tools

How to use cross impact analysis

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Sometimes a blunt-force tool is best for grinding through the analysis and exploration of ideas.

Cross impact analysis* is just that. It forces you to test out the interactions among a set of forces, trends, or decisions.

The image at the right shows the basic concept, but let’s look a little closer at how to make this tool simple and useful.

In the basic grid you would relate, e.g. Item A to Item B, and Item B to Item A. But working the crosses two ways is hard. To do it more simply, just assume each pair interacts. Also, you don’t cross a thing with itself.

Thus in the stair-step cross impact diagram at the right, we work only in the unshaded cells. With this tool, you can explore emerging change to discover possible future outcomes.

Below is a filled-out example about the future consumer marketplace:

Where to use cross impacts

Cross impact is a back-shop or group-process tool. It is for exploration. Most of the time, nobody will want to see the gory details of your cross impact effort, though it is possible to tidy up and streamline the results for sharing with others.

What can you cross impact?

  • Trends/change forces
  • Proposed actions, strategies, or decisions
  • Different stakeholders, vis-a-vis an issue

Cross impact analysis resource page

For more on cross impact analysis, see: LINK. 

Conclusion

No matter the format used, the cross impact tool insists we acknowledge that nothing happens in a vacuum. That’s its real payoff. And the process of doing the analysis is its strongest benefit. Give it a try. Below is a link for a PDF of a template and instructions. 

Cross impact template and instructions

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*This post gives a view of one of multiple approaches to cross impact analysis. The original form, invented by Ted Gordon and Olaf Helmer [LINK] is a quantitative method for assessing probabilities and/or the magnitude of impacts between different factors or decisions. My use is qualitative and is focused on discovery of potential future outcomes. 

Scrivener: A great writing tool

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Scrivener authoring programFor a few months now, I’ve used the authoring software, Scrivener [available for Mac and Windows. I use the $40 Windows version] for writing fiction and non-fiction, whenever my task requires more than a short piece. The program has proven to be a terrific authoring tool. Let me tell you why.

Though the program came highly recommended by writers whose blog posts I read, at first, I was skeptical about it. Early advice as I began to learn to write fiction was, essentially, just get to the writing, don’t chase all sorts of tools for the work, just do it.

I tried it anyway. I started with a trial version, and quickly saw its advantages.

I started using it for fiction writing I was doing for a class. I was writing a short story with about five scenes in it. The program allowed me to build the story and its scenes as I cared to, dropping in and out of different parts while maintaining the ability to view and work on the whole story, if I liked. Some writers focus on word count, and I could keep close track of that, too.

Realizing Scrivener’s power and convenience, I then tried the program for building a transcribed collection of letters from 1906 and 07, and compiling the associated research and annotations for that work. Scrivener was terrific for that, allowing me to take each old letter from its an archive box and transcribe it, edit it, and chase down some of the details in the letter through research, and even collect images to publish with the letters. Putting the letters into their chronological order was a since.

For now, that collection of letters is part of a digital archive for my family, whose forebear wrote the letters. I am well set up, however, to turn the collection into a book manuscript.

I also used the program for client work for my business, setting up a complex and long report based on big forces of change shaping global society. Scrivener let me add and arrange sections at will, and work on ones I was ready to develop, as I saw fit.

Now I am also using Scrivener to write a novel, and the program’s ability to let me develop scenes and chapters, and to work on the ones I am ready to, when I am ready to, and to add detail, annotation, etc. to any and all parts, is a powerful and convenient feature.

Finally, in all these examples, the program has a great benefit to someone like me. I tend to want to perfect, refine, and decorate my written work, choosing fonts, aligning text, settign margins and line spacing, etc. before I’ve actually gotten the thing written. I can make MS Word jump through hoops–I am quite good at manipulating format in Word, but that’s a total distraction from the actual work of writing.

Scrivener strips away that distraction. It’s about the simple task of writing a body of prose–you fix it up visually, later. Getting things written with the bare bones font on screen is superb discipline for me. MS Word too easily lets me design a document before I’ve really written it.

I’ve not tested all the features of the program, and truth be told, I’ve not yet compiled a draft work for anyone other than a small group of writing colleagues in a class, or a draft report for my client project. I’ve yet to truly put a written peice of any large size to bed as a compiled work. But when I do, I’ve seen, I can choose the format for the given purpose: manuscript, magazine subscription, and so on. Those templates are part of the program. I look forward to taking things to the next step.

 

Experiencing the future Part 2: How to build futures experiences

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I made the case in my previous post Experiencing the future Part 1: Getting beyond analysis and changing minds that experiencing the future is vital to good foresight and benefits organizations. I don’t claim to be a practitioner of the most exciting and advanced experiential futures, but I have decades’ experience getting real business execs in real organizational situations to engage the future better, adding experiences that fit what business seems able to embrace and make useful.

Below I offer some “how to”  suggestions for making foresight more experiential. For more on the leading edge, have a look at The Sceptical Futuryst, Stuart Candy’s blog—his topic list is chock full of intriguing and valuable ideas about helping people experience the future. And try a Google search on “experiential futures”.

The ideas below range from the simple to the somewhat more challenging and complex.

Better scanning – See Talk to the Frog and the ideas I share in Ideas on effective environmental scanning in the digital age which make the case for understand how the world is changing better, where possible experiencing that change first hand. The philosophy there is, “get out from behind the mouse.” This is the key to getting a more visual, tactile, and experiential sense of future possibilities–where the first clues or examples of them are in our world now.

Clear ideas about the future – The best foresight concepts are evocative descriptions of future possibilities, which begin to get our heads into something new. For example, the concept of virtual reality. This kind of futures experience is in our thoughts, but that is already more powerful than just engaging with data and analysis about change.

An image of something that may become big in our future. The Espresso Book Machine produces books on demand

Images – There are, by definition, no pictures of the future. But we can do at least two things about that:

1). Create pictures of the future as an artist can, or you can do without art skills, simply doodling, collaging, etc. and

2). Finding pictures of things that may already exist, but aren’t commonplace, and represent something we may see much more of in the future. For example, a picture of a goods-producing kiosk such as the Espresso Book Machine is inspiring of a wide-range of future ideas about goods produced on demand.

On these first two points, I’ve shared some advice for when you are presenting to groups in Giving presentations on the future.

Role playing – Having people get their heads into a particular identity, different from their own, is a powerful way to begin to shift their understanding and give them a different experience. And you can get a group to do this together, putting them into a simulated situation where their identities and circumstances are different, showcasing what might be true in the future. We also like to work with the “TOPs” (technical, organizational, and personal) multiple perspectives method with groups. This concept, described in detail here, was originated by futurist and systems science expert Hal Linstone. It helps a group understand the common perspectives that shape and are shaped by an organization’s decisions. We’ve had great success asking a group to break into three groups, each taking up one of these perspectives to confront issue or ideas about change.

“suffering” – A version of role playing is to have people lose something, or simulate losing something to highlight a potential future change. We had this experience with a futures team who decided to have those participating in a dinner be fed in three ways: normal food, a lavish feast, and plain rice and (simulated) dirty water. Each group had something to think and talk about, from different, simulated perspectives. You can also consider the opposite of “suffering”–Why not try out some utopian ideas and get people to describe and play with what the future would be like if something great happened, such as the end of hunger or cancer.

Getting people to see, touch, experience the leading edge of change: Packaging Executives visit a Center for Hard to Recycle Materials

In the world – It’s particular powerful with office-bound people to get them “out from behind the mouse” and out into experiences different from their own. That can mean seeing things that exist today, but that represent a change we will likely see more of. For example, we put a group of packaging executives on a bus and took them first to a standard municipal recycling plant and then to a center for hard to recycle materials (aka a “CHaRM”). The CHaRM is a rare facility–at the time there were only a few in the world. But it may represent a vital future in their business. Despite their being in the packaging business, some had never been to a conventional recycling facility, let alone to a CHaRM. It was eye-opening for some and idea-provoking for most of them. I reflected on this kind of experience in an earlier post, Offsetting your suburban, middle class, white collar bias which advocates for you getting loose of whatever built-in perspectives and biases you might have.

Scenario building – I’ve written several times about the scenario method and my fondness for it. Its power in really getting people’s head into the future is remarkable and reliable. Scenarios go far beyond basic trend analysis and forecasting to depict in words and/or pictures whole futures, with the changes we are thinking about portrayed in real situations. The greatest power of the method is in experiencing the process, though the outputs can be terrific tools for communicating about the future and sharing the experience with others.

Farmville and other mobile/web games teach people about big complex systems

Gaming – Games give players the power to shape future outcomes. They are a way to bring alive the forces and countercurrents possible that we try to convey in scenarios. Consider for example the power of fantasy ball teams in bringing to life the meaning and power of strategic decisions. More games are about life and decisions than ever. The mobile/computer game Farmville is teaching its virtual farmer users about climate change, for example.

Other tools, techniques and methods

  • Virtual worlds – online and console gaming can simulate futures in elaborate and immersive ways, including allowing players to game out outcomes of decisions.
  • Experiential scenarios – a method for bringing future possibilities more alive for people’s learning and understanding, debate and discussion. It goes beyond art and narrative storytelling to, for example, create experiences in the real world, such as simulating a pandemic’s effects on a city, as was done in Coral Cross.
  • Artifacts from the future – a long-time feature at the back of Wired magazine that features similated objects; consumer products, for example, from some future year. See: Found futures.
No matter how far into the experiential to reach, you’ll gain something from working to bring the future more alive with your colleagues. It’s worth the effort and the risk you’ll take. Give it a try!
Images: Espresso Book Machine via ondemandbooks.com, CHaRM by jbmahaffie, Farmville by tankgore1 via Flickr

Experiencing the future Part 1: Getting beyond analysis and changing minds

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It’s not possible to directly experience the future, it hasn’t happened yet, you cannot go there. And it’s also not possible to directly experience the past—we don’t have a way to go back. The situations have a lot in common–our understanding of past and future are challenged in much the same ways.

I’ve played with the problem on both ends. Before I became a futurist, I was intent on becoming an archaeologist, and studied archaeology at the bachelor’s and master’s levels. Over those years, I met a lot of archaeologists who went beyond books and field research to understand the past better. They tried out ancient technologies and lifeways. They were experiential archaeologists.

Eccentric Flint, Late Classic Maya

My own experiential effort was brief—I tried flint knapping—the shaping process used to make stone tools from cryptocrystalline stone (flint or chert). That gave me an appreciation for some of the finer specimens of stone axes, blades, spear points and arrowheads we were excavating at a Woodland Indian site in southern Illinois, and the amazing Mayan eccentrics (see picture) I learned about when working in Belize. The main results of my experiential effort were cut and blending hands. But I gained an appreciation for ancient technologists.

A recent article in the New Yorker brought this back to mind (abstract here). It tells the story of Lucy Worsley the Chief Curator, at Historic Royal Palaces, a non-profit that runs the Tower of London, Kensington Palace, and Hampton Court Palace, Kew Palace, and the Banqueting House at Whitehall.

Worsley’s work is about bringing to life the lives of Britons (mainly royals) from centuries ago. Among the big experiences she has worked on is recreating and eating a meal served to George III on February 6, 1789.

Leading edge futurists are doing things like this too, and their efforts are a superb way to bring the future alive—to get people beyond the analytical to ideas (experiences) about the future they can actually feel and understand.

Futurist Stuart Candy is one of the field’s leading practitioners. He frequently blogs about experiential futures at The Sceptical Futuryst. Stuart has developed techniques around experiential futures scenarios and recently completed a PhD on that topic, “The Futures of Everyday Life: Politics and the Design of Experiential Scenarios.”

Lucy Wolsey—the experiential historian—has caught a lot of flack from more “serious” historians who think her efforts are silly, misleading, etc. The experiential futurist risks the same thing, with the most likely push-back being from business clients who think their people won’t tolerate things like role playing, and that good business behavior is about PowerPoint briefings in a meeting room, not going places, seeing things, and trying things.

There is at least one blog that focuses on what’s wrong with “experiential archaeology”, it’s called Bad Archaeology. Its authors make the reasonable point that “We cannot shake off the contemporary nature of the experience” when trying to simulate the past. And further, “When we experience places like Stonehenge, Giza or West Kennet, we are experiencing 21st Century, contemporary places.” I think these guys go too far, and they’ve painted themselves into a philosophical corner. There’s plenty of learning and insight to be had by standing at the foot of the Great Pyramid.

The same problem applies to the future, our presentist tendencies are unavoidable as we try, pretend even, to experience what the future might be like.

But I’ve seen over the years that to shake people loose from their fixed thoughts about the future, and to get them to examine their assumptions, you have to try to take them new places, and analytical thinking won’t always get that done. Experiences help change minds.

Lucy Worsley, debating the validity and value of experiential work, told a scholarly audience: “I don’t feel my job will be done until history is as popular as the ‘The X-Factor.’” I am sure they hated that thought, but she’s right, you get more done if you engages people’s minds and hearts, whether trying to have them understand the past or the future.

Not being from a traditionally, academic-based discipline, futurists are less persnickety than historians about the value and validity of experiences. But these efforts can still be a hard sell. It’s worth trying.

Note: A little more on my overarching point about experiences is in my post Two sides of foresight work.

I’ll follow up straight away with ideas on how you can build the experiential side of foresight.

5 critical things in foresight

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What you must have for success in foresight:

A purpose — Why are you exploring the future? The answer will guide what you do, and how you do it
A mindset — The future matters, there are alternative possible futures, and we need to think new thoughts and make new connections to be successful
A habit — Once you get the futures thinking going, don’t stop! Keep it going. It’s not something you do once, and get done
A toolkit — Find and use the tools that will bring you rigor and success as you explore the future
A community — Don’t try to go it alone. Find some people, inside and outside your organization, that will care about what you are doing, listen to your ideas, and hopefully help you explore the future

There are tips, tools, and advice throughout the posts here on ForesightCulture to help you get and refine these. I urge you to explore the posts. The categories displayed on the right side of this page are a great route to specific posts that may help.

Jump start your future!

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Leading Futurists toolsA couple of months ago, my Leading Futurists LLC partner Jennifer Jarratt and I built some new pages on our company website, www.leadingfuturists.biz. Those pages (click here) are about getting started in exploring the future, and they are meant to help us promote our services in helping organizations do just that.

Nevertheless, the pages also offer some clues to how you can get started, so I urge you to have a look. They may inspire you in your efforts to improve foresight in your organization, and give you some leads on how to do that. For example, included is a sample “futures day” agenda, and images show some of the kinds of tools and handouts we have used successfully for a long time.

I am glad to share more insights on this, and can explain what you see further, without suddenly demanding that you be a paying client! Let me know: jbmahaffie@leadingfuturists.biz and/or 202-271-0444.

Quick thought: Write to learn, write to understand

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Pen and paperIn our often frenzied, multi-tasking lives, it’s hard to get quality thinking done. I recommend using writing as a way to learn, to think, and to figure things out. The act of writing (more than a couple of paragraphs) requires you to think something through, frame your thoughts in new ways, and figure out relationships among ideas. You may discover in writing that you learned something new, something that might never have come fully formed to mind. 

Nurturing the habit of writing to explore and understand means doing more writing. And, since exploring the future is open-ended, everything is important and relevant to the future–you need to capture your thinking, nearly anytime, anyplace. Having a commonplace book or journal–whether it’s handwritten or electronic–is a great way to seize the moment and get something written down. You can always return later to see if what you wrote is worth developing further. but get it written down or you may lose the thought altogether.

 
Image: Boa-sorte&Careca, via Flickr, cc license

 

Foresight illustrated: The mother of all futures diagrams

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Cone of uncertainty Every time I have used versions of the diagram shown here with groups in workshops, conversations, and consulting visits, it has always helped to clarify and solidify people's thinking. The other day, in a typical business workshop setting, I introduced it, and as I drew the diagram on a flipchart, I heard one of the folks blurt out: "Now we're talkin'!" What the diagram does is explain, at once, the notion of alternative futures-that the future is not certain or predictable, and that there is a range of possible futures; the idea that nearer-term outcomes are more certain, and further out, less certain; that while some organizations might want to bet on a particular track of change, they need to know they are doing just that, and that a range of futures is possible; and what a group of scenarios is, and that the most likely future will include parts of each scenario. Lloyd Walker, of Precurve, brings a thoughtful and artistic eye to this question as applied to scenarios and has built a similar approach with what he calls the "Field of Probability". I think of the diagram as "the mother of all diagrams" in my work. Give it a try.

Why I love introducing scenario thinking to people

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Scenario workshop flipchartScenario workshop flipchartScenario workshop flipchartScenario workshop flipchartScenario workshop flipchartAs a futurist, my favorite thing is to work with groups to develScenario workshop flipchartScenario workshop flipchartop scenarios. The technique is powerful and it’s not easy for people to comprehend and do. But the rewards are enormous.

The power of scenario building is in how it gets people to immerse themselves in the future. Working on scenarios leaves them no choice but to think both broadly and concretely about the future. Every group I’ve done this with over 20 years has exceeded my expectations and probably their own, as well. They come up with marvelous, provocative ideas, and important insights for their organizations. I’ve learned from being a part of each group, and I’ve seen the people I’ve worked with gain from the experience.

It is clear that once people have had the scenario-building experience, they have new ideas and places to go in their heads. They’ve got a much richer view of the future. They also have a new mental habit–to think about alternative futures, not accepting that there’s some inevitable future out there. They should, and usually do, have a sense of empowerment—that there are parts of their future they can shape, starting now.

So take this note as a call for more scenario building in organizations. This great experience should be shared by far more people. I am looking forward to my next chance to work with a group on scenarios.

Foresight illustrated: Considering different environmental scanning approaches

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Environmental Scanning Approaches The diagram above looks at how organizations may choose to monitor the forces and trends acting on their interests. It can help you consider how you do environmental scanning, and how to make it more valuable to you and your colleagues. Most competent organizations do periodic scanning, formally or informally, but they often do it in a bounded way. They get the obvious periodic due diligence done or have an ongoing culture of monitoring. They catch up with and keep up with their industry or sector, or current markets. But they often miss the longer-term forces that will shape their futures, and don't get early notice of the more speculative or hidden things that may become critically important. It's better to include some stretch thinking–to at least periodically explore beyond the current view of what's happening and what's important. Even better, the culture of foresight approach covers good monitoring of the sector, the market, etc. and the due diligence you need, stretches thinking, but makes those things a continuous habit. That is probably critical to your organization's success, and can move you from reacting to change, to anticipating it and discovering new opportunities.

Update: Please see also this special page on environmental scanning.

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