Daniel W. Rasmus
Daniel W. Rasmus, Founder and Principal Analyst of Serious Insights, is an internationally recognized speaker on the future of work and education. He is the author of several books, including Listening to the Future and Management by Design.
desiredfutures
Daniel I’d be more than happy for you to come and sit on a session I facilitate to see that some futurists spend considerable time challenging people’s perceptions of what is likely or even plausible by testing the assumptions they make.
Very few futurists that I know of rely on forecasting as a preferred tool with many of them using forecasts as the core basis for interrupting the locked in thinking often present. As for trends, they are perhaps more in vogue and even then, a number of us recognise them for what they are – historically discerned patterns that are but one potential way for someone to form an opinion of future potential. Their utility is open to question based on context.
Others utilise CLA to identify and unpack the bias present not only in the futurist, but on the room in general. It should be readily discernable to people that if a person has a reliance toward the use of any particular methodology, they are showing clearly their bias.
Much of what you detailed would be placed in the ‘pop’ futurism basket – thin, poorly supported but often ‘sexy soundbites’ that are as you say ‘brief’ designed to attract attention. But leading with ‘brief’ to attract attention falls into the trap identified by the Chinese saying ‘seeking fame is like a pig seeking slaughter’
Personally I think your article has done a great disservice to many high quality in depth practitioners in the futures field who spend considerable time assisting clients of all types in all industries uncover the flaws in their thinking so that they might enhance that thinking for future needs.
Like the soundbite specialist futurists with their sexy clips and snazzy sayings, ‘brief’ doesn’t cut it when you hit the real world
Which is why many of the better futurists don’t do brief