More, Better & Brighter Futures (Live-online)

As part of our efforts to democratise the future, the Copenhagen Institute for Futures Studies has designed a targeted masterclass that explores different building blocks for enhanced futures imagination and anticipation. Without futures thinking, we become blind to paths ahead, and our actions today may be clouded by bias, rooted in misguided assumptions, or suffer from poverty of the imagination.

This masterclass provides a crucial set of hands-on tools and frameworks that help you become more futures literate – an essential skill for the 21^st century as defined by UNESCO. Through interactive engagement and action learning, combined with a balanced blend of theory, exercises and tangible tools, this masterclass will inspire and enhance your uses of the future.

Futures Literacy is best practiced and learned in relationship with others, and our participants will be upskilled through a collaborative process for understanding and challenging underlying anticipatory assumptions and cognitive biases that can impair decision-making and world views. Our facilitators will bring their knowledge and expertise from working with anticipation as a public good through arts, culture, and education.

Who is this for?

This masterclass is designed for practitioners with little to some experience with futures literacy and foresight processes, as well as innovators, strategic planners, business developers and designers alike, who wish to inform their work through more, better, and brighter futures.

In addition, we offer exclusive trainings that enable you to cultivate futures literacy in a particular thematic area within your organisation or community. Please reach to Senior Advisor, Nicklas Larsen to learn more.

This masterclass will provide you with:

• Knowledge about futures literacy as an essential capability for the 21^st century, what it means to be futures literate, and how to train it
• Experience with using the future as an informative process and a capability that can be trained rather than a destination to arrive at
• Increased awareness of your cognitive biases and anticipatory assumptions that can impair your sense- and decision-making and lead to less-than-ideal outcomes for your organisation or community
• Solid understanding of the societal benefits of participatory futures and how to apply it in practice, both within your organisation and your wider community
• Knowledge about self-reinforcing narratives, metaphors, and myths and how to align them to create a culture and environment in which you can achieve your aspirations
• The opportunity to cultivate a “futures literacy mindset” while expanding your network through exchange of experiences and ideas with like-minded professionals from other communities and industries

Core modules of this masterclass

At the Institute, we view futures literacy as a public good. This masterclass is aligned with our goal of increasing the quality of that public good as it guides participants towards a theoretical and practical understanding of futures literacy and design principles for better uses of the future.

• Futures literacy - Become familiar with the concept of futures literacy, why it was declared as a fundamentally important skill by UNESCO, and what steps you need to take to become futures literate
• Decolonising Futures - Learn about how the environment surrounding you influences the way you think about the future - and how an understanding of this can expand your horizon, open you up for novel ideas, and create space for diverse imaginations
• Participatory Futures - Learn about the vital approaches for involving the public in exploring and shaping potential futures and fuel public debate
• Myths, Metaphors and Narratives - Understand the impact that underlying myths, metaphors, and narratives have on individual, organisational and communal self-understanding - and how reinventing them can aid you in achieving your aspirational future

Format

The masterclass is facilitated live-online in two sessions, with 3.5 hours per live session (including 30-minute break).

The course consists of a mixture of live-online instruction and hands-on online workshop activities facilitated by CIFS advisors/futurists with years of global experience. Throughout, we will contextualise and discuss what we have learned.

Seats are limited to secure close interaction and feedback in the group.

The masterclass includes:

• Live-online instruction and facilitation by CIFS advisors/futurists
• Immersion into CIFS approach to futures literacy and anticipatory futures
• Course material (provided prior to course) and presenter slides
• LinkedIn certificate of course completion badge
• Personal 1-year Futures Membership of CIFS
• Networking opportunities with like-minded business professionals

Dates, times, and sign-up

We offer different options tailored to different time zones. We add new course dates on a rolling basis. The following course dates are currently available:

• Option 1: Nov. 7 – Nov. 8.
  17.00 (CET) // 11.00 (EST) // 08.00 (PST)
  Suitable for Western hemisphere time zones

To sign-up and secure your seat, please add the course date of your preference to the cart and proceed to checkout.

For Futures Partners and Futures Members, please sign-up using the special sign-up form here.

In case of cancellation, please read our course cancellation policy.