Day 01. Activating Futures For All
Futures Games for All
Monday June 22, 2:30pm EDT
✍️ Workshop 3 hour session
In this workshop we will introduce the participants to a variety of gaming techniques, tools and strategies used by futurists. Participants will play two activities that we designed as part of our futures practice (Futures in 1 Hour, Futures Out Loud). Futures in 1 Hour teaches the basics of futures studies in a fun and interactive team-based activity. Futures Out Loud is a scenario generation and evaluation card game. These activities have been used in the field with Fortune 500 companies and in higher education settings. We will discuss how to use games to develop actionable and practical implications and to activate futures for all. At the end of the workshop, we will facilitate an interactive discussion about how participants could use different gaming techniques and strategies in their work and what challenges they might face.
Agenda
Intro to Serious Games – 30 min
Futures in 1 Hour – 75 min
Break – 10 min
Futures Out Loud – 30 min
Discussion & Q&A – 35 min
Leigh Cook
Associate VP, Strategy and Innovation, North Highland
Leigh Cook is a futurist, innovator and strategist. She leads the Futures & Customer Strategy practices at North Highland focused on 1) bringing futures to life through experiential methods that deliver practical insights and make futures accessible to all, and 2) envisioning and creating meaningful human experiences and breakthrough business strategies. Leigh has over 20 years of experience in the areas of brand and experience strategy, customer insight and innovation for many leading global brands across CPG & Retail, Financial Services, Hospitality, Media & Entertainment, Oil & Gas, Public Sector and more. This includes future visioning, ideation facilitation and design research for these leading brands plus extensive market research (both quantitative and qualitative) resulting in many new concepts, brand experiences and strategies. She has won the IRI Marketing Innovation, the Gold and Silver Communicator and Silver Stevie awards for some of her work. She has an MBA in Marketing from Emory University’s Goizueta Business School and a BA (Phi Beta Kappa) in Dramatic Arts from the University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill. Leigh is passionate about using futures thinking and design thinking to help organizations understand their possible futures, innovate and achieve their greatest potential, purpose and sustainable growth. She publishes and speaks regularly on these topics.
Eric Boye
Senior Manager, Digital Partnerships and Capabilities, The Coca-Cola Company
Eric Boye is a strategic foresight and digital innovation strategist currently working at The Coca-Cola Company. Eric combines futures and design strategy principles with technology and business reviews to help customers define their vision, develop their digital roadmaps, and implement their new plans. In addition to consulting engagements, he works on developing strategic partnerships and managing new technology development. Prior to Coca-Cola, Eric worked at North Highland in the Futures practice with a focus on strategic foresight, experience design, and innovation strategy. As part of the Futures practice, Eric co-developed new futures games and methodologies including Futures Out Loud (scenario generation card game) and Futures Explorer (SES-inspired strategy board game). Prior to business school he worked in digital marketing and advertising, including partnering with emerging technology companies to power digital and social media campaigns for Fortune 500 companies. Eric completed his MBA at the Georgia Institute of Technology with a focus on Marketing and Managing Innovation and Technology, and his BA at the University of Michigan. Eric lives with his wife, daughter, and dog in Atlanta near Piedmont Park.
Sandjar Kozubaevon
Director, Futures & Experience Strategy, Sparks Grove, Division of North Highland
Sandjar Kozubaev is a futurist, experience strategist, innovation consultant and educator. He currently works with Sparks Grove, the experience design division of North Highland, a global management consulting firm where he leads the Futures practice. Sandjar fuses his background in economics, design and strategy to help people and organizations imagine futures and bring them to life with stories, experiences and artifacts. Sandjar has helped clients design new products and experiences and become more human-centric and resilient in their approach to strategic planning. Throughout his career, Sandjar worked with Fortune 500 brands and start-ups in the financial services, consumer products, pharmaceuticals, high-tech, automotive and other industries. Sandjar has a BA and MS in economics (Tashkent Oriental Studies Institute, University of St Andrews, respectively) as well as an MBA in Design Strategy (California College of the Arts). He is currently a PhD candidate in Digital Media at Georgia Institute of Technology focusing on speculative design, futures technology and human-computer interaction. His work has been published in numerous business and academic publications and conferences including Industrial Designers Society of America, Design Management Institute, Service Design Network, ACM Conference on Computer-Human Interaction, ACM Conference on GROUP work and others. His writings have also appeared in Fast Company and the Business Chronicle.