A January 2026 Harvard Business Review article, “What Companies That Excel at Strategic Foresight Do Differently,” by Wendi Backler, Alan Iny, and Moe Turner, explores what the best foresight leaders do differently.
They begin with a simple observation:
“At the start of a new year, it’s human nature to want a crystal ball: What lies ahead, and how will it affect us?”
But their core message is more practical than predictive. The organizations that navigate uncertainty best aren’t the ones with the most accurate forecasts. They’re the ones whose leaders make foresight part of everyday decisions.
That lesson is especially relevant for innovative cities.
Foresight is already part of good local government
In local government, some of our most effective practices already reflect strategic foresight—we just don’t always call it that.
Emergency management is a great example. A growing practice in modern emergency operations centers is shifting the focus from pure operational response to broader situational awareness. High-performing teams regularly look 60, 90, or 120 days ahead, identify emerging risks, and plan accordingly. They run tabletop exercises to test assumptions, uncover weaknesses, and strengthen coordination before a crisis arrives.
No one expects those forecasts to be perfect. The value comes from the conversation, the preparation, and the relationships built along the way. That’s exactly the kind of leadership habit the HBR article describes.
Innovation that lasts is tied to future conditions
The same principle applies to emerging technologies like artificial intelligence.
We recognized early that AI would create both opportunities and risks. Instead of jumping straight into tools or pilot projects, we started by exploring possible uses and building a governance structure to evaluate them. We built a decision framework grounded in our core values—privacy, transparency, workforce impact, and service quality. We identified potential use cases, tested them against those criteria, and used that process to guide decisions.
That wasn’t about predicting exactly how AI would evolve. It was about preparing the organization to make better decisions as the future unfolded.
Foresight belongs at the leadership table
One of the clearest lessons from the HBR article is that foresight can’t be delegated to a planning office or innovation team. It has to live with senior leaders and shape real decisions.
That’s one reason the Alliance for Innovation has made strategic foresight a core offering for its member cities. Strategic foresight isn’t just about trend reports or scenario binders. It’s about leadership conversations:
- What assumptions are we making about our community and workforce?
- What signals suggest those assumptions need to change?
- How would our current innovations perform in a different future?
At Vision Council discussions between city managers and technology CEOs, these kinds of foresight conversations often surfaced risks and opportunities no single city would have identified alone.
Better foresight leads to better innovation
The HBR authors emphasize that strong organizations don’t rely on a single forecast. They explore multiple plausible futures and test their strategies against each one.
That approach is at the heart of the Alliance for Innovation’s strategic foresight work. Through research, capacity-building, and peer learning, AFI helps cities apply strategic foresight for innovations to remain relevant across different possible futures.
The question becomes less about the next big idea and more about readiness. What do we need to do now to prepare our organizations and our communities for a range of future possibilities? In what areas do we need to improve or innovate to be ready?
A simple takeaway
The best foresight leaders don’t have better crystal balls. They simply build better habits.
For local governments, that might mean:
- Running regular look-ahead discussions with leadership teams
- Testing innovations against multiple future scenarios
- Learning alongside peers through AFI’s strategic foresight training and research
Strategic foresight isn’t about predicting the future. It’s about building the relationships, habits, and leadership conversations that help innovative cities stay ready—no matter what comes next.
That’s what lies at the heart of AFI’s pre-conference workshop, Anticipatory Leadership: Shaping the Future with Foresight at the annual Transforming Local Government Conference (TLG) in Dallas on April 20th, 2026. The session will be introducing fundamental foresight methods that will empower leaders to shape the future of local government.
Learn more about the workshop here.
