My mission as a futurist: making desirable futures more likely.
Under this motto I work as a generalist on very different projects, often with workshops and research: as a consultant for clients, a researcher out of curiosity, an activist on grant money. I'm based in Berlin, often on the road across Germany and available worldwide.
I get called in when an organisation
has no clear picture yet of where to go.
Six methods I developed →Today I get paid for exactly
what my teachers
used to hate me for …
Jonas DrechselProfile
- Experience
- Futurist since 2018, self-employed since 2012
- Education
- MA in Futures Studies, FU Berlin, 2020. Robert Jungk scholarship, Salzburg 2020
- Roles
- Board member, D2030 e.V.
- Project lead, Missionswerkstatt
- Co-founder, youngk
- Co-initiator, Critical Futures Studies community
- Lecturer, HS Niederrhein
- Before
- Co-founder of a startup for creative freelancers, 2013 to 2017, exit in 2017. Our demand: a day rate of at least 300 euros. My startup story (in German)
- Funded by
- White Mirror by Media Lab Bayern, the Missionswerkstatt by Postcode Lotterie, E.ON Foundation, DFL Stiftung and Stiftung Bürgermut, D2030 by DSEE
- Currently
- White Mirror fellow at Media Lab Bayern
- 5 foundation-funded Missionswerkstatt sessions on the energy transition, with support, April 2026 to August 2027
- Essay “Stance Before Method” in the Journal of Futures Studies
- StimmlosTrend for Wahlheymat
- Dream projects for the youngk collective, defined together
- Room for a project with you
As of October 2026
Dreaming with open eyes: the counter-idea to Black Mirror.
White Mirror is a method for future stories that make real tensions and room for action visible. It starts with worldbuilding, a world with its own logic, captured in a world profile. Begun in 2024 as a blog post on Einbildungskanal, developed in 2026 into a guide for newsrooms in the Future of News Fellowship at Media Lab Bayern.
A thought experiment with hope.
Realistically optimistic, not naive.
Future of News Fellowship
Media Lab Bayern, 2026. Goal: a guide for newsrooms and published prototypes. Developed with Ouassima, Simone Engelhardt, Isabella Hermann, Mareike Schütt and Georg Jänchen.
Einbildungskanal, January 2024
White Mirror: Ein Gedankenspiel mit Hoffnung
The original text, in German. The counter-idea to Black Mirror: hope-giving, more grey-and-colourful, with thick context. The thought experiment alone makes the space of what is possible bigger.
Read the text ↗Medientage München, 21 Oct 2026
Masterclass “Journalismus statt Silicon Valley: Wie Medien Zukunft machen können”, Red Stage. Pitch with the other fellows.
To the panel ↗
World profile, template in progress12 October 2026
White Mirror at Perspective Daily
“Als die Angst kam, schrieb ich aus der Zukunft”, the first White Mirror text in an outside newsroom.
By Désiree Schneider, in German
Black Mirror
The Netflix series reflects the downfall and reinforces a pessimistic world view in which everything is going down the drain anyway.
White Mirror
Stories of people who keep acting in partly dystopian conditions. The pilot “The Empathy Algorithm” is set in Hamburg in 2029, with an algorithm auditor and an AI mediator in couples therapy.
Worldbuilding first
World first, story second. A trend becomes the ruling logic of a world of its own. The world profile captures this logic before a character acts in it and runs into a conflict.
Worldbuilding in the glossary →One-pager ↓Playbook
White Mirroring step by step.
Coming in November 2026
Workshop poster
The method on a single sheet, for the room.
Coming in November 2026
A freelancer collective for better futures work, business with purpose.
At youngk, Agency³ has three meanings: an agency of more than 20 freelancers, the capacity to act that images of the future create, and the right team for every project. It rests on the 3K: Kompetenz (competence) from science, Konstruktion (construction) from futures studies, Kommunikation (communication) from design futuring. Co-founded by Jonas Drechsel.
Because futures don't happen by chance:
shape them, or follow other people's images.
As of October 2026
Team meeting of the members who actively shape youngk, 2025
Introductory workshop with Nina Valkanova, Kreativquartier Potsdam, 2026
The members at the 2025 Christmas partyGDV scenario report
Scenario lead, facilitation, concept, 2025.
Kulturorte im Übermorgen, Kassel
Concept by Jonas, delivered by Georg Jänchen, 2026.
Foundation of a well-known NGO
Three Perspectives workshop in the collective, 2025.
Kreativquartier Potsdam
Introductory workshop on futures thinking, with Nina Valkanova, 2026.
Illustratoren Organisation
Three Perspectives, a sharper position on AI.
“The scenarios and discussions showed me impressively that AI is not just a tool but a real pathfinder for a new kind of customer relationship and sales culture.”
Three Perspectives workshop ↗
Instagram embed
What some people dream of.
Absurd-utopian. Which places of longing can we imagine, beyond the probable?
What can be discussed.
Plausible-alternative. Which developments count as realistic once the view widens?
What everyone thinks is coming.
Projected-official. The future elephant in the room that rarely gets talked about.
The future cannot be known. The workshop makes your images of the future visible and open to discussion, so hidden assumptions become negotiable. Most recently run for the foundation of a well-known NGO, the Illustratoren Organisation, Velptec and HS Kempten.
Developed in-house, offered in the collective
CustomGPT scenario tool
Develop scenarios and translate them into decisions. AI varies them systematically, people steer the substance and check the quality.
Scenario2Agency on youngk.de ↗
One-pager ↓Where are we looking at futures from today?
Critical futures studies asks how images of the future come about: from which assumptions, world views and myths, in whose interest. If you know the foundation, you can shift it and find alternatives beyond seemingly probable futures. Jonas Drechsel co-initiated the German-speaking community: network events since 2023, a podcast, a lecture series at HS Niederrhein.
Disrupts frames of thinking, opens doors
to alternative futures.
- 250
- newsletter subscribers
- 10
- network events
- 5th
- run of the lecture series Design-Kritik-Zukunft at HS Niederrhein, starting autumn 2026
- 20
- podcast episodes
As of October 2026
The first in-person meeting after three years of community: institut für zukünfte, Wolfsburg, July 2026
The Kritik-Kreisel after Fischer, Toest, Lauenstein and Drechsel“Es ist der Kern kritischer Zukunftsforschung, den Status quo, Business as usual, zu erkennen und herauszufordern.”
Amazon. Interview for a new research department, critical futures studies as an outside view.
Journal of Futures Studies, 2026
Applied Critical Futures Studies: Stance Before Method
My essay on how critical futures studies gets into practice: stance comes before method. With the three perspectives and cases from projects.
Read the essay ↗One-pager ↓From workshop method to movement: people get started without waiting for permission.
The Missionswerkstatt takes people from a personal mission to concrete room for action. Afterwards they connect in the Missionswerkstatt community and find allies, and individual missions grow into thematic teams. A project of D2030 e.V., developed by Jonas Drechsel and Johannes Wirz, freely available as a method handbook.
A space for activation and focus:
Give people the power to act!
- 15
- workshops run
- €125,000
- from 4 grants
- 8.6/10
- satisfaction right after the workshop
- 8.1/10
- want to pursue their mission afterwards
- First workshop in March 2024
- From secondary schools to foundations
As of October 2026
Halle rollt e.V., 2025“Great group energy, and at the same time, by the end of the workshop I was completely focused on myself and my tomorrow.”
Seek
Connect personal topics with desirable futures.
Strengthen
Interview each other, share positive visions.
Realise
Put vision and mission into words, first concrete steps.
One-pager ↓Clip ↗
Instagram embed
Workshops, research and process facilitation.
Working with Jonas Drechsel means clarifying the question first, then choosing the method. He asks and wants to know exactly, until your assumptions about the future become negotiable. Depending on what your question needs, the work disrupts, dreams, experiments or just gets going. Method-agnostic, with a clear stance, as a futurist since 2018.
Ten years across research and practice
give me an eye for what is still missing.
Several commissions, above all getting foresight communication going. The clip shows how accessible that can be. ↗
Three-day sprint in Croatia, strategy condensed into a book: a narrative of desirability, backed by empirical scenarios. ↗
Corporate foresight for VW, WDR, Novo Nordisk. A synthetic media report for the WDR innovation hub. ↗
Trend reports over four years: a picture of the sector from weak signals to hypes, with scenarios built from it. ↗
Workshop format developed for the Mitmacht labs: hosts run futures workshops themselves, with a shared way of capturing results. ↗
Small-town barometer and scenario workshop with mayors at the Kleinstadtkongress in Wittenberge. ↗
Concept focused on the futures wheel, including a playbook. Facilitation was a small part. Berlin symposium 2025.
Future workshop, sufficiency played through in practice. What can we do for a more sufficient society? ↗
Teaching since 2024: the lecture series Design-Kritik-Zukunft in the bachelor's, foundations of futures studies in the design master's.
StimmlosTrend: designed, set up and analysed along the lines of the BerlinTrend poll. ↗
Months of coaching with workshops towards a strategic narrative, backed by several plausible futures. ↗- Futures4EuropePlatform owner of the EU foresight platform: repositioning its content, presence and mission, handover to V3. ↗
One-pager Personal Futures ↓Personal Futures
Four possible lives, one story, three next steps. The scenario method from my work with organisations, applied to your own life. For individuals at turning points, in four sessions over two to three months.
First call
30 min, free
Coaching for isi. sensory futures, 2025 ↗“I recommend Jonas as a futures researcher because he brings the right mix of stance and method to widen the horizon and identify alternatives.”
“Jonas asks and wants to know exactly. He isn't shy about shining a light deep inside.”