Wes Kao wrote a piece about“spiky points of view” a few years ago, and it got me wondering what a spiky point of view might be in futures facilitation.
I think that, in futures work, a spiky point of view is not about provocation for its own sake. It’s about taking responsibility for the conditions under which futures are explored.
Many futures processes hide behind methodological neutrality, tool fetishism, or “letting the group decide.” A spiky futures POV says: how we facilitate futures matters as much as what futures we discuss, and pretending otherwise is itself a political stance.
Good futures facilitators don’t just offer methods. They offer judgment, discernment, and ethical orientation. I know that this will be controversial, but that’s what you get from a spiky point of view!