I have to run a series of workshops with an executive suite and they don't have a lot of time for each session. For example, we have 90 minutes to come up with the transformation vision. You know, something that usually takes 5-6 hours? Maybe even a few days? Yeah. An hour and a half.

And, no, breaking it up over a couple of sessions isn't an option thanks to timelines, deadlines and money.

Normally, this kind of session would include exercises like 3 horizons, ecosystem mapping, and other activities that enable the team to build the future together. Once they agree on what the world will look like in 10 years, they can start working on what the organization could look like in that context. But I need to get them there without the benefit of time to build that model of the future.

So I built them a straw dog, something I've written about before: a scenario of the future that they can react to.

I got some 10-year foresight reports from sources like the OECD, fed them into an LLM and then worked with it to create a scenario that I can use to start my workshop.

This was not a quick task.

In fact it took me almost 4 hours. With the LLM.

I spent quite a bit of time getting the scenario to cover all the topics we would have covered if we had done ecosystem mapping. I challenged its assumptions over and over again until I felt like the content was not obvious or simply an extension of today. Despite giving it sources to work from, sometimes the story elements didn't reflect the future direction cited in the reports (i.e. it contradicted them or created its own ideas). Some of the content was too vague or lacked sufficient detail to be compelling. So I prompted and iterated until I landed on an effective scenario.

Then I spent at least an hour making it as plain language as possible so that no one would get bogged down in the wording of the scenario and would instead focus on the content. What I wanted was a story that they would review and critique. I did not want to get into semantic discussions about what certain ideas or words meant. I wanted them to focus on adapting it, based on their knowledge and the work they do, so that it would be an acceptable starting point to begin defining the future of the organization.

Is there a risk that they might not feel as much ownership over the final product because they didn't build it themselves? Yes. Reacting to someone else's content is not the same as building your own, but it allows for a session that can actually finish in 90 minutes. And the point is for them to take the scenario apart: cut what doesn't fit, contradict what they disagree with, replace whole sections with what they know from their own work. Their ownership comes from what they change, not from what I wrote.

In the end, the scenario is an excellent starting point for the discussion, even if it took me most of an afternoon to build. And that was on one piece of input for one exercise, not the workshop design, the materials or the facilitation plan. The session hasn't happened yet, so I don't know how much of the scenario will survive once they get their hands on it. Either way, it's the kind of invisible effort no one in the session sees, but which does most of the work before anyone walks in.

Getting a group in a room is the most expensive way to make a decision. Rather than build on hope, build with intention. Join me for half a day to learn how on September 29 or November 24.