When you scan for change or are presented with material that describes change, you will locate "hits" which describe, for example, events, innovations, policy shifts, social developments, and the way people use technology. As you scan and view more, similarities across "hits" will allow you to cluster them into a trend.



The above image shows the life cycle of a trend. By the time you have identified a trend, it is likely to be already affecting your business. Emerging issues, on the other hand, are the signals that are just beginning to appear on the horizon. These emerging issues might turn out to be irrelevant for your organization, but they can also turn out to be a significant issue that you need to consider. The only way to make this determination is to monitor the emergence via scanning.

Identifying trends is relatively simple, mainly because they are labelled as such, and there is much information about them (e.g., technological and demographic trends, generational issues). It is also likely that the impact of trends is already being felt in the present, so scanning is about better understanding how that trend might evolve over time.

Identifying an emerging issue is more difficult. Emerging issues start with a value shift, or a change in how an issue is viewed. An opinion leader or champion inevitably emerges who begins to move the issue into the public view. It is at this time that you will be able to identify the emerging issue. You might be looking at "experts" who are opinion leaders, or you might be looking at more fringe sources such as those found in youth culture and social movements.

You will need to make an assessment about whether or not the scanning hit is useful to your organization.

Some tips to help you identify relevant trends and emerging issues are:

• explore what the trend/emerging issue is doing today.
• explore what people are saying the trend/emerging issue will do over time.
• explore the potential impact of the trend/emerging in your industry today and in the future.
• place the trend in a global context and consider its implications for your organization today and into the future.
• use your imagination (see Ways of Seeing)
  
  If you find something that might be useful:
• test it by searching for relevant keywords to see what sort of links appear; if you get a lot of hits and the quality of the hits seem high, it means the issue is being talked about by many people and it is something you should include as a scanning hit,
• or test it with your scanning team, or others in the organization – does it seem important to them?,
• If you have a reaction along the lines of "this is rubbish" or "this will never happen," explore a bit further before dismissing what you have found as irrelevant. What else might happen that would make this emerging issue more likely? If nothing substantial comes from this further exploration, then you can probably safely leave that particular hit for now (although check it out every now and then – keep it on a watch list).
  

Determining the value of a "hit" depends both on your personal insight and your ability to mentally move into a future space. Determine relevance only after you have explored the trend in the present AND in the future. A trend’s trajectory today could shift quite radically in the not too far distant future. One aim of scanning is to help your organization avoid surprises, and unless you explore how a trend might play out over time, you are likely to be surprised.

Think big!
Scan hits and trends are not predictions. They are merely an assessment of what might be possible in the future, not what will be. Scan hits and trends therefore inform thinking about how the organization might need to operate in response to increasing complexity and uncertainty in the external environment. So, always take a "big picture" view today and a "long picture" future view of your trend, watch for deviations from your expected norm, and adjust your thinking accordingly.

Source: By kind permission of Maree Conway - "Environmental Scanning: What it is and How to Go About It"

Next: Counter Trends and Wildcards Back: Ways of Seeing To: Shaping Tomorrow

Copyright: Some rights reserved. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.