Foresight-driven strategic planning workshop for science-led businesses
The 2-day Scenarios-to-Strategy Intensive (S2SI): for science-led teams that want to take strategic decisions based on multiple possible futures (not just the future they want.)
Turn long-range thinking into near-term action in 2 days
The problem: Your science-driven team is stuck making reactive decisions with 3-5 year consequences.
The Scenarios-to-Strategy Intensive helps you stop debating and start deciding. In 2 days, you’ll explore multiple possible futures, test your stuck decisions, and leave with 3-5 funded commitments, complete with owners, budgets, and rules for adapting as things change.
The challenge you’re facing
You’re leading a science-based business or research spin-off. You know you should be thinking long-term, but you’re stuck in reactive mode:
- The same questions keep coming up in meetings, but nothing gets resolved
- Strategic decisions are made quickly, while juggling other priorities
- You’re debating pilots, partnerships, and priorities—but can’t commit
- Funding cycles force short-term thinking when you need a longer view
- Your team isn’t aligned on what to advance, pause, or stop
- You want to embed sustainability into strategy, not just talk about it
Sound familiar?
The problem isn’t your team. It’s that you don’t have a structured way to bridge futures thinking with actual decisions.
That’s why we created the Scenarios-to-Strategy intensive.
What is S2SI?
The Scenarios-to-Strategy Intensive (S2SI) is a facilitated, two-day workshop that helps founder-led science teams move from discussing to deciding.
Using proven foresight methods and tight facilitation, we help you:
- Explore multiple possible futures that could impact your business (not just the one you’re hoping for)
- Surface hidden assumptions that are driving your choices
- Build scenarios that translate into actionable decisions for the next 12-24 months
- Align founders and functional leads around what to advance, pilot, pause, or kill
- Make 3-5 concrete decisions you’ll actually fund—with owners, budgets, and timelines
- Create simple “if-then” rules so you can adapt without rehashing everything
During the intensive, we apply our tried and tested process →
The process
Before the workshop (2-3 weeks)
Light pre-work that your team leads, guided by us:
- Interviews with decision-makers to surface stuck decisions and budget constraints
- Quick scan of what’s changing (Tech / Customers / Policy / Capital / Competitors)
- Assumptions mapping to make hidden bets visible
- Pre-read deck (5-7 slides) to align expectations before Day 1
Day 1: Explore & Align
- Review emerging signals and key uncertainties
- Use the Futures Triangle to map forces pushing change, pulling you forward, and holding you back
- Validate and prioritise your assumptions
- Build 3-4 scenarios of possible futures (12-36 months)
- Test your stuck decisions against each scenario
Day 2: Decide & Commit
- Backcast from 3-5 year capabilities to next 12-24 months
- Generate options and test them against scenarios
- Design your portfolio (Advance / Pilot / Pause / Kill)
- Make 3-5 funded decisions with owners, budgets, and milestones
- Create if-then rules (decision triggers) for each decision
- Assign who watches what signals, and when
After the workshop (48-72 hours)
You receive:
- Decision Brief – Your 3-5 moves with owners, budgets, milestones, and triggers
- Portfolio Map – Visual showing what you’re advancing, piloting, pausing, and killing
- Early Signs Tracker – What to watch, where to look, who owns monitoring
- Assumptions & Scenarios Annex – Reference documentation
What makes this different?
Not futures literacy with no clear business goals
Yes, you’ll build competency to work with possible futures, but critically, you’ll leave with agreed decisions backed by budget allocations.
Not a design sprint
It’s hands-on and intensive, but the focus isn’t prototyping. It’s exploring possible futures and emerging risks/opportunities to make strategic decisions.
Not traditional strategy consulting
We don’t take months to analyse and deliver a 100-slide deck. We help your team decide together, in 2 days.
Is S2SI right for you?
This workshop isn’t for everyone. Here’s who it works best for:
Who you are:
The S2SI is for:
- Science-based SMEs or research spin-offs (typically 30-80 people)
- Based in Europe, with international teams working in English
- Founders actively involved in day-to-day operations
What you need:
The S2SI is for teams and businesses that want to:
- Stop debating the same decisions and actually commit
- Align your team around what to advance, pilot, pause, or kill
- Embed sustainability into strategy through real trade-offs
What makes it work:
The S2SI works best when:
- Decision-makers can be in the room (not just a working group)
- You have real budget and capacity constraints to work within
- You’re open to pausing or killing things that aren’t strategic
- You’re willing to do light pre-work before the workshop
Wondering if this is right for you?
Kind words
“The workshop marked an important milestone for our community. Your contribution will play a significant role in helping us move forward and helping us be more resilient and adaptable. We sincerely hope to stay in touch and continue this successful collaboration with you in the future.”
Communications & HR Manager
EU-OPENSCREEN ERIC
“We’d been debating the same three partnerships for six months. After two days with Suzanne, we committed to two, killed one, and assigned owners and budgets. Finally making progress.
Overall, the process was illuminating. It challenged us to accept that our assumptions about how the world is changing might be incorrect, and gave us space to consider our options, using scenarios and signals as a strategic lens.”
Jaco du Plessis
Co-Founder, Preserve Botanica
Ready to stop debating and start deciding?
Let’s explore how strategic foresight and the Scenarios-to-Strategy Intensive can help your team think longer-term and make decisions with confidence.
