Escaping the Matrix: Designed Scenario Strategies
When facing a foresight tsunami (ecological, demographic, economic, technological, and political change), how should institutions respond with due care? New methods offer true diligence in foresight, so no matter what inevitable outcomes occur, stakeholders can know they acted on best available knowledge. OCAD University’s Strategic Foresight and Innovation program has produced groundbreaking work that rethinks the stable paradigms of established scenario practice. Venerable scenario processes fail to address inherent individual and group biases of under-conceptualization, over-abstraction, risk blindness, and lack of variety and expressiveness.
Three breaking methods will be presented: Scenario fiction, which extends scenarios with rigorous narratives and dialogic structuring; creating strategic pathways from multi-stakeholder dialogue scenario modeling, modeling risk, and mitigating bias; and reasoning about the unknown results of known processes.
Following a brief expert panel of invited OCADU faculty and graduates, participants will engage in a rapid foresight workshop adapting simple techniques drawn from these advanced scenario methods.
Participants will leave the session with an understanding of:
- New methods in scenario practice developed by professors and grad students in Toronto/Canada’s Strategic Foresight & Innovation program.
- The 90 minute panel will use active workshop exercises (small group session) to help the audience apply the ideas.
Peter Jones is an associate professor, OCAD University, Toronto; senior fellow of the Strategic Innovation Lab; and founder and managing partner of Dialogic Design International, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
John Cassel is a graduate student at OCAD University, Champaign, Illinois, USA
Suzanne Stein is a foresight analyst, mentor, and professor, Ontario College of Art and Design, Canada Toronto, Canada
Karl Schroeder, is a foresight consultant and award-winning science fiction writer. He is the author of nine novels, Toronto, Canada.
Jonathan Resnick is a recent graduate of the Strategic Foresight & Innovation program at OCAD University, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
