From Trendspotting to Trendsetting: How Trend Analysis Can Help Your Organisation Shape the Future
Knowing ‘what’s next’ in future trends and megatrends is essential to be able to act on influential changes at the right time. With trend analysis, organisations can position themselves as leaders and build adaptability and resilience against future challenges.
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In today’s world, analysing current trends and identifying emerging trends is vital for every organisation’s continued success. Because timing is everything: jumping into a change too early can be risky and costly, but tardiness will ensure someone else reaps all the benefits. Trend analysis will help your organisation to understand what’s coming and when to act.
In foresight, a trend is the direction in which something is moving, or the way it is changing. In addition to direction, a trend always has a time element. It grows, weakens or fluctuates as it travels out of history, into the present, and on to the future.
In a way, future trends are like the storylines in your favourite TV show: as you start watching, you start seeing where things are headed. Later on, different storylines start intertwining and impacting each other. Before actually watching the season finale, you will not know how the storylines will eventually play out, yet you can make some predictions based on what has already happened and what is currently happening.
MEGATRENDS AND THE IMPORTANCE OF TRENDSPOTTING
Besides potential interaction or collisions with other trends, any trend will also be influenced by larger megatrends. In a TV show’s world, if you know that winter is coming and it will last for several years, you can also predict with some accuracy how it will impact every ongoing storyline.
Similarly, in the real world and in foresight, megatrends are long-term, wide-reaching, impactful developments that are interlinked with each other and unlikely to change course. An example of an ongoing megatrend is digitalisation. It influences trends such as increased cybersecurity spending and network connectivity.
Spotting and analysing the future trends that are relevant to your organisation is more important than ever, and so is understanding how megatrends will impact it. After all, one of the key megatrends of our time is that the world is becoming more volatile, and consequently, continued success will require an unprecedented adaptability to change.
WHAT IS TREND ANALYSIS?
Let’s say you’ve identified a trend that is important to your organisation. How do you forecast its path going forward? With trend analysis.
Trend analysis is an umbrella term for gathering all the available data and/or insight regarding a certain trend and using the appropriate methodology to understand it. There are a number of different methods for trend analysis, including trend impact analysis, trend extrapolation, and S-curve analysis. In short:
Trend impact analysis combines quantitative data with qualitative insight on what might influence a trend
Trend extrapolation projects a trend into the future, assuming it will stay on its current route
S-curve analysis places an identified trend at a point on an S-curve, creating a forecast based on the “S” shape of a typical trend lifecycle: slow emergence, fast acceleration to full potential, and finally, a slowdown or decline
The good news is that trends and megatrends are often quantifiable. By collecting statistical data, we can verify a trend’s presence and impact. Demographic change is one good example: we can extrapolate the existing data to see what the population will look like for decades to come, and, unless an unforeseen disruptor emerges, the estimates we make today will be very accurate into the far future.
SCANNING FOR IMPORTANT TRENDS
Whilst trend analysis allows you to understand existing trends, it is also important to know how to reliably spot upcoming trends – and distinguish them from passing fads.
Horizon scanning is a systematic way of uncovering early signs of upcoming trends. Centred around a particular topic of interest, it involves compiling and organising presently available data – even weak signals and ambiguous information – to gain a view of emerging trends and identify the action points to address them.
BECOMING A TRENDSETTER
Why is this important? Going back to TV shows – a storyline shouldn’t only happen to the characters. It should happen because of them. In the same way, your organisation should not only witness a trend but aim to influence its direction – not be a trendspotter but a trendsetter. The true heroes are those who take action and shape the events, play a role in making the future better.
Approaching the future this way also helps make sure your organisation won’t be caught off guard. It builds agility, adaptability, and resilience against challenges. If you integrate the latest trends and their impacts into how your organisation operates now, it will be easier to be prepared for what’s to come.
Acknowledging relevant trends and their impact also induces proactive change and the evolution of your organisation towards the future. By addressing influential trends at the right time, your organisation can position itself as a leader. Having knowledge of ‘the next big thing’ or understanding what is inevitably becoming a thing of the past, your organisation can confidently participate in and shape the conversation.
HOW TO GET STARTED WITH TREND ANALYSIS
Identifying trends and assessing the reliability of different sources of information is hard work. Futures Platform has done much of it for you: with an updating database of more than 1000 trend cards, curated by foresight experts, you can get started easily and efficiently.
Futures Platform’s website comes with resources on how to do trend analysis and conduct horizon scanning, and the platform offers a convenient digital environment to do it in a collaborative way, compiling external information and your organisation’s insight.
These two disciplines play distinct yet complementary roles in strategic decision-making, both essential for success in today's volatile environment.