“Imagine a commercial airline pilot trusted to navigate turbulent skies with no prior simulation training … why then are critical decisions in organisations often left to ‘theory’, ‘experience’, ‘intuition’, or ‘gut instinct’?" - de Suarez et al 2012.
Summary:
The Long Game Project aims to bolster organisational decision-making, team collaboration, and resilience. We're committed to a) creating tools and resources to streamline tabletop exercise accessibility; b) advising, offering thought leadership, and comprehensive consultation to organisations keen on tabletop exercises; c) fostering a culture of organisational gaming and building a community around tabletop games.
Imagine a universe where organisations are primed for the unforeseen, where decision-makers skillfully steer through crises to yield favourable outcomes amidst chaos thanks to routine simulated practice. The art of effective decision-making under uncertain conditions is a skill worth honing. Play now, so you're prepared later.
Our mission is to help organisations improve decision-making (IIDM), enhance team collaboration, and build resilience using tabletop exercises that are rules-light but experience heavy.
Rationale
The world is becoming increasingly complex and unpredictable, with organisations facing various challenges. Institutional decision-making in practice is often ill-equipped to handle such complexity, leading to sub-optimal decision quality and severe failure modes. 80,000 hours lists IIDM as one of the best ways to improve existing levers, interventions and practical suggestions for our long-term future and lists this as a neglected issue. While IIDM is a complex cause area, requiring some disentangling, there are existing levers, interventions and practical suggestions that are under-utilised in practice. The Long Game Project exists to bridge this gap by applying several levers to a diverse range of sectors, helping organisations adapt and thrive in an ever-changing landscape. Our toolkit of levers includes; tabletop exercises, role-playing, future simulations, facilitation, probabilistic thinking games, goal and value alignment, decision design and other methods that combine game design and ideas from behavioural economics, psychology, and organisational theory.
Our Aims:
1. Becoming the go-to source for tabletop scenario advice and tools, providing expert consultation on serious tabletop exercises.
2. Demystifying tabletop exercising by producing easily accessible tools, offering guidance and expertise.
3. Empowering institutions to address complex challenges by transforming their planning, reaction, and adaptation methods in an uncertain world.
4. Focusing on scenarios of global urgency and long-term horizons.
5. Encouraging a culture of organisational gaming and building a community around tabletop games.
Theory of Change
We believe effective decision-making is a skill that can be learned. By exposing organisations and decision makers to simulated experiences, we aim to create a virtuous feedback loop, where participants hone their decision-making abilities, leading to better outcomes and heightened resilience.
This, in turn, fosters more efficient, effective, and adaptable organisations, contributing to a more stable and prosperous future. By equipping decision-makers with the knowledge, skills, and confidence to navigate crises more effectively, we believe that Project Long Game can contribute to a world where organisations are more resilient, adaptable, and capable of handling future complexity.
We will produce (products):
1. Free, open-source tools such as best practice guides for tabletop exercises, standard operating procedure (SOP) documents, a basic rule-set for our tabletop game system, a scenario idea generator, and community discussion channels.
2. Affordable, high-quality tools such as custom full guides and SOP documents for DIY tabletop exercising, a repository of scenarios and resource documents addressing multi-domain risks, and organisational networking channels.
3. Educational content such as workshops on game design and facilitation, modules on tabletop exercise practices for boards and governance, and an online beginner's course for tabletop exercise design.
We will provide (services):
1. Advisory services such as game or scenario design, reviews of current practices, defining problem statements, goals, behaviour targets, and optimising resource utilisation.
2. Modular full-suite consulting services such as custom game design for tabletop exercises and scenarios, design briefs, in-game materials design, operational outline, facilitation, debriefing, data gathering during the game, post-game analysis, and follow-up reporting.
The Team
Dr Dan Epstein is a tabletop games designer and a medical doctor with a PhD from Monash University, brings his expertise in Decision Making, Behaviour Change, Tabletop Game Design, Behavioral Economics, Pandemic Prevention, Forecasting, and Philanthropy. At LGP, he is the core team strategy and game design director.
Sanjana Kashyap is a management consultant who has worked on strategy and implementation for Ministries under the Government of India to advance gov-tech policy initiatives in Digital Learning, Public Health, and Internet Governance. Her previous roles have primarily been working with key ecosystem partners from industry, academia and civil societies to enable strategic decision-making for better citizen outcomes. She also holds a Master’s in Management Studies with academic specialisations in Finance, Statistics and Economics.At LGP, she’s part of the core Team supporting strategy, operations and partnerships.
Together, we bring knowledge and insights to create practical, high-impact tabletop exercises and the operational skills to do the thing.
Goals
Presently, we're focusing on expanding our scenario library and SOPs for DIY exercises, leveraging our network through partnerships, rolling out tiered offerings, beta testing our scenario generator, and cultivating our community.
Our future projects include developing a generative scenario engine, raising awareness, hosting asynchronous email/forum games, designing stand-alone games based on EA concepts, and facilitating larger-scale games with high-impact partners.
2023 Goals:
1. Create: Build a comprehensive library of scenarios and SOP documents.
2. Vibe: Cultivate a vibrant community of 100+ members comprised of practitioners, organisations, researchers, and local champions.
3. Build: Onboard at least 10-15 value-aligned organisations to our premium community.
4. Expand: Deploy 1-2 larger exercises across various industries and sectors.
5. Adapt: Constantly improve service quality by incorporating emerging trends, technologies, and research into our design and delivery methods.
6. Sustain: Achieve financial stability while successfully reporting our impact KPIs.
Join Us in the Game
Follow us
Keep updated on our work and impact via our blog, Twitter, Linkedin and the fresh new discord server.
Talk to us
If you share our mission and are looking to exchange ideas around this, email us at email@longgameproject.org Feel free to write to us with any query you may have!
Try us
If you already have a specific problem statement in mind, use our AI scenario generator to get concept scenario ideas for your organization today!
Generate a full guide to your favourite scenario and provide us with some feedback on the process and product for cash prizes.
Partner with us
We want some domain experts that would be happy to answer our Qs during game design/playtesting. Join us as a domain expert by filling out this form.
We also are building a directory of game masters! If you have played tabletop games/roleplaying games or facilitated meetings and would be interested in hosting or upskilling for Impact tabletop exercises, fill out this form (and jump in the discord!)
Academic and research writing projects.
Thought exchanges on podcasts and social media channels.
Events/ seminars and other ecosystem convenings.
Hire us
Organizations interested in incorporating TTX exercises by scoping problem statements and training requirements can expect the following lifecycle:
1 Connect with us Using our interest form or via email@longgameproject.org
2 Preliminary problem scoping call/s
3 Presentation of customized solutions
4 Service delivery (onsite or remote)
Recommend us
We want to be the go-to resource for tabletop exercising info and expertise.
Please point people our way in your journey.
Thanks to support, testing, guidance and perspective from @Sean Lawrence @cassidynelson @Michael Noetel @SarahPomeranz @James Odene [User-Friendly] @AmyOdene @Nathan Sherburn @arunbharatula @Greg S @manyothers