Futures Thinking, also referred to as ‘foresight’, ‘futurism’, ‘futurology’, and ‘anticipation studies’, is a method for informed reflection on the major changes that will occur in the next 10, 20 or more years in all areas of life. Futures Thinking uses a multidisciplinary approach to pierce the veil of received opinion and identify the dynamics that are creating the future. Futures thinking doesn’t try to predict the future, but rather to illuminate unexpected implications of present-day issues; the emphasis isn’t on what will happen, but on what could happen, given various observed drivers. It’s a way of getting new perspectives and context for present-day decisions, as well as for dealing with the dilemma at the heart of all strategic thinking: the future can’t be predicted, yet we have to make choices based on what is to come.
Design practices are becoming increasingly future-focused, reflecting the complexities of the design challenges that we face. Futures thinking can offer us tools and methods to help with this, but more than that, it might offer us a new way of seeing the world that we design for. This in turn leads to a deeper understanding of transformational change shaping organizations, enhance strategic thinking capability and be able to respond more effectively and more pro-actively to emerging future trends. A futures thinking approach can be integrated into design thinking methodology, from divergent, exploratory mind-set of futures thinking to the outcome-oriented mind-set of design. Helping designers answer both the long-term question of “where do we want to be?” as well as the short-term response to “so what do we do next?”.
Arm IP Design in the Cloud was a strategy product design project which involved a Futures Thinking approach. In order to get a sense of where the future of semiconductor chip design was headed required thinking 10+ years out into the future and looking at the prevailing trends which would influence and determine the needs of semiconductors to the way they can be more easily designed. This starts by looking at the big picture and undertake an approach of 'environment scanning' to acquire information on current and emerging trends, external factors using a STEEP (Social, Technological, Environmental, Economic, Political) method.
The rapid explosion in digital technology, combined with advances in AI/ML, and the prevalence of computing power into everyday experiences meant that future demand for semiconductors would be much higher than today, and the speed at which semiconductors could be designed and manufactured would need to change significantly, in a way that 3-D printers have for hardware component design and manufacture. A future could be envisaged where consumers could create their own customer semiconductors using web based tools, and have the semiconductor delivered the next day. Coming up with innovative solutions to complex problems is as much of an art as a science. This is the stage of the process where design thinking and futures thinking overlap, with practitioners from both fields engaging in brainstorming, visioning, and concept mapping to help construct and arrange ideas in new ways.
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