In Pursuit of Foresight: Disaster Incubation Theory Re - Imagined

Many inquiry reports blame management for their failures of foresight. These reports are based on the premise that, with a little more thought, these oversights, and so the crisis, would have been avoided. Is it really that simple? The important question is whether, without hindsight, it would have even been possible to identify the actual factors that lead to the failure. This book explores this issue as a practical problem. The book takes Barry Turner’s Disaster Incubation Theory as its central theme. The first chapter explores the way Turner structured his theory and the way it has been used, before re-imagining it as a way to fostering foresight. The next three chapters examine key issues in detail. They explain why Turner's model was chosen, outline the issues that need to be considered when seeking to prevent such failures and how to use the proposed frameworks. Chapter 5 examines the lessons learnt from this study and, in particular, looks at the mental approach required when seeking such foresight. Finally, Chapter 6 provides a fully worked example. It uses work by Frank Stech who has applied Turner's theory to a past case. Crises occur everywhere and we continue to struggle to avoid them. In this book Mike Lauder provides executives with thinking tools to help them avoid missing the warning signs of their next crisis. Mike LauderMany inquiry reports blame managers for the failures of foresight. These reports are founded on the premise that, with a little more thought, these oversights, which enabled the crisis to occur, would have been avoided. Is it really that simple? These inquiry reports then go on to offer recommendations that may have prevented the events that occurred but may also be the genesis of the next crisis. In many cases these recommendations have failed to avoid the reverse fallacy, that is when an action or omission is seen as being significant in the context of one particular tragedy that leads to a recommendation and is not universally appropriate, as it may have unintended consequences at some point in the future. These recommendations are just another type of failure of foresight. The really important question, however, is whether, without hindsight, it is possible to avoid such failures. An important enabler when trying to avoid such failures of foresight is to be able to identify in advance the factors that might lead to such failure. The issue of failure of foresight is universal and world-wide. Crises occur everywhere and people still struggle to avoid them. Here Mike Lauder provides executives with thinking tools to help them avoid missing the warning signs of the next crisis.-- Provided by Publisher Cover 1 Contents 6 List of Figures 8 List of Tables 10 Acknowledgements 12 1 In Appreciation of Barry Turner 14 Introduction 14 Aim 15 Disaster Incubation Theory Described 16 Disaster Incubation Theory Sta ges 17 Case Studies 20 Reshaping Turner’s Model 36 Conclusion 40 2 Selecting a Framework for Foresight 42 Introduction 42 Selection of a Framework 43 Approach 47 Chaos as the Norm 54 Conclusion 75 3 Issues for Foresight 78 Introduction 78 Issues of Interest 80 Universals 81 Causes 84 Catalytic Questions 118 Conclusion 122 4 Debate Framework 124 Introduction 124 Developing a Catalytic Framework 124 Generalisation 126 Intelligent Countermoves 127 Foresight or Hindsight 130 Framework 132 Conclusion 142 5 Lesson to be Learnt 144 Introduction 144 Turner’s Phenomena 145 Revised Questions 145 The “What” 149 The “How” 155 Conclusions 158 6 Pursuing Foresight 160 Introduction 160 Looking Back 164 Looking Forward 178 Using the Cube 212 Conclusion 213 Epilogue 220 Bibliography 222 Index 236 Disaster Incubation Theory Re-imagined