Strategic foresight and worldbuilding with companies

Tuuliluleima’ is an artistic and futuristic protopian film developed using design fiction and art-based methods. Design fiction is a method based on narratives and worldbuilding that unravels unknown, yet possible, futures. Worldbuilding focuses on imaginary realms, cultures, and languages, usually used in literature, film, and gaming industries (Zaidi, 2019). This paper presents a research-through-design process of imagining possible futures aiming to better understand creative methods and the role of artistic expression, which can be further utilised as a means to facilitate companies’ foresight and strategy work.

Tuuliluleima followed the core idea of design fiction by creating a physical prototype based on an envisioned future world. The filmmaking process, including costume design and cinematography, had a central role in creating the future world. As part of the speculative design, a futuristic wind chime was created to attract, measure, and deal with wind changes in the future. Tuuliluleima enabled companies to envision possible futures and various personas in future situations. This allowed them to join worldbuilding and apply this in their business strategising process for the future. The strategic foresight design process included the creation and utilisation of several foresight planning tools, such as a foresight matrix for three possible future scenarios (utopian, business as usual, and dystopian) and a canvas for future business model design.