Futures practice, intergenerational responsibility, and the mahi of Ngāti Tamaterā
I have long been fascinated by the relationship between the futures we imagine and the decisions we make in the present. Not simply because I am interested in what might come next, but because I believe our ability to imagine different futures changes how we understand our responsibilities, opportunities and choices today.
For me, futures thinking has never been about predicting what will happen. It is about recognising that the future is not predetermined, that the systems we inherit are not necessarily the systems we must preserve, and that our actions in the present can either expand or constrain the possibilities available to those who follow us.
This is particularly important when working across communities, businesses, institutions and Indigenous contexts. The decisions we make today can have consequences that extend well beyond our own involvement, leadership terms or even lifetimes. Yet so much of our planning remains shaped by annual budgets, electoral cycles, immediate pressures and organisational priorities.
Futures practice invites us to work across these different timescales. It encourages us to consider not only what is urgent, but what is enduring; not only what we want to achieve, but what we want to make possible.
Acknowledging the futures practitioners who have helped shape this mahi
Before sharing some of the work we are undertaking with Ngāti Tamaterā, I want to acknowledge the contribution of Tokona te Raki and Mō Āpōpō – Future Makers to the development and application of futures thinking in Aotearoa.
In particular, I want to mihi to the people behind Te Korekoreka, a Māori future-making framework that I, alongside others in our futures community, have drawn upon over the years to support sense-making and futures conversations across communities, businesses and organisations, both here in Aotearoa and internationally.
What I appreciate about Te Korekoreka is its recognition that creating a different future requires us to examine our present circumstances, learn from what has come before, imagine what could become possible, and make deliberate choices about how we move forward.
This is an important distinction. Futures thinking is not simply an exercise in imagination. It asks something of us in the present.
I also appreciate the work of Mō Āpōpō – Future Makers in helping rangatahi recognise that they have agency in shaping the futures they will inherit. This matters enormously. Young people should not be positioned only as recipients of decisions made by previous generations. They are participants in shaping what comes next.
My mihi is both an acknowledgement of the intellectual and cultural contributions of this work and an expression of appreciation for the wider community of practitioners who continue to share, challenge, develop and apply futures approaches across different settings.
No single framework belongs to every context, and no one approach can replace the knowledge, authority or aspirations of the people with whom we work. The value lies in how we engage with these tools thoughtfully, adapt our practice responsibly, and remain accountable to the communities whose futures are being considered.
Bringing futures practice home: Ngāti Tamaterā and our 100-year Rautaki
One of the most meaningful opportunities I have had to apply this thinking has been through our current work developing Kia Tū a Ngāti Tamaterā — Te Rautaki 100 Tau, a proposed 100-year strategy for our iwi.
This is collective mahi, informed by our whānau, marae, kaumātua, iwi leadership, advisors and the many people who have contributed their whakaaro throughout the process. My role has been to help bring together the strategic thinking, conversations and practical approaches that support our iwi to consider its long-term direction.
The starting point has not been to ask what programmes we should deliver over the next few years. Instead, we have been asking what our tūpuna have entrusted to us, what we must strengthen in our own time, and what we hope our mokopuna will inherit.
These are fundamentally different questions.
They shift our attention from organisational activity towards intergenerational outcomes. They challenge us to consider the relationships between cultural identity, whenua, environmental wellbeing, whānau prosperity, leadership, resources and collective agency.
They also remind us that a 100-year strategy cannot be a fixed plan for the next century. We do not know the precise challenges or opportunities our mokopuna will encounter. Nor should we presume to make every decision on their behalf.
What we can do is strengthen the foundations from which they will make their own choices.
Four Pou, connected across generations
Our emerging Rautaki is organised around four interconnected Pou.
Tūhono considers our connections to whakapapa, identity, reo, tikanga, mātauranga and one another.
Tūtaiao speaks to the whenua, wai, moana, marae, kāinga and environments that shape and sustain us.
Tūora considers what it means for our whānau to flourish through wellbeing, learning, housing, opportunity and economic security.
Tūrangatira speaks to our collective ability to lead, steward resources, exercise influence and determine our own future.
Across these Pou is Te Hononga o Ngā Reanga, the connection between generations: tūpuna, tātou and mokopuna.
This matters because none of these aspirations exists independently. Our cultural identity informs our relationships with whenua. Our relationships with whenua shape our responsibilities and opportunities. Our economic capability influences the choices available to our whānau. Our leadership and collective resources affect our ability to sustain all of these things.
The challenge is not simply to develop four sets of priorities. It is to understand the relationships between them and how decisions made in one area may strengthen, or unintentionally weaken, another.
That is where futures thinking becomes especially valuable.
Making the future useful in the present
An important part of our work has been connecting the 100-year horizon to the decisions we must make now.
We have been considering six horizons: annual action, five years, 25 years, 50 years, 75 years and 100 years.
Each horizon serves a different purpose. Annual and five-year horizons require us to be increasingly specific about priorities, responsibilities, investment and measures of progress. The longer horizons invite us to consider generational change, enduring capability, identity, independence and what we are handing forward.
These horizons are not forecasts. They are a way of keeping different timescales in conversation with one another.
For example, if we aspire for future generations to have a stronger relationship with their whakapapa, what must we protect, document, teach and make accessible today? If we want healthier whenua and moana in 50 years, what restoration, capability and partnerships must begin now? If we want our mokopuna to have greater economic agency, what investments in people, enterprise, assets and knowledge will create more choices over time?
And importantly, how will we know whether those actions are creating meaningful change?
This is where we must distinguish between activity and outcomes. Holding a wānanga, developing a programme or establishing a partnership may be valuable, but those activities are not themselves the long-term result. We need to understand what changes for people, what capability grows, what relationships strengthen and what endures.
The future becomes useful when it changes the quality of our present-day decisions.
Futures practice is also about whose voices shape the future
There is another dimension to this mahi that I consider essential: participation and agency.
When organisations undertake long-term strategy development, there can be a temptation to treat consultation as a final step, something that happens after the strategic direction has already been substantially determined.
But when we are considering intergenerational futures, the process itself matters.
Whose aspirations are represented? Whose experiences have shaped our understanding of the present? Whose knowledge is recognised? Who has the opportunity to question our assumptions? And who will live with the consequences of decisions made today?
These questions are particularly important in an iwi context, where responsibilities, relationships and authority extend beyond any one organisational structure.
Our Rautaki is currently being shared with Ngāti Tamaterā whānau for feedback. It is not yet finalised. That is important to acknowledge because the process of listening, refining and returning to our people is part of the work, not simply a step towards completing a document.
The quality of our strategy will ultimately be judged not by how compelling its language is, but by whether it helps our people make better decisions, strengthens accountability and creates meaningful opportunities for future generations.
From future-taking to future-making
One of the ideas I appreciate in the work of Mō Āpōpō is the distinction between being subject to the future and participating in its creation.
It resonates with something I have observed throughout my own practice: communities and organisations often possess far more knowledge, imagination and capability than conventional planning processes allow them to express.
Sometimes the work is not about introducing an entirely new answer. It is about creating the conditions in which people can see their own possibilities differently.
That might involve questioning assumptions that have become embedded in an institution, examining how different systems influence one another, recognising knowledge that has been overlooked, or helping people connect their immediate actions to longer-term consequences.
For Indigenous communities, futures practice also invites us to challenge the assumption that progress must always mean moving away from what has come before. Our tūpuna, whakapapa, histories and relationships can be sources of knowledge and possibility, not simply matters to preserve separately from contemporary development.
We can look backwards, understand where we stand, and look forwards without treating these as competing directions.
And we can draw upon contemporary technologies, research and new forms of knowledge while remaining grounded in who we are.
Sharing the mahi, not claiming the future
I wanted to share the Ngāti Tamaterā Rautaki work because it is an example of futures practice being applied to a real, living kaupapa.
It is still evolving. There are conversations yet to be had, outcomes to refine, decisions to make and significant work ahead in translating our aspirations into practical action.
I also share it with humility. This is not my future to design for others. It is collective mahi, shaped by the people whose identity, relationships, responsibilities and aspirations sit at its centre.
My contribution is one part of that wider effort, informed by the many people, frameworks and experiences that continue to shape my own practice.
For those working in futures, strategy, governance, Indigenous development, technology, education, economic development or community leadership, I hope this example contributes to our wider conversations about how futures thinking can become more embedded in everyday decision-making.
I am particularly interested in how we move beyond futures as a specialist exercise and towards futures as an ongoing discipline of stewardship.
How do we help institutions act responsibly across generations? How do we create space for communities to exercise greater agency? How do we measure progress when some of the most important outcomes may not become fully visible within our lifetimes? And how do we ensure that the people who inherit the consequences of our decisions also inherit the capability and freedom to shape what comes next?
These are questions I continue to explore through my own mahi and alongside others.
I remain grateful to the people and communities who have contributed to that learning, including Tokona te Raki, Mō Āpōpō – Future Makers, and our wider futures community.
For me, the purpose of futures practice is not to arrive at a perfect description of tomorrow. It is to help us become more deliberate, more responsible and more imaginative about what we do today.
Because the future is not something we simply arrive at.
It is something our decisions, relationships and actions are already helping to create.
Explore the Ngāti Tamaterā 100-Year Rautaki:
https://www.tamatera.iwi.nz/rautaki-100-tauExplore Te Korekoreka:
https://www.tekorekoreka.co.nz/aboutExplore Mō Āpōpō – Future Makers:
https://www.tokonateraki.com/mo-apopo-future-makers