Scenario planning- a proven tool for strategic thinking and decision-making
The use of scenarios as anticipatory planning tools is growing because of the practicality and generality of the approach. Rather than planning for one likely future, senior managers need courage to promote strategic conversation, picture alternative futures and prepare for them. Scenarios are robust tools for exploring possible future operating environments and developing strategies for them - strategies that are resilient enough to aim. Read more.
Rural Finland 2015
The future operating environment of rural development work
The Rural Policy Committee (YTR) launched a scenario project in spring 2005 to chart the future operating environment of rural development in Finland. The aim of the project was to create a common idea of the possible courses of rural development until 2015 in cooperation with the committee network. The main aim of the project was to support rural development work by drafting alternative descriptions of the future operating environment, i.e. scenarios, and to define the opportunities, challenges and development alternatives that must be taken into account in rural development. Read the report.
Envisioning the future
"What was the strength of a Winston Churchill or a Franklin Roosevelt or a Charles de Gaulle or any of the other great statesmen? They had an instinct for history, which meant they could envision the future and provide direction on how to get there. Otto von Bismarck, the first chancellor of the German Empire, once said, 'All a statesman can do is to listen to the footstep of God as he walks through history, and get ahold of the hem of His cloak and walk with Him a few steps of the way.' But most contemporary politicians - or business executives - do not consider that they are walking through history. Is it any wonder, then, that few of them make history?"
- Henry A. Kissinger |
