First International Capacity Building Workshop in Romania - January 26, 2004, Bucharest 1 International Workshop on FORESIGHT Bucharest, Romania – January 26, 2004 The STEEPV method A framework for structured brainstorming Rafael Popper Research Associate

First International Capacity Building Workshop in Romania - January 26, 2004, Bucharest 2 Outline What is Foresight Commonly used foresight methods Foresight methods (locating STEEPV) Basic structure of STEEPV The process Usefulness & drawbacks When to use STEEPV Combining online & real STEEPV STEEPV & prioritisation STEEPV & SWOT Questions (5 minutes) Exercise & discussions (30 minutes)

First International Capacity Building Workshop in Romania - January 26, 2004, Bucharest 3 Foresight involves… Thinking about: –emerging opportunities & challenges –trends and breaks in trends Using systematic methods for –developing insights & visions –bringing together key agents of change (actors) Improving decision making power / action –developing anticipatory strategic intelligence Preparing better policy recommendations

First International Capacity Building Workshop in Romania - January 26, 2004, Bucharest 4 Commonly used methods… QUALITATIVE QUANTITATIVE STEEPV - BRAINSTORMING SWOT & SCANNING CROSS-IMPACT ANALYSIS SCENARIO BUILDING STAKEHOLDERS MAPPING DELPHI TECHNIQUE TIME SERIES REGRESSION MODELS STOCHASTIC SIMULATION ECONOMETRIC MODELS PRIORITISATION Future-oriented visions Past & current data

First International Capacity Building Workshop in Romania - January 26, 2004, Bucharest 5 Foresight Methods ( Loveridge triangle) STEEPV (Structured Creativity) Conjecture with limited systematic evidence Specialist knowledge base Link to policy discourse & practice

First International Capacity Building Workshop in Romania - January 26, 2004, Bucharest 6 Basics of structured brainstorming STEEPV Group method (recently including online groups/networks) Attractive & emerging framework for brainstorming sessions Involve structured-freethinking (to articulate ideas using the STEEPV framework) All ideas should be captured Individual ideas should not be discussed After collection of all ideas the group should discuss on: –clustering ideas; –prioritising ideas, and –identifying ‘wild ideas’ (usually the most difficult task).

First International Capacity Building Workshop in Romania - January 26, 2004, Bucharest 7 The brainstorming process Collecting as many thoughts as possible (on selected problems or subjects) Listing every single idea (without discussing them) Clustering and Reducing redundancy (Grouping of ideas) Evaluating and identifying priorities (Desirable, wild and uncertain issues) Brainstorm Listing Clustering Evaluation STEEPV framework Some clustering and grouping still required using STEEPV

First International Capacity Building Workshop in Romania - January 26, 2004, Bucharest 8 Usefulness of STEEPV method New / better solutions (freethinking) New / better problem definition Help reducing conflict (new / better visions help participants understanding different perspectives on problems) All ideas have equal status (before prioritisation) Participants feel owners/part of the process

First International Capacity Building Workshop in Romania - January 26, 2004, Bucharest 9 Drawbacks Unworkable ideas Results depend on the skill of facilitator to keep discussion alive Strong antagonist / inflexible positions may not allow consideration of some ideas Strong or important personalities can control or drive discussion on their on interest

First International Capacity Building Workshop in Romania - January 26, 2004, Bucharest 10 When can STEEPV be used? At anytime while dealing with: –Problem solving (usually new problems) –Decision making (identifying needs) –Planning (considering a multi-dimensional relations) –Crisis management (linkages with other dimensions) –Highly uncertain situations (exploring impacts) –Scenario activities (evaluating SWOTs on STEEPVs) It helps ‘breaking the ice’ and moving towards a more dynamic working group

First International Capacity Building Workshop in Romania - January 26, 2004, Bucharest 11  To avoid Follow the leader/wave effect Reasons for combining F2F & Online STEEPV  To improve/increase knowledge/data collection  To provide immediate & dynamic knowledge/data:  Collection  Processing  Availability  Evaluation  Clustering & Prioritisation  When time, costs & logistics make frequent meetings unfeasible.  To avoid Ostrich effect

First International Capacity Building Workshop in Romania - January 26, 2004, Bucharest 12 …combining STEEPV & prioritisation

First International Capacity Building Workshop in Romania - January 26, 2004, Bucharest 13 …STEEPV as input for SWOT …to identify competitive sectors online Vision of Carabobo 2020, June 2002, Carabobo State, Venezuela

First International Capacity Building Workshop in Romania - January 26, 2004, Bucharest 14 Rafael Popper PREST, University of Manchester, UK Thank you!

First International Capacity Building Workshop in Romania - January 26, 2004, Bucharest 15 Exercise 1- STEEPV for Romania 2015 (45 minutes) Please get together in groups of 7-8 people Confront your topic with the STEEPV dimensions Discuss the main trends driving & challenging the effective use of bio-technology in Romanian agriculture by 2015 –Nominate one group Chairman & one Secretary –Use the related global issues as starting points for your discussion –Identify a maximum of 10 issues (up to 15 words each) –Rank the level of importance of each issue (1-10) and assign a level of uncertainty from 1-10 (10=very uncertain) –The chairman will keep control of each intervention time –The secretary will try to take notes of most relevant issues