About

Maree Conway runs Thinking Futures, a strategic foresight practice focused on helping you move beyond the status-quo to shape your organisation’s future today.

Maree works with you to find the thinking space to critically interpret and find meaning in the complexity of the trend ecosystem that is the external operating environment, and to use that understanding to inform your strategic responses and action today.

Why get in touch with Maree?

If you see a disconnect between your organisation and its environment, if you are drowning in information about change in the external environment, if you struggle to develop effective strategy, if you see little alignment between your plans and action on a day-to-day basis, or if you want to inject the future into your risk analysis process, you know that formulaic strategy approaches are no longer enough. You need a different approach.

That approach is strategic foresight. Lots of people talk about the need for strategic foresight – I will work with you to make it real in your organisation. I help you make sense of  trend ecosystem that will shape your organisation’s future operating environment, work with you to find the meaning and understanding of the implications of those trends that are specific to your organisation, and help you can use that understanding to strengthen your strategy today.

Here’s the  formal overview of what Thinking Futures does. Thinking Futures works with people in organisations to enhance their long term thinking capacity – otherwise known as their strategic foresight capacity – and to use that thinking to build strategy that is futures ready. I work with you to help you think about possible futures today by:

• building and enhancing environmental scanning to identify information and ideas needed for strategic decision making – I help you bring the outside into your organisation,

• running strategic thinking processes that start with a focus on the long term view rather than short term urgency – I use scenario planning to help you understand the shape of preferred futures, potential risks and opportunities and your emerging strategic options so that your strategy today is robust and futures ready, and

• documenting your strategy in clear, concise and useful strategic plans that inform short-term decision making by your people - I work with your people to make your plans meaningful ‘on the ground’ in your organisation, and a key tool in your strategy execution process.

The three activities – scanning, thinking and planning – all contribute to building a strategic foresight capacity, for both you as an individual, and for your organisation. The more people in your organisation who understand the need for these three strategic capabilities, the stronger and more successful your strategy and its implementation will be.

Download an Information Sheet about Thinking Futures.

In a more informal sense, what I do is I help you find the space you need to think systematically and continuously about the implications of trends and drivers of change for your organisation. I use primarily qualitative approaches that focus on people in your organisation, and facilitate informed discussion, conversation and debate about what those trends and drivers mean for the future of your organisation. I tailor a foresight process for you to allow  you to hone in on critical challenges for your organisation that are emerging, and to understand the longer term implications of those challenges, so that you have time to respond today.

You already know today’s challenges, and you are responding to them every day.  Those responses, however, can often be reactive and short term because you lack the longer term knowledge about how the external environment is changing. Using strategic foresight approaches to build that longer term context allows you to take proactive strategic decisions today, and can move you out of the busyness syndrome that afflicts so many organisations today.

What’s Possible?

Depending on your needs, each of these three activities – scanning, thinking and planning – can be addressed in stand-alone projects, or they can be combined into a strategy project that integrates and links environmental scanning, strategic thinking and strategic planning.

A key differentiator of my work is that I am committed to working with you to build a sustainable strategic foresight capacity to inform your decision making today – this is about building the capacity to connect the thinking with the doing in strategy. Knowledge transfer and providing tailored resources during projects is therefore a primary driver, so that you are able to continue to embed a foresight approach in your strategy processes without needing continuing external consulting support.

My work is characterised by participative processes underpinned by leading edge thinking and research from across the globe – I bring the latest research on strategy and foresight to your organisation.

I work mainly with people in education, government and non-profits who are ready to move beyond business-as-usual models and ways of operating – beyond the status-quo – to build strategy that contributes to a sustainable future for themselves, their organisations and for the planet.

Get in touch to talk about how you can build a strategic foresight capacity where you work – particularly if you just have some questions or want to know more.  I’m deeply into social media as a way of sharing foresight resources and scanning hits so follow me using any of the links that you’ll see on the bottom of each page of the site.