Programme
An applied programme for leaders responsible for strategic risk.
Strategic risks are behaving more like patterns and less like items. AI, climate transition, geopolitical fragmentation, regulatory divergence and shifting stakeholder expectations interact and compound, reshaping the conditions organisations are operating in.
This programme, using futures practice Three Horizons, helps leaders responsible for strategic risk read those patterns and bring them into the board, committee and executive conversations that shape appetite, capability and strategic choice.
At a glance
Why this, why now
They are compounding, multi-causal, difficult to bound, and quick to move from important to urgent. This is exactly the territory where strategic risk practice does its hardest thinking. Three Horizons is a complementary way of reading change in that territory.
The lens, in risk language
Three Horizons is a practice for reading change, co-originated by Bill Sharpe and the International Futures Forum. It has been used at depth for over two decades across climate, healthcare, education, food systems, policy and large-scale transformation.
It is not a way of dividing the future into near, medium and long term. All three are present now: in the pattern the organisation is maintaining, in the conditions emerging, and in the transition activity already underway.
What currently works, what the organisation relies on, and what may be losing fitness as conditions shift. The strategic risk lies in lock-in, false continuity, and confusing the defence of what is declining for the protection of what remains valuable.
The future the organisation is working towards: the conditions, capabilities, relationships and forms of value emerging in the system, and what the organisation stands for as those conditions take shape. The strategic risk lies in failing to engage these possibilities early enough, or in under-investing in the patterns that future depends on.
The ambiguous zone where innovation, disruption and adaptation are already underway. Some activity extends the existing pattern; some helps create the conditions for a different one. The strategic risk lies in mistaking activity for transition.
Worked example
The lens reads the wider system in motion: the energy economy, regulatory environment, capital flows, and shifting expectations of legitimacy. The organisation sits inside it as a participant, not a neutral observer of its own exposures.
What participants take away
How it works
Built around a single organisation's team — a risk team on its own, or a mixed group bringing together risk, audit, strategy, innovation or board members. Surfaces internal dynamics, shared language and the strategic risk conversations the team is already having.
Senior leaders from different organisations and sectors come together (12 to 20 participants). Builds peer connections across the cohort and brings cross-sector perspectives into the room.
Three-part architecture
A cohort launch online, a main learning experience together, and an optional application clinic a few weeks later.
Who it is for
CROs, heads of enterprise risk, strategic risk, emerging risk, operational risk, resilience or transformation governance.
Internal audit, governance and assurance leaders working close to strategic risk, board reporting or organisational transition.
Strategy, sustainability, transformation and resilience leads carrying strategic risk responsibility alongside their primary remit, including in organisations without a dedicated risk function.
Consultants, independent advisers and non-executive directors supporting boards and executive teams on strategic, emerging or systemic risk.
Who delivers it
Facilitator · Founder, Valconia
Strategic and operational risk practitioner with a background in enterprise risk, resilience and transformation, and a Three Horizons foresight practitioner. Brings the risk-function lens to the programme, translating Three Horizons into language and practice that supports senior risk conversations.
Facilitator · Senior Adviser, Valconia
Former Chief Risk Officer with board-level experience of risk governance, appetite and enterprise risk leadership. Brings a practitioner's understanding of the pressures, responsibilities and realities facing senior risk teams.
Facilitator · Director, International Futures Forum
Stewards work to develop capacity and release potential in people, communities and organisations facing complex challenges and uncertain times. Brings deep Three Horizons practice and experience designing responses to systemic challenges.
Programme adviser · Co-originator of Three Horizons
Author of Three Horizons: The Patterning of Hope. Bill's involvement keeps the programme grounded in the underlying practice.
Future Stewards, an initiative hosted by the International Futures Forum, supports the Three Horizons commons through open resources, learning pathways and practitioner development, and offers a route into deeper practice for teams wanting to embed the lens further.
Investment
from £4,500 + VAT
Includes the online launch, main learning experience and light preparation with the client team.
£850 + VAT
per participant
Group rates available for three or more participants from the same organisation.
Cohorts can be tailored to a specific sector, leadership group or strategic risk challenge. Additional application support and follow-up advisory sessions can be scoped separately.
Discuss a cohort