Category Archives: Futurist

Know Your Future!

Futures, Futurist, Strategic Foresight

It’s true. You can tell what your future is going to be!

You can also tell what the future is going to be of that business you work for, that not-for-profit you support, that locale that you live in.

It’s going to pan out one of four ways:

  1. business as usual
  2. some transformative event
  3. breakdown and anarchy
  4. increasing restrictions and rules

Simple!

But, and here’s where strategic thinking, strategic foresight, and futures models come into play. By analysing each of these four possible paths for risks and opportunities you can be prepared.

And further, by thinking though how each of these might happen, and then taking appropriate action, you may be able to, if you will, change your future
For more, visit Dellium Advisory, follow on Twitter, connect using LinkedIn, or review my IT-centric blog.

Wilber’s “Integral Theory”

Futures, Futurist, Strategic Foresight

Ken Wilber’s “Integral Theory” (2011) is a comprehensive view of life.  In his words, he was aiming for a comprehensive theory about the fullness of life:

“I sought a world philosophy—or an integral philosophy—that would believably weave together the many pluralistic contexts of science, morals, aesthetics, Eastern as well as Western philosophy, and the world’s great wisdom traditions. Not on the level of details—that is finitely impossible; but on the level of orienting generalizations: a way to suggest that the world really is one, undivided, whole, and related to itself in every way: a holistic philosophy for a holistic Kosmos, a plausible Theory of Everything.”

This Integral Theory, or Theory of Everything, is a four quadrant model.

  • Q1 [Upper Left]: Interior; Individual (“I”, intentions)
  • Q2 [Lower Left]: Interior; Collective (“We”, culture)
  • Q3 [Lower Right]: Exterior; Collective (“Its”, social)
  • Q4 [Upper Right]: Exterior; Individual (“It”, behavioural)

Wilber adds depth and richness to this model through the overlaying onto each of these quadrants succeeding waves and lines of development, as well states and types of consciousness.

This model’s  primary purpose is for developing multiples frame of reference. That is, this model is used as guide to understanding an issue from many orientations. A simple example is money. When viewed from the Upper Left Quadrant money is seen as an indicator of the relative value that an individual places on a good or service. When viewed from Lower Right Quadrant, money is seen as socially acceptable form of facilitating  the transfer of ownership of goods and services.

Whilst there are critics of Integral Theory, from my perspective the shortcomings of this model are around the biases, preconceptions and worldview that one would bring to using this for the purposes of analysis.

Despite the propensity for the influence of personal worldviews and preconceptions upon the operation and of this model, the value in using Integral Theory is that emerging issues are rigorously examined.

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Wilber, K. (2011).” A Theory of Everything: An Integral Vision for Business, Politics, Science, and Spirituality”  Shambhala Publications. Kindle Edition.

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For more, visit Dellium Advisory, follow on Twitter, connect using LinkedIn, or review my IT-centric blog.

An Introduction to Environmental Scanning

Cognitive Strategy, Futures, Futurist, Innovation, Strategic Foresight

Based on extracts from one of my recent essays: “What is the impact upon donations of this technological age”?

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Choo (1999) states in the seminal article “The Art of Scanning the Environment” that “environmental scanning is the acquisition and use of information about events, trends and relationships in an organisation’s external environment”. It, environmental scanning, is broader than competitor intelligence and competitive intelligence, which are used to analyse a competitor’s actions and the shared market environment respectively. In fact, environmental scanning is used to scan every sector of the external milieu.

From the perspective of further understanding environmental scanning it is helpful to differentiate between the scanning modes. These modes broadly viewing and scanning. Of the two, scanning is more deliberate and focused:

  • Undirected viewing:       information used for sensing
  • Directed viewing:             information used for sense making
  • Informal search                information used for learning
  • Formal search                   information used for decisions

So, for the  purposes of categorisation, the scanning modes that you use could be a mix of directed viewing and informal search. Perhaps because you know what the area of strategic need is, undirected viewing isn’t appropriate. Likewise with formal search. As the output won’t be directly used for decision making, the formal search category won’t be used.

Now, with respect to the process of environmental scanning, using directed viewing to gather a breadth of information about the area of strategic need and informal search to strengthen the case for further understanding of the initial hits. For example, a “scanning hit” on philanthropy was the work of the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation. Analysis of the work they do, giving for specific outcomes, should lead to informal searches returning articles about this topic.

It is through its outcomes that the value of environmental scanning can be realised. It can be seen that the outputs of environmental scanning or the same as information acquisition in the sphere of Organisational Learning (Sanchez, 2008). Sanchez goes onto to conclude that the activity of organisational learning creates value in and for the organisation.

However, as Choo points out, the quality of environmental scanning may be affected by internal perceptions of either the information source’s credibility or relevance of the information itself.

Therefore, by being cognisant of the both the inhibitors to scanning quality and the process of scanning, highly relevant outcomes, or hits, can be realised.

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Choo, C (1999). “The Art of Scanning the Environment”, Bulletin of the American Society for Information Science, Feb-Mar 1999 p21-24

Sanchez, J (2008). “Organisational Learning and value creation in business markets”, European Journal of Marketing , Vol 44, No 11/12, 2010, pp1612-1641]]

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For more, visit Dellium Advisory, follow on Twitter, connect using LinkedIn, or review my IT-centric blog.