Using strategic foresight as a framework for personal growth

Traditionally, strategic foresight is used in a corporate, policy or speculative art and design context. Its methods and tools help to generate resilient strategies for the future of business, governance and society. The foresight process begins with framing and scoping system and the problems within them. And through a series of iterative stages, it involves scanning the horizon, speculating possible futures and creating strategies for getting there. The goal of foresight within these contexts is to help define and navigate the complexity and uncertainty of the present and future. This process of problem-solving and planning for resilience is gaining immense popularity, particularly in a post-pandemic world ridden with broken systems and new needs.

There are other design frameworks, such as design thinking, that are used to solve complex problems. Design thinking is also a future-focused discipline that aims to solve problems in current states and create better future states. But it lacks in staying systemically rooted, and this is where foresight really flourishes.

Understanding the benefits that foresight brings to organizations and systems, I have been thinking about how it might produce similar benefits at the individual level. Only a handful of foresight practitioners have considered how the creative visioning…