Looking back from the horizon
We have been scanning the horizon for clients since well before it was fashionable. This means we now have something most futures practices do not: the ability to look back from the horizons we've scanned and how the signals and trends we identified played out. Some we got right, some we underestimated, and one or two weak signals faded away without becoming trends. This article does that for two of our 10+ year old foresight reports.
Of course, the point of foresight work isn't to be right or perfectly predict the future. But, every so often, looking back from the horizon is worth doing because foresight is otherwise a trade with no feedback, where you can practise for many years and never find out whether you are any good at it.
Nobody is randomly wrong, and there are many ways to be wrong. Going back helps us look for possible systemic failures/biases in our approach (e.g. bias towards tech determinism, too fast timelines…). We can reconstruct why signals seemed important at the time and our evidence for them, which sources we used - and see if that resoning held.
Horizon scanning is the search for weak signals: the early and easily missed signs of change that might grow into important trends over time. We think of it as a radar sweeping the horizon for developments that look small and distant today, but could loom large in the years ahead.
Future of chemical sciences, 2015
In 2015 we supported a client to explore the future of the chemical sciences, scanning the horizon to 2030 for early indicators of how the field might change. The panels below revisit six of those signals with a decade of hindsight, setting where our original thinking expected each one to travel, shown as the dashed grey line, against where it actually landed, shown as the thick coral line.
Select a panel to read what we said beside what happened.
A note on method: the outcome lanes and the height of each line are our own qualitative reading, not a measured index. The dashed line reconstructs the direction the report implied for each signal, since it flagged weak signals rather than publishing forecasts; read it as what our thinking pointed to, not a line we literally drew.
Future of UK international development sector, 2014
In 2014, we helped an organisation explore the future of UK international development, scanning the horizon to 2024 for early indicators of how the country's development and humanitarian NGOs might change.
Select a panel to read what we said beside what happened.
A note on method: the outcome lanes and the height of each line are our own qualitative reading, not a measured index. The dashed line reconstructs the direction the report implied for each signal, since it flagged weak signals rather than publishing forecasts; read it as what our thinking pointed to, not a line we literally drew.
Looking back, what stands out is the spread. A few of these signals became defining trends, several we underestimated, and one or two faded or reversed. That mix is the point: weak signals are not forecasts, and their value lies in spotting them early enough to shape strategy around them. The organisations that navigate change best are simply the ones watching the horizon before the small and distant becomes large and unavoidable.
That is the work we do. We have helped clients across a range of sectors turn weak signals into strategy, through bespoke futures and foresight work and our AI-powered horizon-scanning subscription, SEEK.
Get in touch if you would like to explore how we can support you.