Ten reasons why your organization should be using strategic foresight

Bart Édes
3 min readMar 16, 2021
Photo by Fallon Michael on Unsplash

The COVID-19 pandemic shredded the plans and strategies of public, private and nonprofit organizations globally. Those responsible for risk analysis, business development, strategy formulation, systems and planning, and overall leadership are struggling to understand what may come next as we emerge from the crisis.

Unsurprisingly, there has been a surge in interest in Strategic Foresight (albeit from a low base). Strategic Foresight, or simply Foresight, is a structured and systematic way of using ideas about the future to anticipate and better prepare for change. In circumstances of great uncertainty and complexity, and where the time frame concerned stretches into the medium-to-long term, Foresight methodologies can help an organization trying to make sense of the future.

Here are ten benefits that Foresight brings to organizations that use it:

1. Promotes innovation

Foresight nudges organizations into thinking more broadly about possibilities, including fresh ideas, approaches, products and services. In the process, it stimulates innovation to address challenges that emerge from alternative future scenarios.

2. Enhances agility

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Bart Édes

Author of Learning from Tomorrow: Using Strategic Foresight to Prepare for the Next Big Disruption