Frank Diana, principal futurist at Tata Consultancy Services, argues foresight is the instruction manual for navigating the future’s chaos. Only his manual doesn’t give you a single design—it lays out multiple possibilities.
Frank Diana’s Map of the Future
Diana’s core idea is simple: stop predicting one future and start preparing for many different possibilities. He calls the method possibility chains. Picture them as dominoes. One disruption triggers another, then another. Generative AI enters the office, hiring patterns shift, training budgets move, spans of control widen, real estate needs shrink, tax bases wobble, regulations evolve. Each trigger is a link in a chain, and together they form a picture of how the future might branch.
This is what makes Diana distinct. He isn’t interested in trend lists that sit in slide decks; he’s interested in how trends connect, converge, multiply and amplify. Foresight isn’t prophecy; it’s practice. Leaders rehearse possible branches the way pilots run simulators—so when turbulence comes, muscle memory kicks in.
Five Moves for Polyintelligent Foresight
Here’s how Diana frames foresight as a skill you can train:
- Pick a real pressure. Start with something observable—a new technology, a policy shift, a demographic turn. No crystal balls, just real data.
- Chain the effects. Ask: if this happens, what’s next? Then what? Then what? Trace second- and third-order consequences across time, domains, customers, suppliers, regulators, and communities.
- Build short scenarios. Convert chains into stories leaders can feel. Each scenario has a different risk/opportunity profile and timeline.
- Rehearse futures. Run tabletop exercises and simulations. Walk your team through forks in the chain. Identify tripwires (triggers that force a pivot) and pre-commits (moves you’ll make automatically if conditions align).
- Translate into doctrine. Codify what you’ve learned into operating principles, investment bets, and signal watchlists. Foresight is useless if it doesn’t change behavior.
Why Convergence Is the Curveball
Diana emphasizes that today’s disruptions don’t arrive politely, one at a time. They converge. AI plus climate policy plus demographic change can hit a market all at once. That’s why thinking in chains matters: it forces leaders to see how shocks collide and ripple. A lone technology trend is rarely fatal; it’s the many collisions all at once that can sink you.
History as a Teacher
Another Diana hallmark is history. He argues that the past is a library of echoes. The printing press, the Industrial Revolution, the electrification of cities—all carried lessons in disruption, resistance, and adaptation. Leaders who study those echoes are less surprised when the rhyme shows up in their own industry.
From Theory to Polyintelligence
In a polyintelligent framework, possibility chains slot neatly into the five layers:
• Cognitive (human sense-making): Chains provide a shared map so leaders focus on “what if” questions.
• Computational (machine augmentation): AI runs simulations, scans for weak signals, and flags when a branch is “lighting up.”
• Ecological (systems view): Chains force you to think beyond quarterly KPIs—into supply webs, policy ecosystems, generational and environmental ripple effects.
• Ethical (guardrails): Scenario rehearsals let you stress-test harms and design mitigation before reality hits.
• Relational (ecosystems): Chains reveal partners you’ll need and competitors you might unexpectedly cooperate with.
A Business in Rehearsal Mode
Unilever’s Future Foods initiative is a case in point. Instead of betting on one path—say, plant proteins—they rehearsed multiple futures: lab-grown meat, regenerative farming, hybrid diets. Each scenario informed strategy, partnerships, and R&D. They didn’t predict; they practiced. And when consumer trends shift, they’re already standing where the puck is headed.
Transition: From Mapping Futures to Fueling Them
Foresight is a map. Possibility chains show where the links in the chain lead, and the forks in the road are, and rehearsals train us to act when one path suddenly lights up. But a map alone doesn’t get you there. You can have the clearest chains, the sharpest scenarios, the best rehearsals—and still stall out. Why? Because every change consumes energy.
This is where Transformational Energy Units (TEUs) come in. If foresight is about seeing and rehearsing the future, TEUs are about powering the journey to it. They represent the human, cultural, and organizational capacity to absorb disruption without breaking down. Leaders often underestimate this hidden currency of change. You don’t just need to know what futures are possible—you need to measure whether your enterprise has the energy to get there.
*I use AI in all my work.
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Kevin Benedict
Futurist, and Lecturer at TCS
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***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.
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