Debunking Conspiracy Theories Using Strategic Foresight

Strategic foresight can sound remote from everyday operations until an unfamiliar problem lands on someone's desk. For Sami Mäkeläinen at Telstra, one such problem involved conspiracy theories about 5G during the pandemic. He recalls that what the industry had largely treated as a fringe concern developed into threats to staff and damage to infrastructure.

Colleagues wanted to understand what was driving the behavior and what responses might help. They approached Mäkeläinen because he had tackled unusual questions before, not because he was already a specialist in conspiracy theories.

In this Innovation Rockstars conversation, he describes the research that followed and the wider practice behind it. His account of foresight is less about delivering a confident prediction than helping experts see a problem differently, consider consequences and make better decisions themselves.

Investigate the unfamiliar before choosing a response

Mäkeläinen describes a three-month research effort into conspiratorial thinking, psychology and different forms of misleading information. He reviewed responses tried in other settings and looked for approaches that might help Telstra address the problem.

One outcome was a series of humorous 5G facts videos responding to conspiracy claims. He recalls the campaign receiving international attention and describes it as successful, while stopping short of claiming that any method could resolve the problem completely.

The humorous approach sat alongside conventional factual information, including material from authorities and international organizations. The research broadened the response rather than replacing facts with entertainment.

For leaders, the organizational lesson is that a technically focused business can encounter a problem that requires another kind of understanding. The relevant research may need to cross into psychology, communication or social behavior before the team can decide how to respond. Mäkeläinen's contribution was to investigate that unfamiliar territory and help others act on what he found.

Respect the expertise already in the business

Mäkeläinen describes his role as covering foresight, insight and part of the action that follows. Suggestions, scenarios and possible directions are within his work. The people responsible for the business still need to determine what to do.

He is deliberate about that boundary. His internal customers often have deeper expertise in their own fields than he could acquire. Foresight can add a broader context without pretending to replace their judgment.

“I find it's more valuable when you ask better questions.”

That means helping a product team examine how today's choices might open or close future opportunities. A team focused on this quarter's delivery may welcome a longer-term view, provided it connects to decisions the team actually faces.

The result does not always need to be an instruction. A question that reveals an overlooked consequence can change a decision while leaving ownership with the people best equipped to make it.

Leave capacity for the questions nobody scheduled

Mäkeläinen divides his work into regular activities, planned projects and unexpected requests. Regular work includes reading, maintaining awareness, producing material for wider distribution and participating in advisory groups. Projects can last from days to months.

The third category is important: he deliberately leaves room for questions that arrive outside planning cycles. When an executive needs an assessment quickly, being fully allocated to other work would limit his usefulness.

His research habits support that flexibility. Books provide depth, while research publications, universities, corporate laboratories and government sources help him follow developments. He describes using feeds to skim a broad range of material and moving items needing further attention into a separate database.

The aim is an informed perspective that can be brought to a new question. For a small foresight function, protecting some responsive capacity is part of making the research available when the organization needs it.

Earn demand through work people share

At the time of the conversation, Mäkeläinen describes foresight at Telstra as operating largely through requests from the business. This reflects both a deliberate approach and limited resources: the function cannot actively promote its work into every decision process.

Awareness grows through relationships, a newsletter and sharing interesting material with particular people or groups. He recalls one metaverse presentation generating around a dozen further requests from across the organization.

That example concerns demand for the work, not proof that every presentation changes a business outcome. Mäkeläinen is careful about measurement more generally. He rejects the idea that foresight should be exempt from demonstrating value, but questions whether short-term financial ROI can capture all the value of longer-term thinking.

He keeps examples of what has resulted from the work. Those cases provide something concrete to discuss, alongside the recognition that some useful effects resist a simple financial calculation.

Ask what automation does to human capability

When the conversation turns to future priorities, Mäkeläinen chooses automation rather than a particular fashionable technology. His interest is in how organizations implement it and what happens to the people involved.

“the key here will be to deploy what I call mindful automation, automation that will retain and enhance human skill”

He discusses customer-facing and internal processes, emphasizing people's ability to retain agency and develop capability. His concern is that an organization can automate part of a job while leaving a person accountable for something they can no longer meaningfully control.

This is the same questioning habit applied to an R&D decision: look beyond whether a technology can perform a task and examine what its introduction changes for the people around it.

Mäkeläinen's favorite professional moments are correspondingly small. Someone tells him they have considered an unfamiliar perspective or noticed an unintended consequence. He values those occasions because they show the work reaching the point where it matters: another person thinking more carefully about a decision they will make.