Interview with Alex Fergnani, PhD in Management & Organisation at the University of Singapore Business School, researcher on Corporate Foresight and Futures Methods

Human beings have always been interested in (often even obsessed with) the future, but they have always observed and analysed it in a very linear way, relying mostly only on knowledge of the past. An approach that today is showing all its limits, even though endless theories on managing change to prepare for the future are wasted in ‘every sauce’.

“As a scholar and researcher, when I hear people talk about ‘change’, fireworks go off in me. It is one of those overused words used, in the vast majority of cases, incorrectly,” begins Alex Fergnani, PhD in Management & Organisation at the University of Singapore Business School, researcher on Corporate Foresight and Futures Methods. “Changes have always been there. There is a myth to dispel: change is not a new thing. There are discontinuities (which nevertheless occur periodically) that provoke a sort of ‘awakening of consciousness’ of public institutions, companies, professionals, citizens…but it is often a sort of temporary awakening, necessary to manage emergencies, destined then to retreat into the usual torpor“.

Don’t fall into the trap of ‘we are in an age of change’

In Alex Fergnani’s vision, “debunking the myth of change” also means diminishing the emphasis on conceptual models such as VUCA (the now well-known acronym coined in 1987 used to conceptually describe conditions and contexts of volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity) and all its evolutions, up to the more recent BANI (acronym for Brittle, Anxious, Non-linear, Incomprehensible), “Because history shows us that non-linearity, complexity, uncertainty have always characterised the contexts in which we have lived“.

“I am a big fan of the history of East Asia… which is not so different from the history of many other countries if you look at the contexts of wars, power struggles, and the conditions of populations. A peasant in China in 2,000 BC had to ‘come to terms’ with taxation imposed by governors who changed every few months, wars, environmental disasters, and other conditions that impacted on rice cultivation… life was not linear even back then, it was chaotic, contradictory, uncertain, volatile… just like today.

The real difference, compared to the past, is that today’s changes are much more frequent, faster and ‘connected’(an event in Korea can influence the choices of an entity, an institution, a company on the other side of the world in no time at all). Change today also takes new forms, especially thanks to frequent technological progress, whereas in the past the type of future events was more predictable, for example wars.

“It is therefore the frequency with which change occurs and its originality that are changed, not the volatility, uncertainty, complexity, ambiguity, or contradictoriness of change,” Alex Fergnani specifies.

Conditions whose first obvious impact is the loss of effectiveness of traditional forecasting methods, i.e. those that look into the past and project it into the future (Forecasting).

“Looking into the past is fundamental, we cannot avoid looking into the past because many things will repeat themselves,” Alex Fergnani points out however. “We must, however, start incorporating other methods besides forecasting.”  

It is here that the Futures Studies and the methodology and practice of Foresight fit in, representing a key to observing, exploring and analysing multiple futures by going beyond the logic of Forecasting.

“My vision and approach to Corporate Foresight and Futures Methods are those typical of a researcher and scientist,” explains Fergnani. “As in the scientific method, Futures & Foresight requires a certain methodological systematicity and a rigorous approach, although, it should be pointed out, this is not the same as quantitative scientific methods. In the scientific method, rigour is defined by validity and reliability (quantitatively validated), whereas in Futures & Foresight the methods for measuring rigour are transparency, consistency of scenarios, and plausibility. There is a certain closeness between Foresight and the scientific method in the systematicity and importance of measuring rigour, less so in the goal of ‘validating future hypotheses’ because the goal of Foresight is not to validate what happens, we don’t care what will happen but to construct futures – always in the plural – as a method to change our mindset. The fact that many analysts and business strategists use scenarios to try to figure out what the most likely scenario is is a big misunderstanding of Foresight (which is not about defining a likely scenario at all but about changing mindsets with respect to possible futures)“.

Using the future to make decisions in the present, from approach to choice of methods

We cannot help but complement studies of the past with studies of the future, while avoiding sterile discussions about which words to use by focusing instead on the purpose.

“Foresight is an approach that allows us to analyse the present and the past, in particular to analyse all those elements of change, in the past and in the present, such as the forces of change, weak signals, discontinuities, etc., in order to move towards the future (building future scenarios) and then return to the present to use the insights gained, that is, to use that ‘wisdom’ in a positive, useful and usable way to make decisions and define actions in the present,” explains Alex Fergnani. “It is a sort of loop that allows us to start from the present – also understood as the concretisation of changes initiated in the past – sweep into the future, or rather the futures, and return to the present, using the futures to make better decisions in the present“.

An approach that does not consist of a single method but of a set of methods that must be ‘adapted’ to the needs, the contexts in which they are applied, and the objectives. In other words, a methodology. The approach – the loop that takes us from the present into the future to define choices, strategies and actions in the present – can be used anywhere, regardless of the context (public and private companies, academia and research, non-profit communities, governments, associations, non-governmental bodies, etc.), but methods must be chosen carefully and rigorously.

“Very often what is used for Foresight is a combination of methods, not necessarily coming only from Futures Studies, on the contrary… The most common way is to hybridise methods from other disciplines in the practice of foresight”, points out Fergnani, who, as a researcher and scientist in the field of foresight, sees the contamination between methods (which must necessarily be based on an in-depth knowledge of both the theories and practical approaches of the different disciplines) as a drive for the development and creation of new methods [the subject of his own studies and scientific publications].“Very often what is used for Foresight is a combination of methods, not necessarily coming only from Futures Studies, on the contrary… The most common way is to hybridise methods from other disciplines in the practice of foresight”, points out Fergnani, who, as a researcher and scientist in the field of foresight, sees the contamination between methods (which must necessarily be based on an in-depth knowledge of both the theories and practical approaches of the different disciplines) as a drive for the development and creation of new methods [the subject of his own studies and scientific publications].

The role of technologies

Many companies claim they do not need Futures Studies and already do Foresight using advanced technologies such as Advanced Analytics, Data Intelligence and predictive models based on Artificial Intelligence techniques. “Is it enough to use these tools to really do Foresight?” we ask Fergnani.

“The first step is to understand what tools are used in the company, how and for what purposes. But beware, the choice and use of a tool in no way defines the approach. To make a somewhat far-fetched comparison, if I say I am vegan or vegetarian I am defining a food choice but I am not explaining anything about my approach to food, I am not defining whether I eat healthily or not. Being vegan does not mean eating healthy and following a balanced diet. Eating chips every day is vegan. So, to understand whether the technology tools already used in the company can really be considered to support a Foresight approach, I would go into detail about the ‘analysis diet’ of these companies to understand what method they use and for what purposes. Many companies use Machine Learning and Topic Modelling to do environmental scanning and intercept signals of change; however, if we really wanted to do a proper analysis of weak signals these tools would be insufficient because they are only based on a quantitative method – probabilities assigned to word frequency – whereas we would also need to do qualitative analysis, imaginative exploration, emerging issues analysis, etc.”. .

Companies often show a strong attachment to technological tools; there is blind trust in numerical analysis tools because they are based on objective data, set up with rigorous, logical, scientific methods… which is entirely correct (today an analysis of the risk of fraud on online payments would be unthinkable without the technological tools that do real-time analysis of huge masses of data, to cite just one example), ‘but how does a futurist [a noun that Alex Fergnani dislikes because it has triggered so many misunderstandings of approach and method, leaving room for charlatans – nda] approach the highly polarising dialectic linked to emerging technologies, in particular the one that now feeds the public debates on Artificial Intelligence on a daily basis?”, we ask;Companies often show a strong attachment to technological tools; there is blind trust in numerical analysis tools because they are based on objective data, set up with rigorous, logical, scientific methods… which is entirely correct (today an analysis of the risk of fraud on online payments would be unthinkable without the technological tools that do real-time analysis of huge masses of data, to cite just one example), ‘but how does a futurist [a noun that Alex Fergnani dislikes because it has triggered so many misunderstandings of approach and method, leaving room for charlatans – nda] approach the highly polarising dialectic linked to emerging technologies, in particular the one that now feeds the public debates on Artificial Intelligence on a daily basis?”, we ask;

“Moving away from cognitive biases (first of all, knowing and recognising them) and observing and exploring more than one possible future. There is not just one future, and there are not just two either (one positive and one negative, as we are often told in the media when dealing with the topic of Artificial Intelligence); for Foresight Practitioners [not futurists, then, but Foresight Practitioners – nda] it is crucial to look at the spectrum of possible futures and exercise critical thinking.””Moving away from cognitive biases (first of all, knowing and recognising them) and observing and exploring more than one possible future. There is not just one future, and there are not just two either (one positive and one negative, as we are often told in the media when dealing with the topic of Artificial Intelligence); for Foresight Practitioners [not futurists, then, but Foresight Practitioners – nda] it is crucial to look at the spectrum of possible futures and exercise critical thinking.”

The arrival of ChatGPT to the general public, just to give an example, immediately triggered apocalyptic predictions about the end of various professions, and even the end of the human species.”There has been a jump from A (ChatGPT’s arrival to the general public) to B (various apocalyptic predictions) that often has no logic. Often these narratives are mere speculations that have no details of plausibility and we should all stop and start asking: “Has there been any rigour in creating this speculation? Have the forces of change been observed and analysed? What weak signals have been identified? Has a systemic analysis been made of the possible mix of them in possible futures? Have the possible impacts been explored? Through which methods? …”. We all know all too well that there is none of this in the media narratives’.

Beware of ‘pop futurists

Being able to explore multiple futures is definitely fascinating, to the point that many professionals call themselves futurist experts and consultants (or futurologists) riding the wave. We can’t, in closing this interview, not ask Alex Fergnani “What does it really take to be a futurist seriously and professionally?”, given the success of one of his recent YouTube videos, “4 Tips to Spot a Charlatan Futurist“, and of course his vision as a researcher and Foresight Practitioner.

“There are now many people who call themselves ‘futurist’, ‘futurologist’, ‘foresight professional’, ‘foresight specialist’, ‘foresight practitioner’, ‘futures specialist’, ‘futures practitioner’, ‘futures professional’, ‘futures researcher’, ‘futures literacy expert’, ‘futures literacy researcher’, and so on… the list could be even longer. This confusion is mainly related to the fact that the profession – regardless of how we then want to define the professionals who practice it – has been irrelevant for a long time, stagnant in both the academic and professional practice worlds, even more so in the political world. The fact that there are now so many people who call themselves by appellations that refer to this profession does not at all mean that, in fact, there are many more professionals with acquired skills, but simply that there is a renewed interest in the approach‘.

Regardless of the professional appellation, what really distinguishes a practitioner from the ‘pop futurists’ (whom Fergnani also identifies as ‘charlatans’) is the solid theoretical knowledge of methodological approaches (built up not only through reading books but also through in-depth scientific studies, academic work and training) combined with the mastery of methods in their practical implementation in different contexts.

“It is not enough to talk about the future and be a trend spotter, it is necessary to have the theoretical and practical foundations to be a ‘scenario creator’, it is vital to have a ‘toolbox’ (master the methods) and to be able to expand one’s toolkit with new methods depending on the context, to demonstrate experience and expertise and to maintain impartiality. Foresight professionals never have a privileged view of the future and should not push the narrative towards a preferred scenario. Instead, they should (in most cases) maintain impartiality by concretely embracing the vision of multiple possible futures. The profession takes time to develop skills that also involve facilitation skills, counselling skills, client involvement skills, a good knowledge of the literature, experience in the use of methods…in short, it’s anything but pop!”, Fergnani concludes.