ASSOCIATION OF PROFESSIONAL FUTURISTS
for MOST SIGNIFICANT FUTURES WORKS
ABOUT the
APF has presented the Most Significant Futures Works (MSFW) awards for 15 years to recognize projects that advance the field of futures studies and foresight. MSFW awards served as an invaluable resource for pointing clients and the futures curiosity towards understanding the nature of work. “If” questions (What if? If X, then Y?) are central to what we do as curators, facilitators, and researchers in supporting communities, organizations, and institutions to explore the future(s). In celebration of the APF's 20th anniversary, MSFW was reimagined as the APF IF Awards to reflect the globality, diversity, transdisciplinarity of the organization and the futures and foresight field. The reimagined awards program recognizes the evolving excellence in futures and foresight work with an emphasis on key thematic areas, such as impact, imagination, and indigenous. Last year, we had a record 70 entries from around the world.
APF IF AWARDS
9 FOCAL AREAS
The purpose of the IF Award focal areas are to broaden from the academic constraints and the format descriptor, highlight the values of APF, and reflect our values about recognized awardees
Inspirational
Engenders an ethical imagination, radical optimism, and/or hope
Intergenerational
Addresses intergenerational justice and fairness through explicit futures and foresight tools and methods
Interdependent
Creates further awareness and understanding of challenges using a systems-lens, approaches, and/or practices
Implementation
Showcases work that clearly demonstrates where futures and foresight were integral to a process and/or practice within a community, corporate, agency, and governance context
International
Leverages multinational, regional and/or global engagement to deliver outcomes, effects, and impact
Inclusive
Utilizes participatory futures approaches and practices to create change and/or enhance interconnectedness
Imaginative
Works that employ design-based, multi-sensorial, experiential and/or play-driven, literary, gaming, musical, and other artistic expressions to approach explorations of futures thinking
Indigenous
Promotes future-oriented practices rooted in Indigenous, Native, and/or endogenous approaches, concepts, practices, and voices
Ingenuity
Noteworthy advances in the methods and practices of foresight and futures studiesÂ
IF Award Task Force
Dr. John A. Sweeney - APF IF Award Co-convener
Dr. John A. Sweeney is an award-winning author, designer, and futurist. As a practitioner, consultant, and educator, John has organized, managed, and facilitated workshops and seminars, multi-stakeholder projects, and foresight gaming systems in-person within 45 countries on five continents and online with participants from around the world. At present, John is a Senior Research Fellow at Westminster International University in Tashkent, Uzbekistan where he is a Candidate Co-Chair in “Futures Studies for Anticipatory Governance and Sustainable Policymaking.” He also currently serves as Co-Editor-in-Chief of World Futures Review: A Journal of Strategic Foresight and faculty within the University of Houston’s Master’s of Strategic Foresight. In 2021, John joined SOIF as the Transformative Foresight Lead.
Maggie Greyson - APF IF Award Co-convener
Maggie Greyson is recognized be the Association of Professional Futurists for the Most Significant Futures Work. She is also a Fellow of the School of International Futures. Her mandate is to help people use ambiguous nature of our times to play a meaningful part in the future. Robust research and creative risk-taking define her career as a designer, futurist and writer. Maggie has a Master of Design in Strategic Foresight and Innovation from the Ontario College of Art and Design University. Her work garners international attention for strategic communication and innovative storytelling methods. She has designed interactive online experiences for Fortune 100 companies such as Nissan, GE and Shell. She also has a ten year career as a designer for the stage with companies such as the International Shakespeare’s Globe, in the London and the Stratford Theatre Festival.
Lisa Giuliani - Project Manager Extraordinaire
Director of Youth Global Projects and Future Leader Program Advisor at Teach the Future. Her background is in education management, college and career counseling and project consultant. Extensive background working in public schools, private and nonprofit organizations. Experienced in organizational development, diversity equity and inclusion leadership, research and community engagement. With a Bachelor of Arts focused in Psychology from University of California, Berkeley and a Master of Arts in Industrial Organizational Psychology from Golden Gate University, San Francisco.