of the 2 final drivers) – place to the side of the matrix.

Remove the ‘Importance’ and ‘Uncertainty’ cards from the axes.

20 minutes Select scenario logics

Identify the logic of the drivers – and what the poles are (e.g. for ‘Changing social pattern’, it could be cohesion vs. fragmentation)

On cards, write down the ‘poles’ for the two drivers and place on the corresponding axes

Facilitator to go through each quadrant/pairs of axes to check that the logic of the emergent scenario is understood.

Facilitator to prompt group for title for each scenario – something descriptive and vivid

NOTE: It is important to select axes that are independent of each other.

The most critical uncertainties (high impact and high uncertainty) are then placed into clusters (say five to ten). Each cluster is named and its importance

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is assessed. Usually the most important clusters – the ones seen as most pertinent to the topic – are used as axes. However, it is important to test several axes for fit. It is fair to say that many times in policy areas, the two axes of a 2x2 matrix concern a governance characteristic and a societal perspective.

Tea /coffee served in workshop room

20 minutes Defining features of the scenarios

Option A

Group to offer some defining features of each of the scenarios. Facilitator to use the drivers’ cards from the initial exercise – still positioned to the side of the matrix as prompts. What would life in that scenario look like? Capture a few lines/paragraph for each scenario. Scribe to input captured information into PowerPoint template

Option B – if there are 4 groups of 6-8 people, each group to take one scenario and to discuss and write some defining features (10 mins). Each group to feedback these features to assemble a few lines/paragraph of life in that scenario.

45 – 50 minutes

Facilitators to deliver PowerPoint slide with scenarios and notes to central administrator for projection plenary feedback

Plenary feedback and discussion. Addition notes taken and further stages of the process explained to all participants

Conclusion - all materials loaded on website for post event additional feedback/comment for a given period- 1 week?

Once axes have been defined, terminal states for each axis need to be labelled or named. Such descriptions must be polar opposites and extreme in what they represent. They should however, be phrased in neutral non-judgemental terms (e.g. ‘high’ / ‘low’ instead of ‘good’ / ‘bad’). With the axes in place, drafting the scenarios can begin. A scenario storyline can now be developed, using different levels of language or detail depending on the outputs required and the temporal constraints. The more elaborate the narrative the greater the tangible benefits for the strategy and decision-makers. The storyline can also introduce new stakeholders to the project and the completed outputs. The storyline can be embodied in literary works, or as annexes in handbooks and are often visualised using illustrations.

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Further examples of different types of scenario narrative to be found the Case Studies section of the Scenarios Review.

Stage 3: feedback developed scenario narrative and seek further inputThis can be done remotely – using Delphi or another online survey for example and a group of experts from the ECN (see case studies in Scenarios Review).

Test the scenarios

The first true test of scenarios is to consider if they offer any additional insights. Comparing existing policy platforms against the various scenarios and looking for any deficiencies or ill-addressed areas is one way to achieve this. Gaming is a good way to bring life to the scenarios and to illuminate policy gaps. Still other scenario tests include: wind tunnelling, plausibility matrix, reverse engineering and the fifth scenario. These tests emphasise the relative robustness of individual decisions or policies within each of the scenarios.

Ail-ysgrifennu

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Figure 8: Populated 2X2 scenario matrix – Transport Adaptation (Source: Wales Futures Network Conference 2007)

Conducting Normative Scenario Workshops

Normative scenarios describe a pre-specified future - a world achievable (or avoidable) only through certain actions. Includes "worst case" scenarios and "target-based" scenarios, often requiring "back casting".

A normative scenario can be developed using a participatory process to outline future changes in climate and their everyday implications for coastal managers and stakeholders seeking to cope and adapt to them. Such a scenario is “normative”, because it makes explicit the values, attitudes and mindset of its authors. It depicts a preferable or preferred future vision (sometime called a “lead vision”) without going beyond the realm of that which is possible. Unlike exploratory scenarios –usually based on trend extrapolations and interactions or assumptions - normative scenarios are developed on the basis of hoped for future situations. They often employ back casting techniques (see below). After having set out a desired future state or condition, one must then identify the necessary steps, decisions or prerequisites to realise or achieve this particular state. .

Backasting This is a specific relatively easily grasped technique that is often integrated into the building of a specific variant of the normative scenario, which also allows policymakers and strategists to describe a vision of their preferred future and then set out the steps they will take to deliver it .

A normative scenario build employing backcasting can be laid out as follows:

1. Describe a preferred future.

2. Define the key differences between the preferred future and how things are today.

3. Identify the key steps needed to achieve the desired future.

4. Brainstorm the drivers and trends which could impact on your ability to achieve the preferred future.

5. Map the drivers and trends onto a 2x2 matrix according to whether they are barriers (to achieving the preferred vision) or enablers (towards achieving the preferred vision); and whether they are in your control or out of your control.

6. Discuss what you need to do to ensure that barriers inside your control are

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Figure 8: Normative scenario – backcasting timeline

minimised; and that enablers inside your control are optimised.

7. Explore how to get around barriers outside your control.

8. Define performance indicators that will help you monitor progress towards your preferred future.

Normative Scenario Procedure Model

Backasting Workshop Methodology (Source: UK Foresight Programme 2008)

The following methodology is suggested for an optimal participants group of 12-16 participants (you can probably go up to 20-30 in reality) and is reasonably short. Inserting a key point plenary to orientate the participants in the scenarios phase may be an option or attaching an expert panel session for review and comment on feedback at the end would be ways of getting more out of a single day workshop.

TIME ACTIVITY9.30 Introduction

Describe purpose and agenda Confirm the policy area being discussed

09.45 Describe the preferred future Group discussion What is our vision of success? Capture key points and issues and ensure that everyone agrees.

10.30 a.m.

Define key differences Describe the key differences between: the policy/project or subject area now and in the preferred future the external environment now and in the preferred future The internal environment now and the future.

11.00 a.m.

Identify the key steps to achieving the future Build a timeline between now and the preferred future. Describe the key events and steps that need to occur to achieve the preferred

future. Map them on the timeline.

11.45 Split into breakout groups. Brainstorm trends, drivers and events that might have an impact on the key

steps towards delivering the future. Capture trends, drivers and events on sticky notes. Map sticky notes on 2x2 matrix according to whether they are barriers (to

achieving the preferred vision) or enablers (towards achieving the preferred vision); and whether they are in your control or out of your control.

12.45 Lunch - could be served in the workshop rooms as a buffet to allow further flexibility of schedule and continuation of the drivers mapping

13.45 Controlling the future Four breakout groups Group 1 focus on barriers in our control:

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o What are they?o How will they affect our ability to deliver the preferred future?o What steps do we need to take to remove them?

Group 2 focus on enablers in our control: o What are they?o How will they affect our ability to deliver the preferred future?o How do we harness them to strengthen the strategy?

Group 3 focus on barriers outside our control: o What are they?o How will they affect our ability to deliver the preferred future?o What can we do to minimise their impact?

Group 4 focus on enablers outside our control: o what are theyo How will they affect our ability to deliver the preferred future?o How can we harness them to strengthen the strategy?

14.30 Feedback and discussion 15.00 Next steps

What are they? To be done when? By whom?

15.30 Close

Tips

PreparationIt is really useful to have external experts involved in this process. They offer an objective view and knowledge of the subject area.

You will need sticky notes and a large amount of wall space – with paper or whiteboard – to build the timelines for the activity.

ImplementationFocusing on a single future is a good way to create strategic purpose but it is important to remember that external drivers may continue to impact on – and shape the external environment. It is worth keeping an eye on them.

On the dayIt is helpful to define the timescale for delivering the preferred future. Once that is known, the timeline can be divided into sections – for example

Image of timelineParticipants generally find it easier to populate the first half of the timeline than the second. It is worth encouraging them to push out towards the future.

AfterConcentrate on key actions in the reporting and allocate tasks to particular stakeholders.

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Development of the scenario narrative requires the skills of a professional writer or at least one who is experienced in the field. All the different elements – the visions, the protagonists, and the background – have to be integrated. Stereotyped images of the future should be avoided as should satire based on current affairs. The draft of the scenario is then passed to the client and/or the larger scenario team for discussion and comment. In its narrative form it may resemble an Exploratory scenario in many cases. The feedback from client and the larger scenario team enriches the texture of the scenario with new ideas and visions that fit into the general setting complemented by insights derived from their specialist expertise.

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Hints, Tips and Inspirations

Testing Scenarios

The perspective from 2026: A typical approach to communicating scenarios – Stage 3: Exploratory Scenarios [Source: DEFRA Foresight Futures Toolkit]

“The Medicines Review Commissioner today launched a robust defence of his decision that psychedelic drugs should not be used in the treatment of conditions such as alcoholism, depression and post-traumatic stress disorder. ‘The latest research on the efficacy of psychedelics on these conditions is inconclusive,’ he said, adding ‘I am not, however, closing the door on their use in the future.’

The ruling has disappointed a number of pharmaceutical companies who were hoping for a more favourable outcome, but they have taken his remarks to mean that the next review will allow psychedelics to be used for treating depression at least. This will probably be enough to keep them happy meantime – alcoholism is a shrinking market anyway and using psychedelics to treat stress disorders is still fraught with ethical difficulties.

The Commissioner was anyway at pains to emphasise that his ruling is for the immediate future and that rehabilitation of psychedelics is not being blocked. He simply wishes to ensure that the evidence is in place before making his recommendation one way or another. This is as it should be and those who are expressing their disappointment should remember that it is only twenty years since any discussion of this type was quite certainly off the agenda...

[Extract from Foresight’s Brain Science Addiction and Drugs scenarios]

The most common way to communicate scenarios is to write stories that describe each future and – sometimes – how the world gets there. The stories can present the future from different stakeholder perspectives and can offer short DILOs (day in the life of) – short vignettes that illustrate what the future is like....

Scenario narratives can be long and detailed and developing presentations that use relevant and interesting images can make them more easily communicated in, for example, workshop settings. Dramatisation is another powerful device for presenting scenarios.

It is often helpful to summarise the main differences between scenarios in a comparison chart that can both act as a aide memoire for readers and provide an overview of the scenarios themselves (for an example see the final report, appendix 1 from the Foresight Tackling obesities: Future choices project):

The Medicines Review Commissioner today launched a robust defence of his decision that psychedelic drugs should not be used in the treatment of conditions such as alcoholism, depression and post-

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traumatic stress disorder. ‘The latest research on the efficacy of psychedelics on these conditions is inconclusive,’ he said, adding ‘I am not, however, closing the door on their use in the future.’ “

Michel Godet on Scenario Workshops

“Whatever the subject may be, the workshops are organized according to two regulatory principles or guidelines:

permit full freedom of speech to all speakers (individual time for thought in silence, feedback of all ideas in writing)

channel the participants' production (especially through a strict time management and above all through systematic recourse to techniques like classification of ideas, hierarchization, etc.)

Wrap-up sessions are organized at the close of the workshops. In these sessions, the different groups share and compare their thoughts. In this way, they acquire more thorough knowledge of the problems to be studied and the tools to be used. They are in a position to define together a working method adapted to the constraints of time, plus the means taken and the objectives saught. Note the method is not completely validated until after a cooling-off period.”

[Source: Millennium Project Futures Toolkit v.3 – 2009]

Jerome C. Glenn on Scenarios Workshops

“When selecting a specific method or designing a process, the following general questions and considerations should be kept in mind.

1. Success. What are the criteria for success from the process? Would success be an agreement or a single goal, decisions for direct implementation or the generation and acknowledgment of the plausibility of several scenarios? Is the expectation to give advice to decision makers or to educate the public about the issues as an impetus to create long-range plans? Is the intent of the process to produce a written document approved by the participants for submission to some authority or is the process a one-time activity, an initial step toward further processes, or even a periodic or continuing process? Many purposes can be served, such as: assisting an advanced technology research team to design their plans; collecting information from citizens on their aspirations; determining reactions to specific plans developed elsewhere; or sharing views to create a new direction for many purposes.

2. Future Orientation. How will the process ensure that long-term considerations do not get lost in arguments about who was right or wrong about the past? All too often people say, "before we talk about the future, we have to understand the past." Then the time runs out and nothing useful was discussed about the future to make better decisions today. Discussions of current decisions should be in the larger context of a range of alternative futures. Leaders of such processes should be chosen, in part, for their commitment to long-term thinking, willingness to involve futurists, and openness to genuinely new thought. When possible, a specific year in the future should provide a perceptual focus. For example, the UN General Assembly could use the year 2015 as the focus, since that is the year for achieving the UN Millennium Goals, or the National Long-Term

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Perspective Studies in Africa could use the year 2025 as the focus, since that is the year for achieving African economic integration as specified in the Treaty Establishing the African Economic Community. The arts should also be involved (possibly through competitions) to produce music, paintings, T-shirts, and other media to involve participants in a playful focus on the future.

3. Content. Is the process intended to examine one issue, such as the future of education or health care, or is it intended to examine a whole range of issues involved in answering the general future aspirations of a people? Are the conclusions from the process to be a consensus or a range of options with cost/benefit judgments? Will the agenda be flexible or fixed?

4. Participation. How many people will participate? In what ways? For how long? What range of knowledge and interests should be represented by the participants? Some processes are open to whoever wants to participate, as with public Delphis and can be with charrettes and Syncons. Other processes are open only to people institutionally related and pre-selected, such as the board of directors of a corporation or all the permanent secretaries of government. Still other processes try to select a new group that might never have worked together before. Selection processes could include: literature searches; contests with a prize for the best thinking on some topic; self-selection by those naturally attracted to the issue or process; or recommendations from persons appropriate or institutions relevant to the participatory process, asking those recommended the same question until a pattern of simultaneous recommendations and referrals occurs.

5. Integrity. This ingredient is the most important. How to ensure the integrity of the process is the most difficult and sensitive question to answer. If the process is manipulated to force a previously decided conclusion, then participants will feel used and betrayed and conflict could follow. The initiators of the process must be interested in the whole picture not just a part. For example, if a participatory process were designed to create an agreement on what energy system or systems should be developed over the next 25 years to reduce the "greenhouse effect," then the initiators should not come from only the solar power lobby or the nuclear industry. The initiators should earn a reputation of being "even handed." The integrity of the coordinator of the process is even more important than the initiator's. The coordinator's integrity is defined as the willingness to involve the full range of views and to allow the process to determine its own direction toward the purpose. The best techniques will produce fraudulent results if hidden agendas are allowed to circumvent genuine discussion. Warren Avis1 (of rent-a-car fame) defined consensus as occurring when "sufficient information makes the answer obvious to everyone." Integrity is a necessary condition for consensus.

6. Who should decide how these questions are answered and how the answers are integrated into the participatory process? A steering committee is best, whose members represent a range of views and expertise relevant to the purpose of the process. The steering committee's function will be detailed further as individual methods and techniques are explained below.

After these general questions are addressed, the designers of the process should ask more specific questions. Will the process:

1. involve the shy nontalker

1

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2. allow for innovation during the process

3. create one-way/two-way or group communication

4. allow time to reflect and save face if an individual's mind is changed

5. mix participants to break up cliques

6. make people feel comfortable enough to express private thoughts in public

7. develop a sense of interdependency or community by sharing common ground

8. make necessary information available

9. ensure that people are encouraged to think long-range (25 years or more)

10. encourage assessment of secondary and tertiary consequences of actions from alterative futures

11. include all perspectives on an issue through people representing those perspectives

12. have decision makers from government, business, and other authorities interact with the people affected by their decisions

13. connect the implementation system to the issue, such as the legislature or city council

14. avoid threatening individuals and groups

15. insist on clearly stated conclusions to prevent later misinterpretation

16. guarantee full-news media coverage

17. empower all participants equally in the process

18. create an environment for institutional decision makers to see the process as a positive opportunity?”

[Source: Millennium Project Futures Toolkit v.3 – 2009]

Priming participating stakeholders through issue interviews and 7 Questions – Stage 1: Exploratory Scenarios

[Source: RR600 - HSE futures scenario building: The future of health and safety in 2017]

http://www.hse.gov.uk/research/rrhtm/rr600.htm

“1.2.2 Issue Interviews

The project design called for approximately twenty ‘issue interviews’ with HSE policy-makers, topical experts, and leaders in related agencies and organisations. The interviews were designed to elicit respondents’ insights regarding emerging change, critical issues, positive and negative outcomes, and actions to create positive change. The team opted to use the ‘Seven Questions’ interview

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protocol (see above page x)....Each interview was conducted with both an interviewer and a scribe, to ensure complete transcripts. To achieve the goal of building HSE staff capacity in foresight, HSE staff initially took scribe roles while learning the interview technique, and then took the interview roles in later sessions.

The team designed a two-day scenario-building workshop for twenty-five participants (including the HSE horizon scanning staff). HSE had requested use of the ‘drivers matrix’ scenario approach popularised by Peter Schwartz in The Art of the Long View, clarified by Kees van der Heijden in Scenarios: The Art of Strategic Conversation and The Sixth Sense, and documented by case studies in Gill Ringland’s series of books on scenario use.

This process creates scenarios from drivers of change whose outcomes are both highly important and highly uncertain. The issues interviews provided the pool of potential drivers for scenario participants to evaluate. The horizon scanning team’s ‘hot topics’ provided further data to flesh out the scenario framework defined by the drivers matrix. Participants then brainstormed specific details – timelines, future events, winners/losers – and closed the workshop by briefly possible implications for health and safety generally, and the HSE.

Scenarios are based on documented evidence of emerging change.

As they are usually expressed as stories about the future, the links to that evidence are not always clear. The project design addressed this by specifying the creation of two sets of scenario narratives:

1) extended scenario descriptions that included citations and references to emerging change – the ‘research scenarios’; and

2) shorter, more vivid descriptions suitable for quick review during participative work – the ‘workshop scenarios.’

The ‘research scenarios’ were drafted based on the scenario brainstorming output, augmented by foresight data. They were then reviewed by the scenario building participants. The more vivid ‘workshop scenarios’ were then extracted from the research scenarios. The entire project team contributed to expressing the shorter ‘workshop scenarios’ to ensure they would provoke discussion relevant to health and safety in the workplace.

2. ISSUE INTERVIEWS

2.1 PROCESS

2.1.1 Choosing Respondents

Issue interviews have two key purposes: 1) gathering insights from within HSE on critical changes it faces; and 2) gathering alternative perspectives and insights from a wider view. Among scenario planners, respondents chosen to contribute a wider view are colloquially referred to as ‘remarkable people’ (RPs). They are remarkable primarily in working outside HSE’s organisational culture and its filters; they see the world differently and ask different questions from HSE staff. While remarkable people also operate within institutional cultures that come with their own cultural filters, they are

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different filters. When possible, RPs are also chosen for their expertise in fast-moving areas of change relevant to the scenario focus, and for their ability to think ‘out of the box.’ Combining this external perspective with HSE’s internal perspective creates a greater depth of perceptual field – a parallax view of change. To tap that wider view, the project team identified experts, leaders, and planners from academia and research as well as from relevant government, private, and non-profit organisations. The resulting pool of respondents offered gender, cultural, and professional diversity. In addition to HSE itself, organisations represented included trade unions, government science advisors, futures consultancies, academic research centres, and non-profits focussed on health, workplace safety, and rehabilitation.

2.1.2 Interview Protocol

The team agreed that resources (both time and funding) allowed for twenty interviews involving staff supported by HSL personnel, and supplementary interviews (subject to time limits) performed by HSL personnel only. All interviews used the ‘Seven Questions’ technique and followed the protocol described above. The key elements were:

All interviews were unattributable. Names of respondents were kept only on a master set of scripts, controlled by the team. The respondents controlled the interview and told us what they thought was important in

the agreed context. Interviewers avoided ‘leading the witness’. While they did ask supplementary questions to

draw out further evidence, every effort was made not to ‘shape the evidence’ for the respondents.

After initial pleasantries and agreeing that the interview would take approximately X hours, interviews began with agreement on the topic and on the horizon of enquiry.

“May we agree that our topic is ‘the shape of society and government and its impact on health and safety’?” “May we agree to think towards 2017 and even beyond?”

Before starting on the ‘Seven Questions,’ interviewers broke the ice by asking, “What do you see as the main issues affecting the shape of society and government, and its impact on health and safety, by 2017?”

Respondents brought out 3 to 4 issues that were then developed in dialogue to provide a basis for the ‘Seven Questions’. This start gave respondents a chance to order their thoughts before the interview probed more deeply.

The interview process then continued with the ‘Seven Questions’ ( see page x)

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Supplementary techniques and definitions

[insert brief intro]

Axes

The core of the 2x2 double uncertainty method is that the two axes represent the most significant uncertainties of the overall system under scrutiny (the system is defined by the project question). The scenarios are then created by combining uncertainties. There are further criteria in developing the axes: the axes should not influence each other; and they should represent the most important and uncertain drivers, which will have been identified in the analysis process. In addition, the scenarios created by the combination of the axes should generate challenging strategic questions for the organisation, sector, or domain.

[Roads Less Travelled: Different Methods, Different Futures by Andrew Curry and Wendy Schultz 2009]

DELPHI

The Delphi method is a systematic, interactive futures method relying on a panel of experts. These experts answer questionnaires in two or more rounds. After each round, a facilitator provides an anonymous summary of the experts’ forecasts from the previous round as well as the reasons they provided for their judgments. The experts are thus encouraged to revise their earlier answers in light of the replies of other members of their panel. It is believed that during this process the range of the answers will decrease and the group will converge towards the "correct" answer. Delphi is based on the belief that forecasts from a structured group of experts are more accurate than those from unstructured groups or individuals.[Millennium Project]

Drivers

These are the key forces which are driving and shaping change in relation to the policy area or aspects of the future you are considering. A driver is also any phenomenon that may change the state of a system. A driver may change sources, pathways, receptors or a combination of them: [Foresight]

Sources: Weather-related phenomena (rainfall, marine storms, snow melt etc.) that generate water that could cause flooding.

Pathways: Mechanisms by which water travels from its source to places where it may affect receptors (e.g. runoff, fluvial flows, sea defence overtopping, floodplain inundation).

Receptors: People, industries and built and natural environments that flooding can affect.

Expert Couplet Node (ECN)

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Expert Couplet Nodes ECNs) were established in the COREPOINT project (IMCORE’s precursor) to address the issue of sustaining ICZM, by building capacity for knowledge transfer between research centres and local authorities involved in coastal research and management. In other words, the ECN model equates to the implementation of local level collaborative enquiry targeted towards capacity building in ICZM. The couplet methodology is applied at the local scale, which is deemed most appropriate for the delivery of tangible benefits to coastal communities. The ECNs embedded within the project aim to ensure that a paradigm shift in attitude and behaviour towards traditional science and management practices takes place.

Futures

‘Futures’ is a multi-faceted and multi-disciplinary field. It can be a way of thinking a practical application an academic pursuit.

Discussions on ‘the future’ – and the futures field – are underpinned by the concepts of complexity and uncertainty. Futures is not a synonym for forecasting. Although futures makes use of forecasts, it is not about predicting one future. Rather it is concerned with asking ‘What if’ questions and exploring how key variables, trends and events might shape a range of possible futures. Futures is a process used to make sense of complexity and uncertainty –for organisations and individuals.

Futures approaches are creative and anticipatory. They improve organisational (and individual) capacity to think strategically. Looking at the future(s) helps us to make better decisions in the present.

Futures approaches can be used by all organisations – government, companies, NGOs and voluntary bodies. Examples of the areas where futures approaches are used include:

Developing a new strategy or policy Generating dialogue about the future of the organisation or territory Making an investment decision Understand the impact of external influences on the organisation Challenging mindsets and shaking off complacency Avoiding path dependency and ‘business as usual’

Many tools have been developed to help apply futures. Examples include trend analysis, scenario building, Delphi and futures workshops. [CRI-FI]UncertaintyThe nature of uncertainty is multi-dimensional: it includes statistical uncertainty, scenario uncertainty and recognized ignorance in observed data, in climate models, in climate impacts, in policy context, and on all these locations uncertainties are both epistemic (imperfect knowledge) and stochastic (intrinsic variability in the climate system.

PESTLE

PESTLE analysis stands for "Political, Economic, Social, Technological, and Legal and Environmental analysis" and describes a framework of macro-environmental factors used in helping to identify the different driving forces in play in a particular situation. Sometimes this is also represented as PEST

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(without the Legal and Environmental). It is a very useful and widely employed tool – especially at the trend analysis stage - as it offers a wide ranging framework from which to build scenarios.

Scenarios (also see Scenarios Review)

A tool for ordering one’s perceptions about alternative futures environments in which one’s decisions might be played out. [SchwartzScenarios are a recognised technique for investigating long-term futures where there are many complex and interacting variables, and where the future is very uncertain. [Government Office for Science 2004]

A plausible description of how the future may develop, based on a coherent and internally consistent set of assumptions about key relationships and driving forces (e.g., rate of technology changes, prices). Note that scenarios are neither predictions nor forecasts . [IPPC Glossary of Terms, 1995]

Scenarios are coherent, internally consistent and plausible descriptions of possible future states of the world, used to inform future trends, potential decisions, or consequences. They can be considered as a convenient way of visioning a range of possible futures, constructing worlds outside the normal time spans and processes covering the public policy environment. [UKCIP]

Windtunnelling

Users can employ windtunnelling to test how future changes in the external environment might affect their ability to deliver a particular project or set of strategic objectives. By inviting participants to imagine how they would meet their objectives in different scenarios, windtunnelling helps them identify critical planning points where strategy needs to be flexible and adaptable. Windtunnelling is viewed as a good public sector technique for policy testing.

Process:

1. Develop scenarios, or work with suitable existing ones. 2. Clarify the project idea or desired outcome to be tested.3. Examine how the external conditions described in each scenario affect delivery of the

desired outcome.4. Identify the implications for strategy implementation.

Issues trees

An issues tree establishes a key question and a logical sequence for addressing it. The exercise gives appropriate focus at the outset of a futures investigation. It can encourage the participation of stakeholders and broaden the knowledge of participants.

The key output is a hierarchy of questions that define the core elements of the topic. Each question is addressed by a sub-level set of questions. Together, these questions form a clearoverview of keyworkstreams.

An issues tree can be used to identify key areas to analyse further. It can also be used to help align the work of a project team or to communicate the broad outline of the project.

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Process:

1. Introduce the broad scope.2. Capture critical issues.3. Discuss the various issues.4. Consider the dependencies of the issues.5. Construct trial issues trees.6. Select the final tree. Use to identify work streams.

Trend analysis

Trend analysis is a study of historic performance in order to indicate possible future trends. Existing trends and their interrelatedness are identified. Underlying drivers are understood. Trend longevity and impact is assessed. Trends are usually described as short, medium or long term.

Process:

1. Set the boundaries of the investigation – time allotted, sources, areas to research, degree of impact, etc.

2. Assign areas of investigation to the research team. 3. Conduct research by locating information, observation, cross-referencing and drawing

synthesis. 4. Share findings (a workshop setting is ideal). Compile the trends. Try to understand their

underlying causes.5. Revise the trends to include new or restated observations of the participants. Assess for

impact and importance. Circulate to all stakeholders.6. Develop response by focusing on the most critical trends and their underlying causes.

Fifth Scenario

The fifth scenario exercise is a workshop-based discussion where participants use elements from an existing set of four scenarios to describe their preferred future and the steps required to deliver it. The approach allows policy makers and strategist to develop a ‘customised’ scenario which builds on the strengths, and overcomes the weaknesses, of the existing scenario set; and to describe the steps they will take to deliver it.

Process:

1. Present and discuss an existing set of scenarios.2. Use a plausibility matrix to identify which scenario is closest to the future the group aspires

to.3. Describe a fifth scenario that improves on this scenario by:

• building on its strengths• overcoming its weaknesses • drawing on positive elements from other scenarios.

4. Agree the steps and tasks needed to deliver the fifth scenario.

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