Flawless Scenario Planning in an Unpredictable World

Sometimes our world is turned upside down, giving us two choices: denial or resilience.

When it comes to planning the future of any organization, there are essentially two approaches: assuming that our world will be predictable or assuming our world will be unpredictable. Our approach will be different depending on these assumptions.

The more unpredictable we assume our world can or will be, the more useful scenario planning is. The prime reason organizations would not do scenario planning in an unpredictable world is they lack a viable model for doing so.

In scenario planning, we identify very to somewhat likely future scenarios we want to navigate well. Scenarios describe what could happen in the world we need to effectively navigate. We then plan for each. Scenario planning could focus on any number of potentially significant scenarios.

The payoffs of scenario planning are many. We have fewer risks of being blindsided by changes. We are more resilient to changes. We have a more sensitive radar for emergent new opportunities. We are more proactive than reactive. We’re ahead of other organizations hoping — assuming — they will have a predictable world.

There are two ways to do scenario planning; flawed or flawless.

Flawed planning is based on assumptions. We name our predictive assumptions about what could happen in our world and what we assume we will do reactively or proactively about it. We then act as if our assumptions are reality.

If our world is fairly to mainly unpredictable, as we act on our assumptions, things will keep changing in opposition to our predictive assumptions. There are unnecessary and unaffordable financial, talent, and opportunity costs every time the world doesn’t behave according to the planning assumptions we’re operating and strategizing from.

Flawless planning is flawless because we work from zero assumptions. We work from our questions instead. Questions keep us continuously aligned with a continuously changing world. There are few to no costs the way assumption-based planning does. We leverage our continuously churning assumptions as assets to generate the power of new, actionable questions.

For more about question-based planning, check into “The Power of Questioning Assumptions.” To explore Flawless Scenario Planning with Jack, visit his Calendar.