In crisis times, the focus of people and organisations is on dealing with the present urgent issues. They rely on known approaches and solutions and it often requires time before they realize they are confronted with a new problem to which the old solutions have no answer. They are confronted with uncertainty. In a pursuit to get some clarity in the darkness, they request answers from Intelligence (providers). As this may work when dealing with short-term complicated problems, it doesn't work with longer term complex issues where you can no longer rely on historical data to make sense of your environment. To deal with this uncertainty, Foresight is needed. Organizations can and should use both Intelligence and Foresight. If applied for the right problem, both methodologies can even reinforce each other and add significant value in supporting decision makers.

April 11, 2020