We are so used to the idea that predicting the future is about accuracy that we forget how murky and unclear the present is. To paraphrase Turgot, French Enlightenment philosopher and statesman, we have enough trouble predicting the present, let alone the future.
Since the complexity of policy and management means there is more than one way to interpret an issue, the more interpretations we acknowledge the clearer ironically we are about that the nature and limits of that complexity. Why expect anything less for the future, if the present is not one-way interpretable?
Reframe the present, again and again, and then call what sticks “predictability”.
WHEN COMPLEX IS AS SIMPLE AS IT GETS 