According to Oonagh Gaff, partner at Sheppard Moscow:

"Focusing on the future has always been inherent in our approach to Organisation Development and the overall focus of our business is to encourage people in organisations to look beyond the immediate and to identify not just anticipated change but also the challenges of the unexpected. This is because, while it is not always easy to identify and understand the details of change, learning to control and adjust to it on an individual, team and organisational basis is an essential skill for modern managers - and one that can be developed. It is for this reason that Sheppard Moscow is delighted to be sponsoring a major event on the future of HR - "The Future Opportunity Workshop". This is being organised by the Corporate Research Forum (CRF) at the London Visionarium on 25 January."

The event promises to be an exciting one as it will be led by Pero Micic, chairman of the Future Management Group and a founding member of the Association of Professional Futurists. Pero has worked with some of the world's leading companies including Procter & Gamble, Bayer, Axa, Nestle, SAP and DaimlerBenz on building future scenarios. Among other achievements, Pero Micic is author of various articles and book contributions. He summarised his experiences on future management in his book "Der ZukunftsManager - Wie Sie Marktchancen vor Ihren Mitbewerbern erkennen" (The FutureManager - How to recognise market opportunities ahead of competitors).

The event will be highly participative and will deploy the Group's specific model, process and toolset to determine what the future might look like. As part of this process, prior to the workshop, CRF, which brings together senior HR professionals from over 100 major companies, has asked participants to answer a variety of questions which will provide the basis for a detailed report to be presented and discussed at the workshop itself. The questions asked are wide-ranging and challenging. They include:

What are some of the probable future developments in HR by 2017?

What kind of decisions does your business need to take to prepare for the expected and unexpected changes over the next 10+ years?

Clearly, these are demanding times for major organisations and predicting the future presents major imponderables such as dramatic economic changes in China and elsewhere in Asia, as well as volatility in the global political situation.

The workshop will encourage participants to re-examine their views of what the future is likely to hold for HR so as to help them to gain control over that future and "not just let it happen". Thus, among other things, participants will be asked at the workshop itself to review their initial views and ask themselves specifically which "fascinating future do we want to create in the long-term?" and "which possible and significant surprises do we have to prepare for and how?"

Full notes on the workshop will be posted on the Sheppard Moscow website in due course.

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