Empowering Futures Literacy through a Knowledge-based Service Innovation Workshop
Authors: Boonswasd Porruthai , Shirahada Kunio 
Published: June 2022

During stepping into an era of rapidly changing world and constantly disruption, companies need to generate new value to unlock opportunities and drive the growth (Lee et al., 2009). Innovation is a key initiative for competitive advantage as the main driver of economic growth (Lopez, 2012). Nevertheless, as the environment changes, regulations evolve, new technologies emerge, and even consumer behavior changes, businesses may not have a clear picture of how they will survive or succeed. Companies should increase individuals' futures literacy capacities in order to strengthen firms' sensing dynamic capabilities (Rhisiart et al., 2015). UNESCO has addressed the urgent need to enhance people's capacities and skills by empowering everyone to better use the future to prepare for potential crises or overcome major challenges (UNESCO, 2021). However, there is no established approach for developing these competencies in service innovation. Therefore, we aim to enhance individuals ability by cultivating future literacy, which is a basis of human skill for future service design (Bell, 2009; Miller, 2018).Kononiuk et al. (2021) stated a future study by providing tools to facilitate futures thinking, including trend and scenario analysis. Rohrbeck (2011) listed future-oriented capabilities as the ability to gather external data, and apply creativity to find opportunities and take risks. Therefore, we believe that the global and business scanning, such as megatrend, technology trends or research direction through intellectual property, will be an essential part of enhancing future literacy. Technology trends alone usually cannot cover all organizational scenarios (Lee, 2013). Predicting the future requires not just recognizing and assessing opportunities, but also taking into account potential risks (Morris et al., 2013; Dannenberg and Grapentin, 2016; Haarhaus & Liening, 2020). In addition to considering the potential and impacts of technology breakthroughs, the climate change also influences business and financial decisions (TCFD, 2021). Unexpected business losses may caused by climate-related economic costs, such as rising global temperatures or natural disasters. Firms will be better able to take responsibility and foresight if they are aware of the challenges (TCFD, 2020). Based on the background, we developed knowledge-based service innovation workshop. We have presented megatrend, technology trends and relevant patent information to demonstrate the likelihood of technological advancement. As a reference for comprehending possible scenarios, we also present probable climate-related economic costs. Then, leveraging the future vision as a starting point to generate innovative ideas.This paper discusses the success of promoting future literacy for corporate innovation with the knowledge-based service innovation workshop. We conducted an idea generating workshop for employees at various levels to help them in developing innovative ideas for both internal and external environments. We developed our brainstorming workshop in conjunction with providing of megatrend, technology trends, business-related intellectual property, and trustworthy climate-related financial information. It also considers employee feedback on how to motivate creativity through the provision of future opportunities. The outcomes of this study will contribute to the enhance human resource competencies in order to cope with the future, which will lead to sustainable service innovation development.