In futures workshops, silence is often misread as disengagement. More often, it’s uncertainty doing what uncertainty does: slowing people down.
Participation doesn’t happen because people are confident. It happens because the conditions make it safe to think out loud before you’re sure.
Facilitating futures means designing participation pathways, not waiting for volunteers. If only the most confident voices shape the conversation, you don’t get foresight. You get reinforcement of the present.
It’s always useful asking who hasn’t spoken yet and what might help them enter the futures that are being created.