546: Strategic foresight gives product managers a competitive edge – with Jod Kaftan

How product managers can see around corners Watch on YouTube TLDR In this episode of Product Mastery Now, I’m interviewing Jod Kaftan, service design leader at Launch by NTT Data and former head of product design and research at Oracle, to explore strategic foresight—a methodology that moves product managers beyond traditional road mapping to anticipate and shape the future their products will compete in. Jod explains how evidence-based imagination creates competitive advantage and shares practical tools for applying futuristic methodologies to product development, helping teams escape short-term thinking and position themselves for the futures they can see coming. Introduction Too many product managers are building tomorrow’s products with yesterday’s planning methods. While your competition is reacting to trends after they’ve already taken hold, what if you could be the one who sees the trends coming? In this episode, we are exploring a methodology to give you that advantage—strategic foresight for product managers. This allows you to move beyond traditional road mapping to anticipate and shape the future your products will compete in. This is evidence-based imagination that gives you a real competitive edge. Our guest is Jod Kaftan, previously the Head of Product Design and Research at Oracle and now the service design leader at Launch by NTT Data. With over 20 years of experience helping organizations from Sony, Google, Wells Fargo, and others navigate uncertain futures, Jod is known for moving teams beyond traditional 3-horizon planning to apply real futurist methodologies. He’s pioneered approaches that turn “evidence-based imagination” into competitive advantage. Also, Jod is keynoting at my favorite product innovation conference, the Product Development and Management Association’s Ignite Innovation Conference. It is Sept 13th-16th in Chicago. Go to PDMAsummit.com for details about the conference. Miss this conversation and your roadmaps will stay trapped in short-term thinking while more strategic competitors position themselves for the futures they can see coming. That’s a risk you can’t afford, and this episode will equip you to avoid it. Summary of Concepts Discussed for Product Managers * Human-Centered Approach to InnovationJod emphasizes expanding human-centered design beyond end users to include all stakeholders—frontline employees, partners, and anyone involved in delivering customer value. This front-stage/backstage perspective recognizes that improving employee experience inevitably improves customer experience. * What is Strategic Foresight?Strategic foresight is an evidence-based imagination approach that moves beyond prediction to explore what’s probable, possible, and preferable. It’s about getting out of the prediction business and into building more agile, adaptive organizations by using personal agency to curate preferred futures anchored in values. * The Triangle Framework: Probable, Possible, PreferrableJod outlines a framework starting with probable futures (what’s likely), expanding to possible futures (what could be), and culminating in preferred futures (what we want based on our values). This creates guiding images that point back to actions we should take today. * Evidence-Based ImaginationStrategic foresight uses detailed, systematic imagination that activates multiple brain regions. By imagining futures with painstaking detail,