Back to the Future

Facing Our Futures: How Foresight, Futures Design and Strategy Creates Prosperity and Growth

By Nikolas Badminton

Bloomsbury Business, 256 pp., $35

"I'm a dreamer, futurist, a foresight practitioner, and a _hope engineer—_another term I interlace with futurist," writes Badminton, whose book attempts to outline general principles to help business leaders grasp not only probable futures but seemingly impossible ones. Badminton is not as worried about a question like "Where do you see yourself in five years?" He cares about what the future might hold in the next 50, 75, or even 100 years.

It's a tantalizing thought, but Badminton stumbles while trying to equip readers to formulate their own compelling ideas.

Having not read a book on this topic before, I was intrigued by the foundational principles that inform the discipline of futurism. "Foresight," writes Badminton, "is the practice of how we come together to think critically about our world and how our futures may play out." As interesting an academic exercise as that may be, Badminton doesn't do enough to confirm the value of foresight.

Put simply, many who have attempted to predict the future have failed time and again. With so much noise and data for people to parse and evaluate, can they truly implement the practice of foresight to gain insight into the future beyond the next five or maybe 10 years? Badminton is convinced individuals can. I remain skeptical.

Regardless of the accuracy of foresight and futures design, the basic principle is sound. As talent development professionals, we need to stay aware and alert to changing landscapes in the field; we also need to look over the horizon and attempt to see what's coming. Badminton's Positive-Dystopian Futures Framework could be helpful for organizational leaders to appreciate the innumerable possibilities embedded in the future by preparing them to adapt, change, and even design a future we want rather than one we're forced to inherit.

Facing Our Futures could have used a more critical editorial eye because the book often feels unnecessarily repetitive and too ideological. The book never quite makes the case the author wants; however, its fundamental principles resonated with me. Predictive powers are limited, but there is value to be found here. The text is not a crystal ball, but it may encourage more professionals to look a little closer at that mysterious horizon we call the future.