Thought Leader
& Executive Advisor

Shift your mindset to wonder WHAT IF… and take your anticipatory thinking to the next level.

Futurist Speaker, Author & Executive Advisor

Nikolas Badminton educates and motivates world-leading executives, organizations, and governments on how to ignite curiosity, transformation and change to drive sustainable profit, increased market value and hypergrowth.

His keynotes inspire executives to create powerful visions of the futures, question how we work today, and explore how we need to create resilient and thriving industries power next level human ability.

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Future Ready

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Explore new horizons and futures

We help you consider 10, 20, and 30+ year horizons to ignite thinking about how the exponentially changing world will affect your business, and how possible futures might come to pass.

Discover and apply signals and trends

We scan the world for impactful signals that demystify the cultural shifts, technological advancements, societal developments and research that shows the trajectory of humanity towards different futures.

Anticipate scenarios

We explore incredible stories on how our futures work and how people, systems, technology and culture collides to challenge us and create opportunities for growth.

Design the stories of our futures

We design and create inspirational and visceral stories of our speculative futures that allow leaders to challenge their poverty of imagination and encourage curiosity and exploration of new frontiers.

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Hope Engineering Framework

Nikolas Badminton and his highly-skilled team at the Futurist Think Tank has collaborated with numerous CEOs, executive teams, and organizations to implement practical tools for imagining futures, creating futures literacy and implementing strategic foresight in their organizations.

Nikolas’ proven Hope Engineering© Framework is a foundational approach that presents principles used to anchor the signals scanning, trends identification, what if… scenarios exploration, and developing stories that help us feel our futures. This framework kickstarts foresight as a practice and capability that augments existing strategic planning processes.

Client Results

United Nations Resilience Frontiers  Program Design

What: Worked with the United Nations Climate Change Secretariat on creating a new foresight program to design future solutions for climate resilience, and provided the guidance and opening keynote to 100 designers, government leaders, and foresight practitioners for a week-long design charette.

Results: Ongoing program establishment with the world-renowned United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).

Pandemic Planning for Trillion-dollar Technology Company (Google)

What: Working with a global tech leader’s security and resilience services executive team to provide a view on foresight practices and integration of new processes for longer-range planning within existing risk planning. And, ongoing research and advice on futures in relation to the COVID-19 pandemic and keeping 114,000+ employees safe.

Results: Strengthened risk planning across product groups and security capabilities. Provided the ability to anticipate global events using the identification of weak and strong signals, and hypothetical scenario building.

Product and service planning for #1 luxury car brand (Rolls Royce)

What: Provided the executive with a speculative view of 2030 and beyond on the likely tastes and behaviors relating to Ultra-high Net Worth Individuals (UHNWIs). Analysis to allow for the anticipation of wealth movement, shifting populations, property ownership, global citizenship, luxury goods acquisition and collecting, and automotive needs (including self-driving cars, electric vehicles, and concierge services).

Results: Informed ongoing product and service work that will help maintain market position and advantage against other luxury car manufacturers and brands.

YVR 2037: Engaging travelers to shape the airport of the future

What: The creation of a Master Plan that looks forward to the future and ensures the best use of YVR’s land, drive growth in passenger, aircraft and cargo volumes. Five short science fiction stories were written and a video used alongside media engagement to engage stakeholders and the communities YVR serves.

Results: Incredible local engagement through over a dozen stakeholder and community design sessions. This was incredible as only four were initially planned but demand was overwhelming due to the campaign. There was wide media engagement with 13+ impressions. Ideas about the future inspire community thinking.

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Futurist.com
Think Tank

Learn More

Nikolas Badminton now runs the Futurist.com Think Tank – established in 1993 by Glen Hiemstra – and helps organizations connect with the greatest thinkings in the foresight world.

Step up to challenge your creativity and imagination, and help you become masters of curiosity, anticipation and explorers of incredible futures.

Disrupt the culture of short-term thinking by exploring new ideas, celebrating creativity in every part of business, and creating a culture of finding new ways to work that create incredible new opportunities.

Develop resilient and future-ready mindsets in your organization that generate equitable business models, drive increased growth and market capitalization.

Nikolas' insight, foresight and expertise is invitational in nature, where his captivating content not only leaves his audience wanting more, but inspires them in a way that energizes the growth mindset and punctuates a “WHAT IF” mentality.

I found Nikolas' comprehensive and multifaceted approach to visioning the future and its associated trends inspiring and insightful

Nikolas is a talented future expert with a natural gift for futures and strategic business thinking. He made a huge impact for us to get the conversation about foresight going in North America but also the world.

Nikolas had that right balance of setting up the way we think about the future. He brought a provocative point of view on how AI and the new large compute areas (artificial intelligence, spatial etc.) that left the room starting to shift the way they approach future product framing.

Future Ready Clients

Futurist Consulting FAQ

Nikolas is the Chief Futurist for the Futurist Think Tank at futurist.com, a Fellow of The Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce (The RSA), and works with trillion-dollar companies, central banks, governments, startups and those willing to challenge our poverty of imagination, awaken curiosity and create incredible futures.

He has worked with hundreds of world-leading companies, including NASA, Google, Microsoft, United Nations, United Way, Bayer, Corteva, Bank of Canada, American Express, AT&T, Thales International, Rolls Royce, Heineken, Procter & Gamble, Government of Canada, UK Home Office, Government of Cayman Islands, IDEO, and many more.

Nikolas has been a mainstay in the media for the past decade talking about our futures. He’s appeared in the ‘Smart Drugs’ documentary, was an advisor to the ‘Age of AI’ series with Robert Downley Jr and appears in the upcoming series ‘The Secrets of Big Data’ on Discovery. He appears regularly on SIRIUSXM, and on CTV’s Future Friday. His essential research has also been featured by the BBC, VICE, The Atlantic, Fast Company, Techcrunch, Business Insider, Huffington Post, Forbes, Sputnik, Venturebeat, and Global News. He also produces and interviews incredible thinkers on the renowned Exponential Minds Podcast.

In Fall 2022 Nikolas’ new book will be released – ‘Facing Our Futures’ provides executives and organizations with the foundations for futures design and the tools to imagine new futures, create bolder visions, anticipate unforeseen risks, and strengthen strategic planning. Nikolas’ thinking can also be seen in the opening chapter of ‘The Future Starts Now’. Both are published by Bloomsbury Business.

Over many years we have brought together some of the world’s best and brightest strategic foresight practitioners, researchers, science fiction authors, architects, designers and thinks in the Futurist Think Tank.

We challenge our collective poverty of imagination and awaken curiosity about our futures.

We disrupt the culture of short-term thinking by celebrating play, creative thinking and brave actions to challenge our failing industrial complex.

We develop resilient and future-ready mindsets that can imagine a multitude of possible futures that positively affect the lives of over eight billion people on this Spaceship Earth.

Nikolas Badminton FRSA is a world-renowned futurist speaker, researcher and consultant. He is the Chief Futurist at Futurist.com, Consultant, Author, Media Producer, and Executive Advisor. He has delivered futurist keynotes to and worked with executives and the C-suite at over 300 of the world’s most impactful organizations and governments.

Nikolas and the Futurist Think Tank help executives learn strategic foresight practices that shape the visions that shape impactful organizations, trillion-dollar companies, startups, progressive governments, and multi-billion dollar investment funds.

Nikolas’ keynotes are always customized for what you need and ignite your audience’s thinking to shift midgets from WHAT IS TO WHAT IF… The result is the ability to be curious, explore possibilities, and imagine incredible futures for all.

“If operations are the body, strategy is the brain then Foresight is the awareness and consciousness of an organization. We need to embrace foresight and challenge our collective poverty of imagination to create long-term profit and resiliency.” Nikolas Badminton

Nikolas Badminton and The Futurist Think Tank provides coaching to C-suite executives on augmenting corporate strategic planning and risk analysis with foresight capabilities.

In addition, monthly and quarterly signals and trends reports can be provided with active coaching on the implications of what we are seeing shape our futures. Coaching can also be provided for incoming Futurist-in-Residence and Chief Futures Officers (CFuO).

The Futurist Think Tank provides Strategic foresight services as a planning-oriented discipline related to work undertaken with trained futurists to provide value to progressive organizations and executives.

We structure our projects around the needs of our clients and undertake a number of key activities:

Discussion of global megatrends, secondary research and scanning for signals.
Identifying disruptive industry trends.
Seeking challenges and seeing unforeseen risks.
Building WHAT IF… futures scenarios.
Writing speculative fiction and designing experiential futures.
Backcasting and risk anticipation.

It’s been found that organizations that build anticipatory capabilities, strategic foresight practices, and future-proof their business have been found to outperform the average by a 33% higher profitability and a 200% higher growth. Those organizations that do not can face performance discounts of 37% to 108%.

Our clients become resident futurists in organizations and go on to establish world-leading capabilities that give them the edge over competitors.

Nikolas Badminton and the Futurist Think Tank provides Foresight Training to clients looking to learn more about the discipline of foresight.

The training empowers teams to look for global megatrends, run secondary research and scan for signals, identify disruptive industry trends, seek challenges and unforeseen risks, build WHAT IF… futures scenarios, speculative fiction, experiential futures, backcasting, and risk anticipation.

In addition, teams can learn more about the tools and techniques used in foresight

Positive-Dystopian Framework (our proprietary method).
Causal Layered Analysis (CLA).
Building WHAT IF… futures scenarios.
Writing speculative fiction and designing experiential futures.
Backcasting and risk anticipation.
and, other strategic foresight methods.

Nikolas Badminton and the Futurist Think Tank provides Foresight Development Workshops to complement the Futurist Keynotes and Foresight 101 Training. These use the proven Foresight Development Framework and help teams focus on the priorities and challenges they have today and imagine the futures ahead of them and their industry.

Our in-person and virtual workshops engage client teams deeply in the work of strategic foresight and our teams guide them expertly through

Discussing global megatrends, secondary research and scanning for signals.
Identifying disruptive industry trends.
Seeking challenges and seeing unforeseen risks.
Building WHAT IF… futures scenarios.
Writing speculative fiction and designing experiential futures.
Backcasting and risk anticipation.

Nikolas Badminton and the team at the FUTURIST THINK TANK have developed an interactive experience where you can interact with the keynote and learn about building complex futures stories from the signals, trends and scenarios we explore together across a number of areas that we identify as important for you and your audience.

Areas of exploration can include global megatrends, evolution and transformation in your industry, algorithms and data growth, security and privacy, circularity and sustainability (ESG), and more. We adjust for your industry and organization.

This interactive game is played throughout the keynote and can teach you how to

Understand signals and trends that will shape the future of your industry
Explore scenarios that define technological, human and wildcard futures
Shift your mindset from what is to WHAT IF… and develop over 200 stories that can be used as a starting point for exploring the future of your organization and strategic planning.
Create fun, engagement and discussion on important topics within your audience

And, following the keynote you will have a deeper understanding of how your organization considers possible futures – is it tech-driven , humanity-focused or hoping that they’ll survive the changes coming your way?

Thought Leader
& Executive Advisor

Futurist Speaker, Author & Executive Advisor

Become