Future Search is an evidence-based method of planning based on “getting the whole system in the room.” This means getting all stakeholder groups together – fostering connections between people who usually don’t talk with each other. In this way silos are broken down and all parts of the system see and understand the entire picture. In a structured process, the stakeholders work together to discover the common ground they share, and plan for a future they all desire. At the end, you have a common ground agenda that everyone agrees to, plans to implement it, full buy-in from all stakeholder groups because they created the plan! So there is no need to “sell” the plan! This is a much faster and efficient process than other more traditional planning methods.

Yes! Future Search has been used successfully for over 45 years, in a wide variety of businesses, organizations, and communities, with hundreds of examples. Studies have shown that leaders are pleased to know that their stakeholders are behind them. It energizes a business or organization or community, and sparks committed involvement.

There are four principles that undergird any Future Search, and are applicable also to a wide variety of situations.

• Get the whole system in the room – ensure that all stakeholder groups are represented. Any group not included is likely to create resistance. Groups that are included will provide their unique perspectives and input, and be invested in carrying out the plans they help create.

• See the whole picture, not just narrow silos, before deciding on actions. Everything is connected to everything, and acting in one area is going to have impact and consequences in other areas. Some of these may be unanticipated and unhelpful or worse. Only if the participants have a shared and accurate view of their whole system can they then devise effective plans to move forward.

• Focus on the future and discovering the common ground that the stakeholder groups share. Past history and conflicts are treated as valuable data, but are not action items.

• People manage their own participation and take responsibility for enacting what they have agreed on. The process is empowering – participants perform best when they have autonomy and don’t have to react to efforts to control them.

When meetings and planning processes stay true to these principles, the results are creative and innovative, sustainable and long-lasting, and will create a future that is better than anyone would have expected.

The first step is to assemble a planning team made up of representatives of all the stakeholder groups. Under my guidance, the planning team defines the boundary of the project, and works to identify whom to invite to participate, making sure to include representatives of all stakeholder groups. They also set dates and venue parameters, and define the target for the future (e.g., five years from now).

The participants gather (in-person or virtually) for an intensive and highly interactive five-step process:

• Review of the past – global history, their system’s history, and personal history. In this way the participants start to gain a shared view of their common legacy.

• Survey of current trends impacting the system – what is going on in the environment in which the system is embedded that is affected the system, and that which must be addressed as we move into the future. By getting diverse stakeholder groups to identify what they feel must be addressed, the participants continue to develop a shared view of their circumstances. Barriers between groups start to fall as they gain understanding of one another’s perceptions.

• Visioning a desired future – by imagining their business or organization or community in the future (e.g., five years from now), the participants develop a vision for how they would like their system to operate. This unleashes creativity and aspirational goals, based on the shared view developed in steps 1 and 2.

• Discovering common ground – as the various scenarios for the future are presented, it becomes clear that there is substantial agreement about the sort of future everyone wants. There is often some tweaking of the visions in order to get full agreement, but this leads to unanimous support for usually 8-12 statements in a Common Ground Agenda for desired future.

• Action planning – each participants decides which elements of the Common Ground Agenda they would like to help implement, forming action teams that develop plans for how to make they envisioned future come to reality.

If the four principles are adhered to, at the end of the Future Search process, leaders will get:

• A vision for the future that is co-created and shared by all stakeholder groupss
• Complete buy-in and commitment to implement the Common Ground Agenda
• Action plans to implement the Common Ground Agenda
• A committee structure to support the implementation of the Common Ground Agenda
• Follow-up structure to ensure accountability and implementation