The Real Strength and The Overstated Power of the Futures/Implications Wheel

Artwork adapted from [8]. Credits to icon: Lars Meiertoberens (The Noun Project).

The futures wheel is a subjective, qualitative foresight method to anticipate multiple consequences of one central source of change. This source of change can be a trend (a driving force), an emerging issue, an event (a wild card), a radical innovation, a decision, or a policy. As such, the change can be both external or internal to the entity/organization where the wheel is practiced. The method was developed by Jerome Glenn in 1971 while he was a student at the Antioch Graduate School of Education [1]. The method involves three simple steps, yet each of them requires attention on a number of details, as follows:

1. The source of change under analysis is written at the center of a sheet of paper. It should be well defined, specific and well written. This will be the center of the wheel. An example of source of change may be: 80% of online traffic shifts to the metaverse (a cut-off event originating from a driving force) (see Figure 1).
2. First order consequences of the source of change, both positive and negative, are written around it. This can be done in group in workshop settings as well as individually for research purposes. First order consequence should be written parsimoniously, and attention should be payed to whether they are directly originating from the source of change without…