Ever feel like addressing the environmental crisis or other massive societal transformations seems utterly unreachable? Our latest "Deep Dive: Unpack This Paper" episode explores "Pastcasting: engaging with seemingly unreachable futures", a novel and powerful methodology that flips traditional futuring on its head.

This paper introduces pastcasting as an innovative approach designed to make urgent societal transformations, like achieving global sustainability goals, concrete and actionable. Instead of predicting the future, pastcasting invites participants to imagine complex problems as if they have already been solved in an alternative, more desirable present. They then collaboratively 'pastcast' what specific actions were taken in the recent past to achieve that outcome.

Discover how this method, meticulously detailed through an action-oriented research collaboration and participatory workshop with the Swedish Transition Network (STN), proves to be liberating and generative of ideas for action. The workshop, which vividly reimagined the 2007-2008 financial crisis as an oil crisis leading to a present where global oil consumption was halved, highlights key insights:

• It facilitates imagination by providing a familiar, alternative present.
• It shifts the locus of agency closer to participants, empowering them directly.
• It reduces the perceived difficulty of transformation by placing the "pains" of change in the past.
• It breaks path dependency in thinking about how change can occur.

Tune in to understand how pastcasting can energize participants and generate actionable ideas for local change, effectively bridging the gap between what must be done and what feels possible for urgent sustainability goals. This deep dive is essential for anyone seeking practical, innovative methods to inspire real-world action.

Ref:

Minna Laurell Thorslund, Elina Eriksson, Daniel Pargman, Mia Hesselgren, Pella Thiel, Martin Hedberg, Amanda Martling. Pastcasting: Engaging with seemingly unreachable futures. Futures, Volume 171, 2025, 103609. ISSN 0016-3287. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.futures.2025.103609.

Welcome back to our show.

Today, we're zeroing in on ParEvo, an online methodology designed to help us think more comprehensively about the future. Unlike traditional approaches that often focus on a single, desired outcome, ParEvo offers a complementary perspective by exploring a wide range of possible futures.

So, what exactly is ParEvo? It's a participatory online process that generates diverse future narratives, not to predict a single outcome, but to identify a rich array of possibilities that need consideration. Participants start with a "seed text" and anonymously and independently extend the narrative, building a tree structure of alternative storylines through iterations. Once generated, these storylines are evaluated for their likelihood, desirability, and other criteria, extracting crucial value from the process.

What makes ParEvo stand out?

• It's built on an "evolutionary algorithm," focusing on the reiteration of variation, selection, and retention of information.
• It's "more divergent and satisficing" rather than "convergent and optimizing," prioritizing the generation of a diversity of views about possible futures.
• It emphasizes the construction of narratives by participants as the primary resource, which then informs detailed analysis.
• The core idea is that generating and analyzing a diversity of storylines helps us be better prepared for a future that is "only likely to be partially knowable".

ParEvo has already been applied in diverse contexts, from exploring Post-Brexit Britain and climate change to corporate strategy. For instance, the Centre for the Study of Existential Risk (CSER) used it to explore futures related to governing biological research and developing the science of global risk.

Ultimately, ParEvo facilitates the "exploration" of the new, complementing the "exploitation" of existing knowledge. Having both capacities is more valuable than just one. ParEvo represents a substantially different way of thinking about the future that can enhance our understanding and adaptive capacity.

Ref:

Davies, R., Hobson, T., Mani, L., & Beard, S. (2023). ParEvo: A methodology for the exploration and evaluation of alternative futures. Evaluation, 30(1), 27-49. https://doi.org/10.1177/13563890231188743 (Original work published 2024)

In today's hyper-competitive markets, product innovation isn't just an advantage—it's a necessity for survival. But how can firms consistently develop new products that truly hit the mark?

This episode dives deep into a groundbreaking study that uncovers the powerful interplay between strategic foresight, knowledge management (specifically knowledge exploration and exploitation), and open innovation in driving new product development (NPD) success.

We'll explore how strategic foresight directly impacts open innovation, enabling firms to anticipate future trends and proactively shape their innovation efforts. Discover the crucial, balanced roles of knowledge exploration and exploitation in fostering open innovation and achieving optimal NPD outcomes. Most importantly, we'll reveal why open innovation acts as a critical mechanism linking foresight and knowledge management to significantly improve NPD performance, moving beyond traditional internal-only approaches.

Based on empirical data collected from 298 technology-based firms in rapidly developing economies like Lithuania and Slovakia, this research extends the Knowledge-Based View (KBV) of the firm by emphasizing the vital integration of external knowledge with internal processes.

Tune in to learn practical recommendations for managers on how to prioritize foresight activities, implement balanced knowledge management practices, and effectively leverage strategic alliances and networks to enhance their firm's innovation capabilities and achieve sustained competitive advantage. Understand this integrated approach to innovation and get a clear roadmap for improving your new product development performance through collaborative strategies in dynamic business environments.

Ref: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jik.2025.100654