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I’ve typed up the list we made of things to think about for ERP introduction based on everybody’s perspectives, experiences and insights, which seemed to add up to a very useful set of headings. This is in the first attachment here. If I’ve missed something, please let me know and I’ll add it.

We also talked about the leadership and people side of introducing new systems and other change. I drew your attention to John Kotter’s approach to this, which I highly recommend as a reference. (John Kotter is an international authority – arguably the international authority – on this topic.) A summary is available here https://www.kotterinc.com/methodology/8-steps/ where an ebook can be downloaded.

I also mentioned Chip and Dan Heath’s material on change (“How to make a switch”), specifically their model “Direct the rider (the conscious mind); Motivate the elephant (the unconscious mind); Shape the path (the process)”. This is expanded on in the attached sheet and more information can be found at https://heathbrothers.com/resources/overview/. (You do need to register to access the resources.) John Kotter also has a take on the human side of change, which is summarised in the attached sheet “The Core Pattern Associated with Successful Change”.

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The Core Pattern Associated with Successful Change

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How to make a switch - worksheet (Human-Chimp incorporated)

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ERP Introduction checklist - 21 August 2023

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CeeD Tayside Leaders Group 31 October 2023 - slides used

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Eight behaviours for effective leadership team dialogue

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Eight behaviours for effective leadership team dialogue

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You'll find a useful summary article on mutual learning behaviours at this link

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Articles - Roger Schwarz & Associates, Inc.

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Recently, I was talking with a senior leader from a world-class global learning and development company. We were discussing his firm's approach to teaching leadership. He was talking about how to help leaders influence others. I asked him, "Do you ...

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CeeD Tayside Leaders Group 19 April 2023 - slides used

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What is leadership? - With David Marquet

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5 Learning Disciplines (5 spoke exercise)

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5 Learning Disciplines (5 spoke exercise)

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'If there is one single thing a learning organisation does well, it is helping people embrace change. People in learning organisations react more quickly when their environment changes because they know how to anticipate changes that are going to occur... and how to create the kinds of changes they want. Change and learning may not exactly be synonymous, but they are inextricably linked.' Peter Senge et al 5th Discipline Fieldbook p. 11

Extended Reading

FactFile #2 The 5 Disciplines

Recommended Reading
Peter Senge

Five Learning Disciplines...

by Bill Cropper, Director - The Change Forum

According to Senge, leaders in learning organisations learn to thrive on change and constantly innovate by methodically cultivating these 5 Disciplines. They may never be fully mastered, but learning-centred leaders, teams and organisations practise them continuously.

Our approach to workplace improvement and learning-centred leadership is based firmly in the values, concepts, principles and language of learning organisations.

Ø Read more about The Five Disciplines in more detail in our FactFile #2 available for free download HERE

Working with the 5 Disciplines

Sometimes it's difficult to work out where to start work on the 5 Disciplines. Some say they just want to 'do Systems Thinking' or 'work on a Shared Vision' and leave Personal Mastery or Team Learning out of the picture. Trouble is - they can't, because as you may have realised, all the Disciplines are inter-linked.

Do I need to build a Shared Vision first with my team? But hold on - I can't really do that until we start having better conversations (Team Learning). Can I start by using Systems Thinking to map out with my team a few problems that keep repeating themselves at work? But wait - they'll need to understand assumptions and Mental Models if that's going to be worthwhile...

Because of their inter-connected nature, it doesn't matter where you start. The Disciplines are like 5 fingers of the same hand. This doesn't mean trying to work with all 5 Disciplines at the same time. There's nothing wrong with concentrating on one (and we say no more than 2 at a time) of the Disciplines first and working your way onto the others serial fashion.

_________________o0o_________________

This FactFile is derived from our program Guide: © Learning-Centred Leadership: Applying the Tools of the
5 Disciplines to Team Learning and Leadership
copyright Bill Cropper - The Change Forum 2004-08

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Sources referred to:

Senge, Peter M. (1990, revised 2006) The Fifth Discipline: The Art & Practice of The Learning Organization New York: Doubleday

Senge, Peter M., and others (1994) The Fifth Discipline Fieldbook: Strategies and Tools for Building a Learning Organization. New York: Doubleday

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The 5 Leadership Learning Disciplines in brief are:

Download extended PDF version: FactFile-2

In 1990, Peter Senge published "The Fifth Discipline" (later followed by "The Fifth Discipline Fieldbook: Strategies and Tools for Building a Learning Organization" in 1994). His books pulled together his extensive research into what different organisations do to build learning capacity - and why some organisations use learning better than others.

Senge codified these practices into what he called 'The 5 Learning Disciplines' as well as coming up with the concept-label of 'learning organisations'.

"A learning organisation discovers how to tap people's commitment and capacity to learn at all levels...where people continually expand their capacity to create the results they truly desire, where new and expansive patterns of thinking are nurtured, where collective aspiration is set free and where people are continually learning how to learn together." Peter Senge

More than merely a business best-seller, The Fifth Discipline propelled Senge into the front row of management thinkers, created a language about change all kinds of companies could embrace, and offered a vision of workplaces that were humane and built around a culture of learning.

Like any ideal, the perfect 'learning organisation' is not an attainable goal, but rather a desirable and useful set of guiding ideas and principles for people and organisations to aspire towards. There's more to being a learning organisation than just amassing knowledge. Every organisation creates and uses knowledge. The challenge is that few seem to actually learn how to manage it, apply it, grow through it and use it effectively.

There's no one correct formula -- different organisations try different processes, strategies and systems to share learning, acquire knowledge and turn it into the capacity to learn for change, re-learn and continually improve. There are, however, some key elements that all learning organisations have in common. Senge sorted many of these into 5 key learning areas or themes, he called 'The Five Disciplines'.

Five Learning Disciplines

The 5 Learning Disciplines - Shared Vision ,Mental Models , Personal Mastery , Team Learning and Systems Thinking - are each made up of a set of tools and practices for building and sustaining learning leadership capability in organisations. Each Discipline consists of:

Principles, propositions or concepts (Senge calls these 'guiding ideas')

Tools or techniques that, once learned and practised, assist in making the Disciplines come to life

Practices or precepts to follow in your own leadership behaviour and approaches

The key vision question is 'What do we want to create together?'. Taking time early in the change process to have the conversations needed to shape a truly shared vision is crucial to build common understandings and commitments, unleash people's aspirations and hopes and unearth reservations and resistances. Leaders learn to use tools such as Shared Vision: 'Positive Visioning', 'Concept-shifting' and 'Values Alignment' to create a shared vision, forge common meaning/focus and mutually agree what the learning targets, improvement strategies and challenge-goals should be to get there.

Mental Models: One key to change success is in surfacing deep-seated mental models - beliefs, values, mind-sets and assumptions that determine the way people think and act. Getting in touch with the thinking going on about change in your workplace, challenging or clarifying assumptions and encouraging people to reframe is essential. Leaders learn to use tools like the'Ladder of Inference' and 'Reflective Inquiry' to practise making their mental models clearer for each other and challenging each others' assumptions in order to build shared understanding.

is centrally to do with 'self-awareness' - how much we know about ourselves and the impact our behaviour has on others. Personal mastery is the human face of change - to manage change relationships sensitively, to be willing to have our own beliefs and values challenged and to ensure our change interactions and behaviours are authentic, congruent and principled. Leaders learn to use tools like Personal Mastery 'Perceptual Positions' and'Reframing' to enhance the quality of interaction and relationship in and outside their teams.

develop reflection, inquiry and discussion skills to conduct more skillful change conversations with each other which form the basis for creating a shared vision of change and deciding on common commitments to action. It's also about teams developing the discipline to use the action learning cycle rigorously in change-work. Leaders learn to use tools like the Team Learning happens when teams start 'thinking together' - sharing their experience, insights, knowledge and skills with each other about how to do things better. Teams'Action-Learning Cycle' and 'Dialogue' to develop critical reflection skills and conduct more robust, skillful discussions with their teams and each other.

is a framework for seeing inter-relationships that underlie complex situations and interactions rather than simplistic (and mostly inaccurate) linear cause-effect chains. It enables teams to unravel the often hidden subtleties, influences, leverage points and intended/unintended consequences of change plans and programs and leads to deeper, more complete awareness of the interconnections behind changing any system. Leaders learn to use Systems Thinking 'Systems Thinking Maps' and 'Archetypes' to map and analyse situations, events, problems and possible causes/courses of action to find better (and often not obvious) change options/solutions.

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'If there is one single thing a learning organisation does well, it is helping people embrace change. People in learning organisations react more quickly when their environment changes because they know how to anticipate changes that are going to occur... and how to create the kinds of changes they want.

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Framework for Innovation (double diamond)

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Framework for Innovation (double diamond)

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Helping designers and non-designers across the globe tackle some of the most complex social, economic and environmental problems.

The framework is fundamental to our work

It enables us to support the public, private and third sector organisations we work with transform the way they develop and deliver their services.

This work by the Design Council is licensed under a CC BY 4.0 license.

At the heart of the framework for innovation is Design Council's design methodology, the Double Diamond - a clear, comprehensive and visual description of the design process. Launched in 2004, the Double Diamond has become world-renowned with millions of references to it on the web.

As well as highlighting the design process, Design Council's framework for innovation also includes the key principles and design methods that designers and non-designers need to take, and the ideal working culture needed, to achieve significant and long-lasting positive change.

Design Council's Double Diamond clearly conveys a design process to designers and non-designers alike. The two diamonds represent a process of exploring an issue more widely or deeply (divergent thinking) and then taking focused action (convergent thinking).

Discover. The first diamond helps people understand, rather than simply assume, what the problem is. It involves speaking to and spending time with people who are affected by the issues.

Define. The insight gathered from the discovery phase can help you to define the challenge in a different way.

Develop. The second diamond encourages people to give different answers to the clearly defined problem, seeking inspiration from elsewhere and co-designing with a range of different people.

Deliver. Delivery involves testing out different solutions at small-scale, rejecting those that will not work and improving the ones that will.

This is not a linear process as the arrows on the diagram show. Many of the organisations we support learn something more about the underlying problems which can send them back to the beginning. Making and testing very early stage ideas can be part of discovery. And in an ever-changing and digital world, no idea is ever 'finished'. We are constantly getting feedback on how products and services are working and iteratively improving them.

The design principles

The framework for innovation outlines four core principles for problem-solvers to adopt so that they can work as effectively as possible.

Put people first. Start with an understanding of the people using a service, their needs, strengths and aspirations.

Communicate visually and inclusively. Help people gain a shared understanding of the problem and ideas.

Collaborate and co-create. Work together and get inspired by what others are doing.

Iterate, iterate, iterate. Do this to spot errors early, avoid risk and build confidence in your ideas.

The methods bank

We have authored, adapted or adopted a portfolio of design methods which help our clients to identify and address their challenges and achieve successful outcomes. We have structured these methods in three areas to help them use the design process to explore, shape or build:

Explore: challenges, needs and opportunities

Shape: prototypes, insights and visions

Build: ideas, plans and expertise

Creating a culture of success

The problems we face today require more than one idea, they require working with other organisations and supporting people to be part of the solution. As important as the process and principles organisations we adopt, is the culture of an organisation and how it connects with citizens and partners.

Leadership is needed to encourage innovation, build skills and capability, provide permission for experimentation and learning. Strong leadership also allows projects to be open and agile, showing results along the way and being able to change.

Engagement is needed with people who are delivering the ideas and receiving them, but also with other partners who might have other ideas. Developing connections and building relationships is as important as creating ideas.

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Helping designers and non-designers across the globe tackle some of the most complex social, economic and environmental problems.

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There is a seeming paradox in futures thinking. On the one hand, it is quite difficult and not very common as either method or skill. On the other hand, it is a natural function of the mind and parts of the brain are dedicated to it, sometimes called 'memory of the future'; we call this natural capacity future consciousness.

The task of facilitating futures thinking is to ease the difficulties and release the natural capacity. That is what the methods explained here enable you to do.

One set of blockages to future consciousness, especially sharing it, is various social habits and taboos that inhibit its function through customs, language and dominant social expectations. Another is the psychology of certainty and uncertainty. Exploratory future thinking includes facing uncertainty in ways that most people try and avoid. This will show itself in denial and avoidance of questions. It will also appear as arguments of the form "Don't be ridiculous, that could never happen" or "No way! That isn't possible". Another factor is around power and security. Nobody likes to consider a future which removes their power position or livelihood. However, in a radically changing world it may be prudent to anticipate such events and prepare contingency plans

The Three Horizons method helps get around some of these difficulties by providing a context in which people can legitimately share different perspectives both amongst each other and internally in their own minds. You will see this later in the section on three voices.

The important skill and capacity of the facilitator is to be able to hold the mental and emotional space for people to be safe in exploring these things. It is also to ensure that "all voices are heard" in the process of building the three horizon map. This means that you, the facilitator, need to have practised three horizons thinking and developed your own future consciousness to have the confidence to carry this through.

Having said that, wide experience by many practitioners in many situations has shown that it has a sort of power to "do itself", at least at a basic level, if you set up the structure and follow the facilitation protocols.

Patterns of Change

The three horizon model gives us a deeper understanding of the significance of what we usually call short, medium and long term futures. The model is based on the observation that businesses, technologies, political policies and even whole civilizations exhibit life-cycles of initiation, growth, peak performance, decline and even death. These cycles can be viewed as waves of change in which a dominant form is eventually overtaken and displaced by another.

This pattern also shows up in our personal lives where we go through a change of life that is not an extension of the past but has a quite new pattern emerge. In this process we go through a disruptive crisis of transition and transformation.

These displacements may be gradual but, in times of rapid change, they can be quite abrupt. For example, we speak of disruptive technologies that suddenly reach a tipping point and take over the technological ecosystem. However, a closer look reveals that these waves are also going on simultaneously on different scales, changing their place in the foreground or background over time. Yet this is not easy to see unless we appreciate the qualitative differences between the waves. Understanding is further helped by recognising the value of thinking in terms of three waves at a time.

A good way to picture this is to switch from the analogy of waves and think instead in terms of horizons. Imagine you are looking at a view from the plains near the coast towards inland mountains. The first horizon is where the plains end and the foothills of the second horizon rise. Yet behind them are the high mountains of the third horizon. The plains may be agricultural, the foothills wooded and the mountains without trees and with glaciers. Each horizon is qualitatively different. The analogy here is that we need to be able to see different qualities that distinguish the short, medium and long term as more significant than the amount of time. In some areas of society, the three horizons may cover a span of ten years; in others they may span half a century. In other words qualitative or structural change is more significant for strategy than span of time.

We usually label the vertical axis as 'Pattern', 'Viability', 'Prevalence' or 'Strategic Fit', which capture the idea of the shift in the most dominant, or prevalent, pattern moving between the horizons over time. It is a reflection of the strategic fit to emerging conditions, and so this is an alternative labelling. Alternatively we can think of the vertical dimension as a scale of a particular condition of interest. For example in the field of sustainability it could be the resilience of a community that falls and rises according to what is going on and the way people live.

H1 - The First Horizon...

... is the dominant system at present. It represents 'business as usual'. We rely on these systems being stable and reliable but as the world changes, so aspects of business as usual begin to feel out of place or no longer fit for purpose. Eventually business as usual will be superseded by new ways of doing things.

H3 - The Third Horizon...

...emerges as the long term successor to business-as-usual. It grows from fringe activity in the present that introduces completely new ways of doing things but which turn out to be much better fitted to the world that is emerging than the dominant H1 systems. We call these early manifestations "pockets of the future in the present."

H2 - The Second Horizon...

...is a pattern of transition activities and innovations, people trying things out in response to the ways in which the landscape is changing. Some of these innovations will be taken up by H1 systems to prolong their life while some will pave the way for the emergence of the radically different H3 systems.

Qualities of the Future in the Present

All three horizons are always present, they capture three qualitatively different ways of connecting the present moment to the future.

Aspects of H1 will persist in any new business as usual; aspects of H3 are always evident, if not obvious, in current discourse and argument and in all kinds of activity on the fringes of the dominant system; while H2, like a moving border between past and future, is all around us in examples of innovative alternative practice.

However, the First Horizon's commitment is to survival. As the current, dominant, system it maintains its dominance, even in a changing world, either by crushing Second and Third Horizon innovation (variant 1 below), or by co-opting it to support its established system (variant 2). This resistance to change impacts on the transition to H3: often it leads to the innovations in H2 being 'mainstreamed' in order to prolong the life of the existing system, rather than to help movement towards a new system.

Common Variants

The three line diagram used so far here is what we might call the standard version which is useful for introducing the concept as a framework for facilitation. However, as a model of the way the future unfolds it is only one form. Indeed, it is rather an ideal form for where a shift of pattern is relatively successful and without difficulties other than the deconstruction and reconstruction that is unavoidable in Horizon 2. There are different variants that show that it is useful to bear in mind for more advanced applications, or to point out to people that change into the future is not always straightforward. The standard and three additional variants are shown here:

Bear in mind that these are just archetypes and the real world is always going to be a messy mixture. The point is not to impose them on a situation, but to use them to sensitise our perception to what is actually going on, and the dynamics in play.

Variant 1: Challenge and Transformation

Horizon 1 is a current strategy that works well until changes in the environment plus its own diminishing returns put it on a curve of decline. Meanwhile Horizon 2, aware of this, is innovating more effective approaches which eventually overtake.

In the background, a completely new paradigm is emerging as Horizon 3. It appears for a long time to be marginal and ineffective but since it matches better the new environment it eventually takes over. The Horizon 2 innovations have served as enabling to the transformation.

Variant 2: Collapse and Slow Recovery

In this variant the supremacy of the Horizon 1 paradigm creates runaway success but at the expense of some critical condition. Failure to capture coupled with weaker innovation in Horizon 2 leads to sudden collapse. Horizon 2 is unable to make up for this.

In the background Horizon 3 continues to develop and after the initial upset and chaos of the collapse demonstrates its ability to match the new conditions and emerges as the next viable paradigm.

Examples: Many city and region economies have been through this cycle due to their strong commitment to a particular industry that has lost competitiveness e.g. autos, steel, textiles.

Variant 3: H1 Capture and Extension

Horizon 1 is challenged by changing conditions and there is strong innovation opportunity taken by Horizon 2. However, each wave of innovation is captured by Horizon 1 and applied to extend its life. This may go on for several cycles.

Horizon 3 remains in the background since it is so different from Horizon 1 that there is no place for it in the mainstream. It continues to languish in the margins until a much more fundamental and long term change occurs.

Examples: financial crises (e.g.2008) show a breakdown in the Horizon 1 business-as-usual and there is clamour for fundamental reform. However, the dominant system pushes back and only minor adjustments are made (e.g. quantitative easing, regulatory reform). Meanwhile the underlying structural problem still persists leading inevitably to a series of crises and fixes. New financial structures and currencies languish in the background as Horizon 3 possible solutions. Entrepreneurial attempts are made for alternatives that might be on the path to H3 or sustain and extend H1.

Variant 4: H2 Overshoot

H1 is challenged by a compelling vision that is hyped up and creates a wave of investment in Horizon 2 innovations. This creates a boom followed by bust as many innovations are poorly judged.

Horizon 3, which was the source of the vision gets a boost from the Horizon 2 over-investment, and grows strongly as confidence returns and the vision matures.

Examples: Technologies are often over-hyped by their protagonists in order to attract funding, but are then not able to fully absorb that investment if a boom takes off. The Dotcom bust was a major example.

Mindsets and Perspectives

The effectiveness of Three Horizons comes from recognising that the three horizons are not just abstract representations of change, but characterise three qualitatively different orientations to the future in the present - they describe ways people are behaving to maintain the first horizon or seeking to change it. We referred to this earlier as "three voices".

The interaction between the horizons is as much culturally determined as it is economic or technologically determined. The people and groups associated with each horizon at a given point in time have very different interests, values and mindsets. This makes communication difficult and the tendency for misunderstanding and conflict very high. Indeed, there is competition between the horizon mentalities and in some cases outright conflict. This is why we more often than not see Variants 2 and 3 rather than the smother transition of the Variant 1.

However, in managing transformational change, where we want to avoid the costs of conflict or collapse, it is necessary to develop a perspective that understands all three mindsets and takes them into account. The challenge for transformational leadership is to be able to stand back from an overall position to be able to see the interplay between them, and work with them all constructively - we call this the step into future consciousness. This is most easily studied as the kinds of attitudes and judgements that people from each of the horizons make about each other and each other's activities and priorities.

All three mindsets are present in the situation simultaneously, either isolated or in conflict. The facilitation task is getting them to talk to each other and work towards collaborative transition for transformation. The initial stances of each mindset towards the others is caricatured in the above diagram on the left. On the right are how these negative mindsets can be transformed into positive perspectives.

In the facilitation role it is helpful to listen to people's contributions and conversations with the two triangles in mind and see if you can spot entrenched positions and therefore encourage the co-operative relationship between the voices.

Convening the Future

The Three Horizons model offers a simple way into a conversation about:

the dominant system and the challenges to its sustainability into the future, ie the case for change (Horizon 1);

the emerging future state or the imagined system of which we can identify elements in the present that provide encouragement and inspiration (Horizon 3);

the nature of the tensions and dilemmas between H3 visions and H1 reality, and the subtle processes of change, new ways of working, new capacities, new structures even, required to navigate the transition between them;

the requirement to develop a mature perspective that accepts the need both to address the challenges to the First Horizon and nurture the seeds of the Third. This is not an either/or, good/bad discussion. We need both to 'keep the lights on' today, and to find a way of keeping them on in the future in very different circumstances.

We typically introduce the horizons, and think about the way the dynamic changes between them over time, in this order: H1 - H3 - H2. This is because without a third horizon it is impossible to make the distinction between 'sustaining innovation' (H2-) and 'transformative innovation' (H2+).

Starting with the first horizon brings into view why the conversation is happening, why it is felt that the current 'business as usual' can no longer make the changes needed. Moving to the third horizon we talk about our own visions but also all the other alternative and competing views of the future of which we are aware. This is a chance to surface underlying assumptions and different value systems, and where power to shape the future lies. Real examples populate the 'pockets of the future'. A deeper enquiry into uncertainty can use scenario approaches to develop alternative stories of how the future context might turn out that we will need to adapt to.

In the second horizon we identify initiatives underway and how they relate to sustaining and transformative change. As we develop the third horizon picture more then we can also start to see the role of the first horizon in the future. Usually, once we have been able to let go of it and move to the third horizon we find there are important things that must not be lost and can be adapted to the new environment.

Bringing all three horizons together as an interrelated pattern and as a shared narrative of possibilities for navigating towards the chosen better future, is a crucial practical result of cultivating future consciousness through convening the future.

Methods

There are three method Facilitation Guides for Three Horizons:

Three Horizons Mapping: this is the basic process of building a Three Horizon map of any topic.

Three Horizons Multi-Actor Mapping: this broadens the mapping process to combine multiple viewpoints on the emerging H3. It is a good way to combine the vision of the group with other sources of change that need to be taken into account.

Three Horizons Action Planning: this takes the output of the Mapping method and structures action towards a desired H3 vision.

Dilemma Navigation provides a more advanced method of developing visionary and adaptive pathways that retain essential values of H1 while moving towards the H3 vision. Further methods for this, and for Navigational Scenarios are coming soon.

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There is a seeming paradox in futures thinking. On the one hand, it is quite difficult and not very common as either method or skill. On the other hand, it is a natural function of the mind and parts of the brain are dedicated to it, sometimes called 'memory of the future'; we call this [...]

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The Three Horizons framework explained by Bill Sharpe

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Illustrated by Jennifer Williams

Format: Paperback

Extent: 150pp.
Size: 14 x 21.6 cm
ISBN: 978-1-911193-86-9

SECOND EDITION
A practical framework for thinking about the future... and an exploration of 'future consciousness' and how to develop it.

Three Horizons is a simple and intuitive framework for thinking about the future. The framework explains how people often manage to disagree so violently about their visions of the future and how to achieve them - and it offers a practical way to begin constructive conversations about the future at home, in organisations and in society at large.

The three horizons are about much, much more than simply stretching our thinking to embrace the short, medium and long term. They offer a co-ordinated way of managing innovation, a way of creating transformational change that has a chance of succeeding, a way of dealing with uncertainty and a way of seeing the future in the present.

In this beautifully illustrated book, Bill Sharpe introduces the Three Horizons framework as a prompt for developing a 'future consciousness' - a rich and multi-faceted awareness of the future potential of the present moment - and explores how to put that awareness to work to create the futures we aspire to.

The book first outlines the Three Horizons framework and the practices it supports, including case studies of its effective application in rural community development, education, healthcare and elsewhere.

In the final section, Sharpe outlines the potential of future consciousness as a shared cultural practice, exploring his intuition that "we have within us a far deeper capacity for shared life than we are using, and that we are suffering from an attempt to know our way into the future instead of live our way".

Three Horizons is exquisitely illustrated by artist and IFF member Jennifer Williams.

Readership
Policy makers and advisers, leaders in organisations in the public and private sector, futurists and anyone with an interest in change and planning in society at large.

"How can an eclectic group of experts, with very different worldviews, come to a shared vision for the future? Using the Three Horizons framework, skilled facilitators achieved the seemingly impossible and enabled the Carnegie Commission for Rural Community Development to agree a compelling, inspiring and hopeful blueprint for the future of rural communities. Now Bill Sharpe reveals the full potential for this way of thinking to generate practical hope in all kinds of complex policy areas."
Kate Braithwaite, Operations Director, UnLtd and formerly Carnegie UK Trust

"We need to pass from worrying about the future to constructively engaging upon its creation. For all those interested in this task, this book delivers a powerful way of thinking about that future in qualitatively different horizons. If we want transformation to be more than just an aspiration, then we need to position it and to understand the dilemmas that define progress towards a better society. This book helps with that positioning and puts discipline into the process of foresight."
Professor Peter Kawalek, Manchester Business School

"Every so often a new futures method comes along that opens up new ways of seeing the future. Three Horizons is such a method. It links the present to possible futures, and embodies ways of identifying strategic and innovation challenges. Bill Sharpe, one of the Three Horizons pioneers, has written a valuable primer on its theory and emerging practice."
Andrew Curry, The Futures Company

"Three Horizons provides a valuable tool for understanding the complexity hidden in past trends and the choices always implicit in the apparent determinism of future possibilities. An intelligent approach to seeing into the future demands both insight into the underlying forces driving surface events and the imagination to know that what appears self-evident may be only the result of a pattern of logic that fails to take fully into account the future play of those forces. Bill Sharpe's book helps us break out of the Newtonian deterministic thinking that so often blinds us to the choices we have made and reveals our power to alter them."
Garry Jacobs, Chairman and CEO of the World Academy of Arts and Sciences

"It has been a privilege to work with Pierre Wack and Bill Sharpe in thinking about the future and turning it into action. Both understand visionary action planning at its best."
Napier Collyns, Co-founder, Global Business Network

Nominated for The 2014 Most Significant Futures Works (profuturists.org)
"I was skeptical of this book, and Bill Sharpe's approach to understanding what's demanded by the future before I tried it out myself. Afterwards, I realized that Sharpe (as, I gather, one of the pioneers in developing this process) was really onto something. The business executives we asked to engage in the three horizons seemed to understand the concept at once and were able to work with it and even quote the results to each other in the subsequent discussion.

Other futurists have worked more extensively with this approach than I have. I'm sure I've barely begun to explore the complex possibilities of this way of looking at the future as people in organizations may see it. However, I believe it is worth our while to draw attention to Sharpe and his colleagues' valuable contribution to our futures toolbox. There is more to their ideas than just tools, of course. Sharpe describes it as shifting from our "simple, one-dimensional view of time stretching into the future and instead adopt(ing) a three-dimensional point of view in which we become aware of each horizon as a distinct quality of relationship between the future and the present." It's a good book to read, with relatively simple explanations undefined for futurists, at least undefined and engaging stories about how 3 Horizons works in practice. Finally, the book is graphically attractive and easy to grasp."

The Three Horizons Model is recommended by Dr Alison Wicks and Dr Maggie Jamieson in 'New Ways for Occupational Scientists to Tackle "Wicked Problems" Impacting Population Health', Journal of Occupational Science (2014).
"...we encourage occupational scientists to embrace the Three Horizons (Sharpe, 2013), a simple and intuitive framework for thinking about the future and how to bring about positive change.

Developed over several years by members of the International Futures Forum, this framework creates an awareness of the future potential of the present, a "future consciousness" (Sharpe, 2013, p. 8), enabling a mindset to create a future that society needs and wants.

... The Three Horizons framework has been used effectively by various groups to create transformative change and innovation (Sharpe, 2013, pp.65-85). According to Sharpe, transformative change results from re-patterning the way people do things rather than merely extending current patterns. Given the nature of the wicked problems impacting on population health, we believe occupational scientists need to investigate ways and means of initiating transformative change as their contribution to research on the uncertain future that lies ahead. We believe that to tackle wicked problems such as climate change, occupational scientists and others need to do research differently and re-conceptualise the future. The Three Horizons framework can assist in enabling members of research teams to start conversations about innovative ways of creating a transformed future."

Read the full paper in Journal of Occupational Science

Once the Three Horizons is understood and embedded in thinking and working, there's no going back...
"Three Horizons is more than a tool to describe the Litany of change. It's also a way to surface different perspectives on an issue in a very overt way, and to move beyond those seemingly intractable perspectives to collaborative ways of thinking about possible futures, or 'holding transformational dialogue which informs our action in the complexity of the present while respecting the unknowability of the future'...

Like all frameworks, the Three Horizons is only useful and relevant if it fits the context in which one is working and living. So far, I've found it useful in different ways in client contexts and in my own scanning as a way to map out the scope of change being faced. The Three Horizons is not just a tool for understanding change and transformation though. It's also a way to understand the power of intent and hope-individual and collective-as we look towards the future.

And like all things transformational and developmental, once the Three Horizons is understood and embedded in thinking and working, there's no going back."

Maree Conway, Founding Partner: The Centre for Australian Foresight, writing in The Association of Professional Futurists' Compass Newsletter.

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Three Horizons: The Patterning of Hope - 2nd Ed - International Futures Forum

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Illustrated by Jennifer Williams Format: Paperback Extent: 150pp.Size: 14 x 21.6 cmISBN: 978-1-911193-86-9 SECOND EDITION A practical framework for thinking about the future... and an exploration of 'future consciousness' and how to develop it. Three Horizons is a simple and intuitive framework for thinking about the future.