The document discusses how complexity, volatility, uncertainty, and ambiguity are challenging executives and companies. It presents scenario planning as a strategic mindset that can help organizations embrace uncertainty and see beyond short-term predictions by developing realistic alternative futures. Scenario planning works by starting with a question, gathering information, identifying key drivers of change, and composing different plots or scenarios to explore implications. This allows companies to connect dots between current decisions and uncertain future events. The document also advocates for more agile and adaptive strategies that embrace change, take incremental steps, acknowledge risk, continually immerse in markets, and maintain organizational alignment.
3. 52%
feel unprepared for complexity
57%
feel unprepared for decreasing
brand loyalty
56% 71%
feel unprepared for growth opportunities
feel unprepared for data explosion
68% 73%
feel unprepared for social media
of CEOs believe CMOs lack business credibility
4. “Marketing as a function is in some
danger of being marginalized”
- Donald Lehmann, Executive Director of
Marketing Science Institute
17. the world is facing increased
turbulence over the next decade and
beyond caused by leadership change
in emerging markets, major policy
shifts by governments, increased
armed conflict, interlinked economies,
budget cuts by local and national
government
Global Trends 2025: A Transformed World
released by the National Intelligence Council
36. “Giving up the illusion that you can predict
the future is a very liberating moment. All
you can do is to give yourself the capacity
to respond to the only certainty in life -
which is uncertainty. The creation of that
capability is the purpose of strategy”
Lord John Browne, former CEO BP
43. approaches
Royal Dutch/Shell & Global Business Network
The French School
The Futures Group
Wilson and Ralston
Lindgren and Bandhold
Reference scenarios
Decision Strategies International
Procedural scenarios
Industry scenarios
Performance-based scenarios
44. Start with a question
Isolate the relevant decisions that need to be made
Gather the information
Focus on the question but not at the detriment of the unexpected and
look for disconfirming evidence
Identify the drivers
Identify the driving forces that influence the outcome of events
Composing the plots
Build plots that look at different, realistic outcome of the drivers /
information and their implications
45. scenarios give
us realistic
alternative
futures
image by assbach
46. allow us to see
beyond the headlights
photo by victor cavazzoni