It’s nice to seen that the good folks at Filene Research Institute, a think tank for the credit union industry, has made a report I did for them a year or so ago available to the public: Global Trends: Drivers, Values, Implications, and Strategic Questions for Credit Unions. In my shorthand, it’s “Four Scenarios.” I had been giving various trend talks to credit unions for a few year and Filene approached me about pulling together a more comprehensive story on the future of credit unions. We agreed scenarios would be a good way to do it.
I have become a fan of the scenario archetype method (kudos to Foresight Alliance colleague Mark Justman for bring this technique to my attention several years back,which emerged from the Hawaii Futures program was written up by Wendy Shultz). At my former firm, Innovaro, we used archetypes to our frame a response to a myriad of client inquiries to the question: “how is the recession going to play out?” that began pouring in back in 2008.
Since credit unions are so heavily dependent on economic futures, I felt the archetype methods would be a great fit for this project — and it was (or at least, I hope you’ll agree that it was!) I don’t want to give the whole plot away, but here is the high-level description of the four scenarios:
The report details the assumptions, drivers, and implications. I hope that credit union strategists will find it directly applicable and perhaps futurists will find it useful as well as an example of client work. Andy Hines
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