"A number of transformations are underway that pose risks to, and opportunities for, the future of work in Canada. Discussions about the future of work and future skills have a poor track record of securing alignment between the skills employers and economies need and the skills job seekers have. This report introduces strategic foresight, a discipline that helps organizations and individuals think about and plan for the future in a context of radical uncertainty involving disruptive political, economic, social, technological, legal, and environmental changes. This paper is for newcomers to strategic foresight, whose organizations may benefit from the value that the discipline provides.

This paper: (1) shows how striving to predict the future of work using only traditional forecasting methods can be counterproductive and identifies the benefits of strategic foresight; (2) defines fundamental strategic foresight concepts and provides examples of strategic foresight techniques from academic literature; (3) identifies politics, economics, society, technology, law, environment and climate change, and health as major categories of trends affecting the future of work in Canada; (4) shares useful strategic foresight approaches to help plan for the future of work and future skills and offers tips for implementation; and (5) provides an in-depth discussion of scenario planning, one of the most important strategic foresight methods for addressing the 'era of converging crises'."'

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