If You Knew What Tomorrow Looked Like

By Doug Stephens

There are essentially three kinds of information a company can use in order to operate their business:

– Hindsight:  Usually analysis aimed at explaining or understanding  what just happened

– Insight:  Typically situation analysis accompanied by recommendations to improve what’s happening right now

– Foresight: Often research aimed at identifying future threats and opportunities resulting from significant trends set to impact the business, culminating in predictions about what’s going to happen

Most companies invest in the past

What I find curious is the degree to which companies spend a disproportionate amount of time, effort and operating budget developing hindsight – literally gazing into the rear-view mirror.  In fact, many have armies of analysts crunching away at data in an effort to provide leadership with an understanding of what happened last week, last month or last year, presumably so they can then report coherently to their boss, board or shareholders.

Some companies manage to balance their outlook with a degree of insight. Beyond basic scorekeeping, senior functional heads take what the analysts produce and use it to course-correct for the coming weeks or months or if they’re really aggressive…for the coming fiscal year.

However, it’s been my experience that only a small percentage of companies invest adequately in foresight.  And to be clear, I’m not simply referring to typical, periodic market research.  And this is not about the CEO simply coming back from a spiritual retreat and sharing his or her vision.  I’m talking about research that aims to build a complete organizational understanding of what the world and their business will look like in 25, 50 or 100 years.  I’m talking about sound and validated futures research.   Think of your own company.  How much of your time and your colleagues’ time is spent reporting on what’s happened versus trying to understand what’s going to happen?  How much more competitive could you be if that distribution of effort was reversed?

So why is that?  Why do most companies come up short in their investment in understanding the future?

It’s difficult to know for certain but here’s what I think.

Confronting the future takes courage

I believe that the willingness to develop foresight requires enormous organizational courage.  Garnering foresight or a view of what will be, may take you into unfamiliar territory and may mean facing uncertainty.   In some cases, foresight may reveal the inevitable obsolescence of your product, company or industry.   Understanding the future  may require that that you take unprecedented action today.  It may cause revolution in your business.  And it definitely requires strong leadership. Frankly, the future can be a scary place.

But the fact is that foresight also often reveals opportunities to create new markets, serve new needs and build new products.  Foresight promotes proactive change and evolution.  Foresight gives direction and meaning to what the company does.  And ultimately foresight is an essential component of survival.

It comes down to one simple question.  If you knew what tomorrow looked like, how would it change what you do today?