Future Trends
Future Trends is a workshop from the Hyper Island toolbox in which a group names the trends likely to change its business over the next three years, votes on the most significant ones and works out how the organisation could respond. It combines a warm-up about worries, a trend brainstorm in four categories, dot voting and a template for exploring the top trends. The result is a shared view of external change and first ideas for a response.
Facilitation script
- 1
Introduce purpose, time frame and agenda.
5 min - 2
Stinky Fish warm-up: individuals note their worries about the future and share them.
20 min - 3
Trend brainstorm in four five-minute rounds: business, user behaviour, talent demands, technology.
20 min - 4
Read the wall, merge duplicates and vote with eight dots each. Keep the top three trends.
10 min - 5
Small groups fill in the trend template for one trend each.
20 min - 6
Groups share back and the whole group discusses implications.
15 min - 7
Check-out: reflections and agreed next steps.
10 min
Tips
Ask for trends as statements about a change that is under way, with a direction, not as single nouns; 'customers expect answers within minutes' can be worked on, 'speed' cannot.
If the group's trend knowledge is thin, send a short reading pack beforehand or invite one outside voice.
Decide before the session who will take the completed templates into the strategy process, because that is the point at which most of this work gets lost.
Common pitfalls
Trends written as buzzwords ('AI', 'sustainability') that everyone votes for and nobody can work with in the template stage
Voting for what is most talked about instead of what will most affect this organisation, so the top three match any industry report
Letting the Stinky Fish round run long, which leaves the group anxious and short of time for the trends themselves
Small groups fill in risks and consequences and skip where the organisation should stand in three years, which is the only forward-looking part of the template
Ending with three completed templates and no owner, so nothing from the session reaches the actual strategy work
Variations
Change the time horizon or the four categories to fit the organisation, for example adding regulation for a regulated industry. With a large group, keep the top five or six trends so that every small group has its own. Online, set up four areas on a shared whiteboard, use the tool's voting function and put a template frame in each breakout room. For a deeper strategy process, feed the selected trends into Scenario Planning or a Three Horizons map.
Where it fits
When to use it
A leadership or project team is about to set strategy and people hold very different pictures of what is changing around them
An innovation or transformation programme starts and needs an agreed set of external drivers to refer to
A team is busy with operations and has not looked outward for a long time
You have one to two hours and want something lighter than a full environmental analysis
Worries about digital change are being voiced in corridors and need a constructive place to go
When not to use it
You need a systematic scan of the environment for a formal strategy document; use PESTLE Analysis or STEEP Analysis
The question is how different futures could play out, not which trends matter; use Scenario Planning
The group has no exposure to the market, customers or technology in question; do research first, because the method only surfaces what participants already know
A decision on the response has already been taken and the session would only decorate it
Related methods
Frequently asked questions
What is Future Trends?▾
Future Trends is a Hyper Island workshop in which a group identifies the trends that will most change its business over the next three years. Participants brainstorm trends in four categories, vote on the most significant ones and explore in small groups how the organisation should respond. It takes one to two hours.
Which trend categories does the workshop use?▾
The brainstorm runs in four rounds: business, user behaviour, talent demands and technology. The categories can be adapted to the organisation, as long as they force the group to look in more than one direction.
How is Future Trends different from a PESTLE analysis?▾
PESTLE is a systematic scan across six fixed categories of the external environment and is usually prepared with research. Future Trends is a faster group exercise that draws on what participants already see, prioritises by vote and moves straight to implications. It is a conversation starter more than an analysis.
Why does the workshop start with Stinky Fish?▾
Stinky Fish asks people to name the concerns they carry but rarely say out loud. Starting with worries about the future makes uncertainty normal in the room and gives the trend brainstorm more honest material.
What happens with the results?▾
Each top trend ends up on a template describing its opportunities, consequences and risks and the position the organisation wants to reach in three years. These templates are input for strategy, roadmap or scenario work and need an owner who carries them there.
Plan your next workshop with AI
Workshop Weaver helps you combine methods like Future Trends into a complete, timed agenda in minutes.
Try it freeMethod descriptions on Workshop Weaver are original content written by our team, based on established facilitation practices. This method was inspired by work from Hyper Island.