The best known input method is environmental scanning. Most organisations will be able to talk about their environmental scanning, although approaches vary between individuals and organisations. Even though it is a well known activity, it is doubtful whether there is a common definition of just what environmental scanning (or ES) is. Many people think that reading the newspaper is ES, while others think that networking with colleagues at a conference is sufficient to say they have done an environmental scan.
And, indeed, while these approaches gather information about the environmental external to the organisation, they yield very limited information which is not already in the mainstream. In particular, the people doing the scanning need to be aware of the ways in which their own worldviews condition their scanning, and that they are likely to miss critical or otherwise useful pieces of information, simply because their habitual ways of filtering information does not allow them to 'see' that information.
Choo (Information Management for the Intelligent Organization: The Art of Scanning the Environment, 2nd edn, Information Today, Medford, New Jersey, 1998, p76) provides a good model for thinking about environmental scanning. Choo views scanning as one level in a more complex model of scanning activities that need to be undertaken by an organisation. In particular, he differentiates between:
- competitor intelligence,
- competitive intelligence,
- business intelligence,
- environmental scanning, and
- social scanning.
These levels are 'nested', in that the 'lower' level informs the 'higher' level. Each is useful for different purposes, and for different types of questions being asked. It depends on how wide the future is that you are exploring, and how far into that future you want to go.
Metascanning
A metascanning approach is also useful in our time deprived society. There are many people and organisations whose job it is to scan the future. Some will let you have limited access to some of their findings for free, but most will ask you to sign up for a service. The value is that these folks have already done the initial work for you which will save you time - as long as you have investigated the metascanners and are satisfied with their approach and methods.
Another example is SRIC-BI, a US based group whose website offers a lot of information about their scanning process. An online newsletter ScanMonthly is an indication of their output, and has archived issues going back some years. Z-Punkt is a commercial organisation so you will have to pay for access to their trend database, but their site has lots of other useful information and downloads.
Manyworlds is an interesting site - business focused, but with a separate futures section. They say they provide "'meta-opinion' of critical thinking that can separate the 'signal' from the 'noise' of business thinking". Its value is in how it categorises and links a vast amount of material in a network. There's a lot of stuff here that I don't want to read, but I usually find a gem everytime I go to the site.
A different approach is used by the Trendwatching site, which identifies trends and puts them together in categories such as uberpremium, tryvertising and hygenia. Their focus is consumer trends, and it's a bit 'light', but it's a interesting site to tap into. Springspotters is a site that will let you contribute to a global scanning endeavour, with the possiblity of your trend being published in an online newsletter. A more commercially oriented site, and very much in the here and now (in fact they say they don't want trends that have not yet entered the marketplace), but worth keeping on your radar.
Shaping Tomorrow is a UK based company whose website has a wealth of scanning information. They provide trend updates (on their site and via a weekly newsletter), as well as more in depth scanning grouped into areas such as insights, sources and blindspots. This site gives you lots of raw material to explore, as well as some analysis and commentary by members of their network. Well worth subscribing to. Click on the image below to go to their site.
The Arlington Institute has a strongly futures focused approach, and its newletter FutureEdition, is a must-read. As they say:
"At The Arlington Institute, we believe that to understand the future, you need to have an open mind and cast a very wide net. To that end, FUTUREdition explores a cross-disciplinary palette of issues, from the frontiers of science and technology to major developments in mass media, geopolitics, the environment, and social perspectives."
This quote encapsulates the approach you need when you are scanning. You need to get out of your here and now, and scan in areas you would not normally consider. Often, the more weird and whacky it sounds, the better! This is a must read scanning site.
The UK government's foresight project, through its Horizon Scanning section, has established two environmental scanning databases: the Sigma Scan and Delta Scan. The Sigma database deals with trends and issues generally, while the Delta database focuses on science and technology issues. Both are detailed and extensive and worth some time.
The Tomorrow Project, based in the UK, has recently set up a scanning database called Glimpses, which uses eight headings to bring together information of trends:
- Globalisation
- Life Course
- Individuals and identity
- Media and technology
- Politics and government
- Social exclusion
- Employment
- Sustainability
All these organisations offer newsletters and/or RSS feeds.
Strategic Scanning
During his time as a Strategic Foresight Analyst at Swinburne, Joseph Voros edited a number of scanning publications. This text below, reproduced with his permission, is extracted from an FAQ he prepared to explain the purposes of one particular publication, the Foresight Snippets (which are no longer published).
By definition, strategic scanning involves looking for what are known, in the foresight profession, as "weak signals." And because they are weak signals, they may seem to have little or no bearing on "here and now" and may therefore not seem useful (when seen from within the context of the hurly-burly of our day-to-day rush to do our daily work).
The judgement of "usefulness" arises as a result of the (mostly unconscious) filtering of the world which we all undertake most of the time we are awake. This filtering process is certainly very important - it stops us from becoming overwhelmed by detail and data. But this filtering process also creates what are known as "blind spots" in our view of the world. We each have different filters operating and therefore we each have different blind spots. In an organisational setting this collection of blind spots can have disastrous implications for strategic thinking and strategy-making - just read some of the optimistic business plans for companies which were making slide rules in the late 1950s, for example!
In essence, the job of strategic scanning is to interrupt our daily thinking, break us out of routine views of the world and how it may be changing, and, frankly, to smack up against some of the blind spots which we all possess.
Caution!
This concept of horizon or periphery scanning is starting to appear in the mainstream business literature. For example, Harvard Business School recently published a book entitled " Peripheral Vision: Detecting the Weak Signals that Will Make or Break Your Company" by George Day and Paul Schoemaker. While this book is useful, it focuses on information 'out there' - either within the company or in the environment external to the company. It misses the point entirely about how people doing the scanning need to be aware of how they view the world and the lenses and filters they use to make sense of that world. Without this sort of self-reflection, it is easy to miss something that will turn out to be of critical importance to a business in the future.
In environmental scanning, the business of the futurist is to open up and out (ie broaden and deepen) the information sources available to an organisation. To do this successfully, the futurist must first understand his or her worldview.
