A “Scenario Sprint” for private schools
How could your school’s strategic landscape change in the next 10 years?
A 1-day workshop for private schools in Dubai
You’ll develop four potential futures for your school — all of them plausible
Scenario planning is a tried-and-true methodology for grasping how the future terrain in which your school operates might realistically change over time. Its purpose is not to predict what will happen, but to show you what could happen — and what the implications of those changes would be for your future success. Some of these insights will undoubtedly validate the soundness of your strategy — while others may challenge it by shedding light on less favorable possibilities you should also be taking into consideration. Either way, if you’re responsible for your school’s continued competitiveness, scenario planning is a valuable — and often eye-opening — exercise.
“our future?
It’s uncertainty as far as the eye can see.”
That’s what the principal of a private school I worked with in Brazil said about his school’s strategic landscape.
Of course he was right: all organizations face the prospect of an ever-changing operating terrain, and thus hard-to-predict fortunes. But private schools may be a special case — and those in the UAE especially so. That’s because over the next decade, the landscape you operate in will be reshaped by countless uncertainties, some specific to the UAE’s focus and vulnerabilities. To name just some of the big ones (and let’s not even mention another COVID-type disruption that could arise):
How could new modes of learning and teaching emerge thanks to AI?
What new regulatory adjustments will you have to comply with?
How will social media continue to affect your students?
How could parents’ expectations change? And their involvement?
Will your competitive field be different? How? Will new players arrive on the scene?
What might happen that could create new cost pressures to be dealt with?
Could it become more challenging for you to recruit talent, locally or from abroad?
… and perhaps above all the others:
What economic or geopolitical tempests, whether originating in the region or far away, could buffet Dubai’s expat community? What might the impact of these “high winds” be on you?
No one has a crystal ball, but scenario planning makes it possible to gain insights and clarity about future possibilities, enabling you to plan for them today.
How the Scenario Sprint works
One key to sustained success is resilience. And since you will be even more resilient by anticipating change rather than only reacting to it, foresight can be vitally important. But a major foresight project can take weeks. Your time is valuable. So I developed a unique workshop structure called the “Scenario Sprint”: an accelerated scenario generation workshop that takes only one day to visualize and explore alternative possible futures for your school.
Here are the main features of this intensive, specially designed exercise:
You’ll work in pairs. Since “two heads are better than one,” each school sends a team of two to participate — typically the principal plus another key member of the leadership team. This way, you’ll bring different perspectives into the exercise, riffing off each other’s knowledge and experience.
You’re guided all the way through. You’ll go step-by-step through the scenario generation methodology, led by me, Woody Wade. I have been a scenario planning practitioner and facilitator for 15+ years, and though I’m based in Switzerland I have an important Dubai connection: I am an Adjunct Professor teaching the methodology to Master’s degree students at Rochester Institute of Technology’s Dubai campus. I’ve also written a number of books on scenario planning — the newest is a practical handbook, Your Four Futures. Leading the Scenario Sprint, I present the steps of the process to everyone, then float between teams to poke and prod, explain, answer questions, make suggestions — and generally help improve outcomes wherever I can.
You’ll work only on your own school’s future. While the Scenario Sprint is attended by leaders from different institutions, no one will be sharing confidential or proprietary information with anyone else or presenting it to the entire group. You could say that the Scenario Sprint is in effect like a dozen school-specific workshops taking place in parallel in the same room. Each team does its own work, with me facilitating the process. Your own plans, info, and competitive positioning remain fully protected — and by the end of the day, strengthened.
You’ll end the day with a valuable practical roadmap. For each scenario, you’ll identify specific opportunities and challenges: foresight that can be translated into immediate action back on campus.
Why attend?
With so many external forces having the potential to affect you, are you confident that you can visualize your school’s strategic terrain several years from now? It’s not an easy task, which is why exploring plausible futures in a structured way is such a big help. The logical framework we’ll use can help you see how to make more assured strategic decisions that are better aligned with the future that might unfold, e.g. concerning:
Your enrollment strategy
When, where, and how much to invest in EdTech and other technological innovations
Adapting your curriculum to changing needs
Recruiting and retaining talented teachers and administrators
Resource planning
Branding, positioning, and differentiating your school from your competition
Preparing your school’s response to high-risk disruptions
Short and sweet: Foreseeing future uncertainties more clearly is an enormous strategic advantage!
Dubai: when and where
Date: Tuesday, 3 February 2026
Location: Shangri-La Hotel, Sheikh Zayed Road, Dubai
Cost: Early bird price AED 4,500* per school (2 participants)
Language: English
* The early bird registration price is valid through 15 December;
thereafter AED 6,000 per team of 2
Which two people should attend from your school?
The pair of participants attending the Scenario Sprint from your school is up to you, but I would recommend that it include executives from among these three groups:
The principal or head of school
The governing board or ownership group
The school’s leadership team, i.e. senior decision makers with responsibility for strategy, financial performance, marketing, human resources, etc.
Secure Your Place
Seats are limited to ensure a focused experience. Reserve your place now to ensure your school can benefit. Click this button:
About your Facilitator
Woody Wade is a scenario planning practitioner and author of the new book Your Four Futures. For more than fifteen years, he has led foresight workshops for leadership teams in about 35 countries, helping a wide variety of organizations navigate the uncertainties they will face. For the last four years, he has taught scenario planning to Master’s Degree students at Rochester Institute of Technology’s Dubai campus as an Adjunct Professor, and besides developing this post-graduate course, he also launched an online scenario planning course on Udemy which has trained over 4,000 learners worldwide.
Based in Lausanne, Switzerland, Woody earned an MBA from Harvard Business School and a Bachelor’s degree in history and Germanic languages from Indiana University.
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Be ready when the future arrives — in whatever form it may take.