Scenario planning

When you need a long-term business strategy for a country or region or are planning for operations that might span years, you can't depend on a static business model. You need scenario planning.

Scenario planning is an inclusive process that brings company decision makers and external experts together. Working alongside the group identifies trends and possibilities, such as high oil prices or creeping resource nationalisation. It predicts how likely each trend or event is, and how significant its impact would be on your business. Based on that Menas writes various extreme scenarios of what could or might happen.

Scenario planning:

• determines the variables
• tests to understand how specific combinations of variables will operate
• produces a set of stories about how the business environment could evolve
• assesses these stories to understand a client's risks and opportunities
• develops strategies to manage risks and maximise opportunities

With scenario planning, the client:

• understands the full range of possibilities in the operating environment
• is equipped with a set of indicators for the emergence of different outcomes
• can implement plans to minimise harm to business interests and safeguard opportunities
• can prepare alternative investment plans that depend on which scenario occurs.