Scoping
Transactional & Contextual Environments
Every Three Horizons project begins with an issue of concern for certain actors. Using ecosystem thinking, we build a picture of the day-to-day patterns of interaction around this issue and the actors who create the main value constellations. This forms the transactional environment—the space in which actors have significant influence to change things through their own actions.
Beyond this lies the contextual environment, where broader change occurs. Developments here may strongly affect the transactional environment, even though they lie beyond its direct reach.
Understanding the boundary between these two environments is central. It is not fixed, and a key aspect of any change project is exploring how we might “convene the future” by bringing new configurations of actors together who can shift the pattern and its boundaries.
The most difficult and messy problems rarely offer simple answers about where causes and effects begin or end. In these cases, defining the scope depends entirely on how you choose to frame the problem. By keeping both the transactional and contextual boundaries in play, we can explore the possibilities for transformative change as we move from the first to the third horizon.
Exercise
Choose your topic of concern and identify a focal actor who seeks to drive change. Begin by completing the Ecosystem Thinking exercise.
Map today’s boundary between the transactional and contextual environments. Ask yourself: Where is the scope in which the current “business-as-usual” pattern dominates?
Identify emerging contextual forces. Consider which wider contextual developments are beginning to reshape the transactional environment and will become sources of future change
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