Future Ripples Method

Future Ripples is a half-day activity to promote future thinking by collecting present signals/trends and brainstorming possible direct and indirect consequences of a selected signal/trend.

Time: 4 hours ( + 1-2 hours preparation of signals)

Intended for product design + innovation teams, research teams or anyone who wants to develop futures thinking capacities

The process consists of four main steps:

1. Scanning for signals/trends;

2. Choosing a signal;

3. Creating the ripples of consequences;

4. Following up.

These steps match the activities of scanning, framing and mapping/futuring in a traditional foresight process. Finally, a follow-up step concludes the workshop with steering towards actionable activities.

Authors: Felix Epp, Tim Moesgen, Antti Salovaara, Emmi Pouta and İdil Gaziulusoy

Link to research paper: https://dl.acm.org/doi/abs/10.1145/3532106.3534570