Locations
By envisioning plausible futures through the lenses of diverse scenarios, we can explore how key drivers of change might interact, amplify, or contradict one another to shape the future landscape. Scenarios create a systemic and dynamic framework that allows teams to identify challenges not just for today but for emerging realities, making them particularly valuable for the CPD process.
Once scenarios are developed, the next step is to mine them for insights into potential development challenges. This process involves systematically analyzing each scenario to ask critical questions about risks, opportunities, and systemic issues that emerge in these futures. The insights derived from this exercise enable teams to frame actionable development challenges that address both present needs and future uncertainties.
Analyzing Scenarios to Identify Development Challenges
To extract meaningful challenges from scenarios, teams must interrogate each scenario with a set of guiding questions designed to uncover risks, opportunities, and systemic issues that arise in each plausible future.
Framing Development Challenges
The insights from scenario analysis can then be synthesized into clear, actionable development challenges. Using the template provided earlier, teams can articulate these challenges by linking them to specific drivers, outcomes, and implications.
This structured approach ensures that challenges are grounded in evidence and aligned with strategic priorities.
After analyzing individual scenarios, it’s essential to look for recurring themes or challenges that appear across multiple futures. These recurring issues often represent the most critical development challenges, as they are robust across different uncertainties.
For example, challenges around urban resilience or climate adaptation might emerge in both “Collapse” and “Transformation” scenarios, albeit in different forms.
Clustering these themes provides a streamlined, prioritized list of challenges that reflect systemic risks and opportunities. This consolidated list becomes a foundational input for Section 1 of the CPD and guides program design and partnerships in subsequent stages.
We have provided an easy to fill template to help you frame and describe the development challenges that emerge from your scenario analysis.
Click here to download a copy of the Development Challenge Template
We offer you example workshop agendas for the workshops you will need to conduct for scenario analysis and challenge identification. These two workshops guide teams through analysing scenarios, extracting key insights, and framing development challenges using the tailored template. It balances collaborative discussions, structured activities, and time for synthesis. Please look at the example agenda we have provided below and modify it for your own purposes.
Download the example workshop agendas for scenario analysis
Conclusion
The outputs from this process offer a comprehensive view of the complexities and opportunities of the future. These challenges are not just reflections of risks but also invitations to innovate, collaborate, and strategically position UNDP’s work in an uncertain world.
However, not all challenges can be addressed at once. The next step in this process is to prioritize these challenges, ensuring that the focus is aligned with UNDP’s mandate, comparative advantage, and the strategic needs of the country context. Prioritization is critical to translating foresight insights into impactful action.
With a long list of development challenges now identified, the focus shifts to determining which ones UNDP should prioritize.
This step involves evaluating the challenges based on strategic criteria, such as alignment with UNDP’s mandate, national development goals, and the potential impact on vulnerable populations. Through this process, the most critical and actionable challenges will emerge, guiding the program priorities and partnerships in the CPD.
In the next chapter, we’ll explore tools, frameworks, and methodologies to systematically prioritize these challenges, ensuring that UNDP’s contributions are both impactful and future-ready.