Storytelling and Scenario Planning

My previous posts on scenario planning (here and here) are some of the most searched on this blog. This past weekend, I used the storytelling procedure from the scenario planning module I attended at the Authentic Leadership in Action program. That module had relied heavily on the three days of preparation that led up to our creation and sharing of future scenario stories. We had brainstormed and plotted and fleshed out current and future trends that would affect the future of leadership, created scenarios around the major trends, and then set ourselves inside these scenarios to write stories from the future.

I spent Saturday facilitating the annual meeting between The Otesha Project’s Board of Directors and staff members, and midway during the day it hit me that the storytelling method was the perfect thing to bring into the group to close off our day. Otesha, since its inception in 2002, has been a fascinating organization – one that tries to incorporate consensus models and a youth-run framework into a vision for Canada-wide change.

Particularly at this point in its history, the stories of how Otesha might go forward are unwritten. The Board and staff referred often to their five year plan, but even within that framework saw wide possibilities for meeting Otesha’s mission: to bring sustainable consumption into the mainstream of Canadian culture. As the organization goes through a major transition – both co-founders have transitioned out of their director roles and now serve on the Board, full-time staff have reorganized their structure from semi-hierarchical to a flat, non-hierarchical structure, and all remain committed to a consensus model even as staff transition in and out of the organization – there is a beautiful diversity of complementary visions for meeting Otesha’s goals in the years to come.

Recognizing the diversity in the room, and the diversity of options available, I pulled in the story creation from the scenario planning module I had attended. In our last two hours, after a day discussing organizational SWOTS, key questions around HR, finances, and programming, and some intense brainstorm/visioning sessions, we gathered in a circle. Following the character creation method used in the module I’d attended, we each selected the numbers and characteristics that made up our future character. Then we mentally fastforwarded ourselves into the lives of these imaginary people – who were they, where did they live? And in the year 2011 (when Otesha’s current five year plan comes to completion), how would these characters have been touched by Otesha?

What followed was one of the most intense half hours I’ve seen a group embrace. For 30-40 minutes, everyone spread out throughout different rooms, curled up with notebooks, and started writing their stories of who their character was and how Otesha had reached into his/her life. People were gripping their pens and pencils furiously, filling up pages rapidly, pausing to reread, examine, rewrite, staring into space as they gathered their thoughts. The rooms were silent save for the sounds of our pens on paper; for thirty minutes, everyone travelled forward in time and imagined the future they could create together.

The greatest gift that comes from this method is the sharing of stories with each other. As we gathered for our last hour together, each member of the group shared their stories. More than one story made us laugh, more than one story brought tears to our eyes. Every single story offered possibility, and painted for us all a picture of Otesha’s future, and a picture of Canada’s future. I think that this hope and possibility is what each attendee is taking with them as they head back into their regular workweeks, and as a facilitator it’s a hope and possibility that have made me feel reconnected to my work.