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Wind-tunneling is a foresight methodology designed to test the resilience of a strategy, plan, or programme against various future scenarios. Named after the aviation industry practice of testing aircraft designs in wind tunnels, this method evaluates how well a strategy can withstand or adapt to external pressures. In the context of development planning, wind-tunneling helps ensure that programmes are robust and adaptive, enabling teams to identify potential risks, weaknesses, and opportunities before implementation.
This exercise is particularly useful in complex environments where uncertainty about future conditions could undermine well-intentioned plans. In development planning, wind-tunneling helps uncover risks by testing a programme’s assumptions and components against diverse scenarios.
By analyzing what might fail, thrive, or need adjustment in different contexts, teams can identify specific risks to programme success. For example:
The result is a clearer understanding of what might disrupt a programme and the strategies needed to mitigate those disruptions.
Prerequisites: Scenarios for Wind-Tunneling
Wind-tunneling requires detailed future scenarios to test programmes against. Teams may choose one of three options:
In case you opt for Option 3, you can use some 'off the shelf' scenarios linked to below.
Get access to 'ready-made' scenarios for your wind-tunnelling exercise
Wind-tunnelling Method Overview
Wind-tunneling involves testing a programme or strategy against multiple plausible futures (scenarios) to identify potential risks, opportunities, and areas for improvement. The process ensures that the programme design is resilient, adaptable, and robust across a range of future contexts.
Expected Outcome: Risk List from Wind-tunnelling
The wind-tunnelling exercise is designed to yield a comprehensive list of risks based on how the programme performs in different scenarios. These risks provide critical input for the next steps:
- Risk Mapping: Placing these risks on the Risk Radar based on Impact vs. Influenceability to prioritise risks that need addressing in the CPD.
- Risk Management: Develop targeted mitigation or adaptation plans for high-priority risks based on their categorization.
Download a one page example of outputs of the wind-tunnelling exercise