Barbara Heinzen prefers to work slowly, while meeting necessary organisational deadlines. Slowness matters because people need time to absorb hard facts and new ideas. The methods and tools described here come from a variety of slow projects in long-term thinking. It is possible to sample this kind of work in a short meeting, and that can be very exhilarating. However, the most durable results come from working through hard issues over a number of months.

 

Slow processes are not necessarily more expensive, but they are paced differently in order for learning to be embedded in people’s thinking and work.

 

 

Perhaps the hardest part of Barbara Heinzen’s work is getting the licence to begin. One large project began when Barbara Heinzen started talking with the chairman of a major oil company in South Africa about the HIV/AIDS epidemic. He was confused by the public debate and the statistics flying in all directions. “What can I believe?” he asked. “What are we really facing and what will be the impact on our markets?” That question led to a project which mixed academic work on the spread of the disease with internal interviews to discover what people in the company had already experienced with HIV/AIDS. From these two major pieces of work, came scenarios of the future impact of AIDS as well as a number of critical corporate policies.

 

Before any project begins, Barbara Heinzen works with the commissioning team to clarify the purpose of the project. Who is this for? What is a good result? What are the critical deadlines, what is the available budget and who will do the work?   How will the work be used? Is this the right time to do it? What is the right method to use?

 

Most of Barbara Heinzen’s projects have used scenario building as a key tool, but many of the steps are suitable for other assignments. Once a project begins, the first task is to establish the group’s natural agenda – the issues that require research and thinking.  This can be done through internal interviews or arts-led workshop exercises. This work highlights what the group knows or assumes about the future. Subsequent research then tests assumptions and expands the knowledge base. This research is used to inform scenario stories which in turn often require more research to check the plausibility of scenario events. Once the stories are written, they are tested with outsiders and used to stimulate discussions about those judgements facing a business, an organisation or a nation.

 

A more detail description of these steps can be found in "Scenario building: simple steps, hard to do".

 

Successful scenario projects call on a large tool kit of techniques and rules of thumb. Most are designed to facilitate active shared learning. These tools have general applicability, especially as we learn to live with complexity and unpredictability. Many move beyond the boundaries of logical, factual understanding to engage with the harder, less discussable issues that inform tough decisions and strategic choices. 

 

Picture of now, current reality: In any planning exercise, there is a need to understand the present. This applies both to an organisation and to the world around it. Several different techniques can be used to establish this picture. 

 

A statistical profile of key facts and the long term trends that created them is key early exercise. This work can reveal important contradictions and point towards driving forces behind the trends.  Finding original research into long standing issues – such as rural to urban migration in East Africa or the financial performance of Chinese state-run enterprises – can help interpret the statistical profile and reveal the forces creating the trends.

 

These are both ‘desktop’ activities. Learning journeys and walk-abouts back up statistics with the evidence of our own eyes and ears. Learning journeys take us to places we have not been before – a new type of business, or a village experimenting with different energy sources. A walk-about can be anywhere, even in neighbourhoods we thought we knew well. On both, it is important to talk with people about their everyday lives. Cameras that capture significant images then help to illustrate larger issues.

 

In all these exercises – statistics, academic research, stepping outside – we are looking for ways to understand the present, but also for what’s new. We are surrounded by signs of new forces and trends shaping the future, but need to learn how to notice them. What statistics are suggesting new directions? What new activities point to an emerging trend?

 

As the facts and research accumulate, it is important to understand how the whole system works. What is influencing what? Good systems thinking should be summarised in a simple diagram that helps us understand the totality of the situation. Sometimes, this systemic understanding is best communicated with a metaphor. In summarising the state of Kenya, for example, we used the image of a house whose principal foundations were crumbling. 

 

Arts & language: When a team is looking at the future of a society or the future of a business or organisation, they are engaged in a shared and complex task. Often the complexity of the issues defeats a strictly rational approach. At such times, techniques from theatre, poetry and art can be extremely useful.  

 

Language is particularly important. Many strategic discussions are held in a fog of inexact phrases, jargon and conventional clichés. A poet, however, is extremely careful in his or her use of words. People who think clearly about the future also need to search for the most expressive phrase, the exact word and clearest definition of what is being described. Clear and original language not only avoids misunderstandings, but helps to put hard issues in a new light. Language especially matters when working with mixed cultures, as some ideas may only surface when people can use their mother tongues. 

 

Much can also be learned from theatre where people will use improvisation exercises to explore difficult themes. Improvisation exercises can also be used with groups thinking about the long term future. Ice-breaking exercises which move people around an imaginary map or which use sound or rhythm to loosen their stiff limbs, can make it easier to work together. Transitional objects that people bring with them – or collect during a walk-about – can be assembled silently into an implicit and revealing narrative. Story-telling is another important skill. In one exercise, each person reports something inexplicable they had noticed. Small groups were then formed and each group had to combine its members’ observations into a single shared story. Role-playing can also generate very rapid learning in a group. When the Dutch government used scenarios to prepare several departments for a crisis, they wrote a story and asked people from each department to act out his or her department’s response. As people responded, the facilitators introduced new events, forcing people to reconsider their decisions.

 

Whether one is using rational research or arts facilitation, focusing on one’s “felt sense” of the situation is an important ability. This term comes from Eugene Gendlin http://www.focusing.org  who argues that the full intricacy of a complex situation is first perceived as a physical sensation. By using focusing methods and ideas, Barbara Heinzen has helped groups name and clarify difficult issues. 

 

Rules of thumb:  We all use rules of thumb to guide us. Barbara Heinzen’s rules of thumb begin with a simple one: good questions discover good answers.  In Africa, the development community frequently talks about good governance, as if governance were a new feature of the landscape. By first asking, ‘who is accountable to whom and how?’ existing governance systems can be identified and strengthened.

 

Another rule of thumb is to look for the continuities. Many scenario exercises concentrate on what is changing and what is uncertain. However, the future will also be shaped by things that do not change. This also applies to an organisation’s internal resources, such as a resilient corporate culture, which employees have been proud to join.

 

A third, and related, rule of thumb is that resistance is meaningful. This insight originally came from reading Jung’s autobiography when he was complaining about a patient who never took his advice. Eventually Jung realised that it would have been suicidal for his patient to do what Jung was asking. In organisations and societies,  change is often resisted because it is believed to be suicidal in one way or another.