Lifting Our Sights: Stakeholder Toolkit

Abstract: This toolkit supplements the Lifting Our Sights (LOS) research which investigates key trends and their potential for impact on Armed Forces leavers and their families in the future. It has been designed to assist a variety of organisations and stakeholders to work with the LOS findings, apply them in different settings and strengthen the conversation on supporting UK veterans. Whilst the focus is on what the future might look like, the whole LOS project is based upon how different that future will be to the present, on which most of our daily attention is spent. The term ‘toolkit’ although widely used has many different meanings. In our case, the stakeholder toolkit lists a series of activities, including outline topic areas, questions and assessments, that organisations can use to stimulate and frame discussions which we anticipate will help shape strategies and operational approaches and lead to greater shared understanding and hence collaboration over the coming decade. All of these would benefit the Armed Forces Community. In addition to this toolkit, our website www.liftingoursights.org.uk contains e-versions of the foresights, assessments and supporting presentation slide packs that organisations can download and adapt to help run whatever style activity is contemplated. We intend to update these resources regularly, and will respond to feedback on their usage, which we will be very grateful to receive. We encourage organisations to use this toolkit to further build upon the Lifting Our Sights findings and to unpack how these trends will more specifically affect their work with and for Armed Forces leavers. In particular, it is envisaged that this will assist with ongoing dialogue in the Armed Forces Community, Local Government, National Government, Charities and in various media and communications teams, in how each can continue to lift their sights as they work to better serve veterans and their families over the next decade and beyond. A more ambitious aim though is that the dialogue then serves to develop or refine strategies, identify priorities, align programmes or secure funding. This list is not exclusive. While the toolkit has been written with specific stakeholders and potential use cases in mind, it has been subject to only limited user testing, and in practice there will be overlaps between the various use cases outlined. It cannot take account of an organisation’s individual culture and approach to planning, nor its maturity or indeed the available resources. For some the toolkit will be too simplistic, for others it will be overly complex. We hope to have struck a happy medium and anticipate that users will tailor their own approach to reflect their organisation or setting, and we would strongly encourage all users to scan the other use case sections, which might contain particular nuggets that could also be incorporated. Of course, examining future trends alone is unlikely to provide a complete solution – policy changes driven by the veering of narrow political winds will also need consideration, particularly where they are unforeseen. Please use the information presented here to help your organisation to work with the material from the Lifting Our Sights research, in order to better prepare for future change. An accompanying PowerPoint document can be downloaded from the LOS website which includes all the foresights alongside other supporting materials. Our belief is that organisations that incorporate future-focused investigation into their practices can increase their preparedness for change as well as its agility to act when required. These yield benefits that can span the range from a charity better meeting beneficiaries’ needs to a corporation gaining a competitive advantage. We have not laboured the question of cost/benefit analysis, which must feature in any assessment. Where and when this analysis takes place though will differ with each organisation participating, but it should not be overlooked. This toolkit is packaged into a series of ‘assessments’ for key stakeholders and with potential use cases in mind (see table). Thereafter, the toolkit provides helpful information on how to continue the conversation including a future-focused interview format and ‘top tips’ to bear in mind for those exploring the future. It concludes with links to a series of other foresight 
and horizon scanning toolkits where there is more detail on futures tools and how to apply them.