Scenarios of the future
Scenarios of the future are visions of future opportunities and development paths. They present various ‘future’ conditions in a comprehensive and systematic way. They broaden the perspective of perceiving what the future holds.
In building them, we rely on identified trends and factors of change in five areas: social, technological, economic, environmental, and political (STEEP analysis). We pay special attention to these changes in cases where it is difficult to predict what direction they will take as they can have a completely transformational impact on reality.
There are many ways of scenario planning and creating them can be based on one or two variables;
the goal can be to create a more holistic image, showing relationships between many elements. These holistic visions give the most interesting effects. Depending on the chosen methodology, the scenarios can be presented using charts, illustrated stories or fragments of stories. It is worth emphasising that the development of scenarios is only the first step. In the next stage, using knowledge of the company/institution/industry, we define what scenario changes should be made to effectively function in the reality described in the scenario.
What future scenarios provide:
- Variant thinking about the future instead of focusing on one preferred version,
- Comprehensive and multidimensional analysis of the external environment,
- Identification of new technologies that have the implementation potential and allow for the realisation of a given scenario of the future,
- Support in the process of planning and making strategic decisions,
- Lists of recommendations regarding necessary changes in the areas of, e.g., processes, products/services, communication, technology – for each of the future options;
How we implement them:
Future scenarios are built by a team of infuture institute experts based on previous qualitative and quantitative research. They are based on both existing data and creative methods. They can be developed in a workshop together with a group of specialists or representatives of a given industry. In the next step, we verify the created concepts of the future using quantitative methods.
Sample assignments:
As part of the ‘Employee of the Future’ report, we created 5 future scenarios that combine selected change factors and show their mutual impact. For each scenario, we also defined the features that the employee of the future should have, the competences that would be necessary for him/her, the skills he/she would have to possess, as well as determining how the needs and values of such an employee would change. In addition, we created a sample job offer for one of the professions of the future i.e. ‘robot consultant’. Below please find a network of change factors along with the scenarios of the future based on them.
Robots play an important role in human life as carers for the elderly or as home helpers. That is why it is so important that elderly and lonely people find the right robot suited to their needs. As a robot consultant, you will advise our clients about which robot they should choose. Your tasks will include observing the client, getting to know him/her and his/her needs. Understanding new technologies (IoT, AI) and their application in the home environment of our clients are the competencies that we value the most.
