Designed by Peter Hayward and Stuart Candy (The Polak Game, 2017) from Fred Polak's work on images of the future (The Image of the Future, 1955).
Has a group stand on two axes in a room (is the future getting better or worse, and can we shape it) to show which disagreements come from different outlooks.
When to reach for it
At the start of a planning or scenario session, when leaders keep talking past each other and the split seems to be about outlook more than evidence.
How it runs
- Mark two crossing lines on the floor: better or worse, in control or not.
- Ask the first question and have everyone take a position.
- Ask the second question and have everyone move again.
- Have each quadrant discuss what standing there means for its plans.
- Let each quadrant report while the others listen.
Where it sits in SOLVE eX
Go to the source
- The Polak Game, Or: Where Do You Stand?, Journal of Futures Studies 22(2), 2017
- The Image of the Future, Dutch original in two volumes; English translation by Elise Boulding, 1961, 1955