Tessa Finlev
Tessa Finlev is a leading global futurist with over 15 years in the field. Her career began at the intersection of social change, peacebuilding, and futures thinking. For the past decade, Tessa has been teaching audiences around the world the art and science of strategic foresight. She has taught peacebuilders in Sudan and Kenya; international development professionals in Thailand, Ukraine, and Italy; and corporate professionals throughout the US.
Tessa has conducted research and spoken on topics as wide-ranging as the future of youth employment in Saudi Arabia, government collaboration in the Global South, mobile phone usage in Nigeria, future of wellbeing, entertainment, blockchains, mixed reality, criminal justice, labor rights, national identity, and more.
Today, Tessa is focused on two key areas:
(1) Building organizational foresight to enable decisive leadership and mindsets anchored in long-term outcomes over short-term gains. Her goal is to give clients the building blocks to successfully grow foresight programs and apply strategic foresight in real-time decision-making.
(2) Researching the future of Africa based on local truths, rather than mirroring narratives from the Global North.
During her tenure at the Institute for the Future (IFTF) Tessa co-created and co-led the Foresight Essentials training program, one of the most widely adopted foresight trainings in the world. She also founded and ran the Peace and Development Lab, and developed IFTF’s toolkit for inclusive futures in partnership with their Fellows program, which she ran.
Tessa later became the first ever in-house Foresight Strategist at Dolby Laboratories, where she launched a company-wide Futures Council and a shared visioning multi-year process with the People and Places team.
She is a Research Affiliate with IFTF, an Associated Partner with the Copenhagen Institute of Futures Studies, and founder of the boutique foresight firm, Facilitating Foresight. Tessa is a two-time immigrant—Denmark → US → Kenya—which she considers her strategic superpower. She is used to being an outsider and looking at opportunities and challenges from unusual angles.
Benson Njau
Ben Njau is Director of Africa Research at Facilitating Foresight, where he leads the Africa Megatrends initiative. His foresight approach is practical, learner-centered, and deeply rooted in real-world systems and lived experience. Raised in rural Kenya, Ben brings a perspective rarely centered in traditional foresight work—one grounded in the realities of informal economies, community-based systems, and place-based knowledge. This grounding allows him to spot emerging signals and implementation challenges that are often invisible to urban or global-north practitioners. His superpower is cutting through jargon to get to what’s really going on beneath the surface.
Ben holds a bachelor’s degree in Interdisciplinary Research from the University of California, Berkeley, where his thesis examined the impacts of devolution in Kenya. His work focuses on human systems and rural realities, helping clients ensure their futures strategies are inclusive and applicable across diverse geographies.
He has delivered foresight trainings for Norec, supporting exchange participants, partner organizations, and the Partnership for Democracy program. He has trained peacebuilders in Sudan through UNDP Sudan, conducted horizon scanning in Nigeria with Nokia, and presented on the future of the informal economy at the Institute for the Future’s flagship research conference.
Before joining Facilitating Foresight, Ben taught computers at Boys Mountain School in Loitokitok, Kenya; served as an Outward Bound Instructor in both Kenya and California; worked with Solarcity (now Tesla energy) to transition homeowners to clean energy; and managed co-working spaces. He is fluent in English, Kiswahili, and Kikuyu, and is passionate about making foresight accessible and meaningful to the people shaping Africa’s future—not just policymakers, but the communities living the change.
In addition to his foresight work, Ben runs a wilderness adventure organization that brings people into Kenya’s mountains and forests through hiking, camping, and climbing—continuing his lifelong commitment to exploration, connection, and grounded perspective.