Created 10/7/2011 10:21:09 AM

Scenario planning has been a key methodology of futures studies (Mannermaa, 1991) to help various organizations – private, non-profit, governmental – to learn from the future (Van der Heijden, 2004) and to challenge strategic paradigms (Roubelat, 2006).

Given that in action based scenarios (Marchais and Roubelat 2007), strategies are challenged from any phase shift, they cannot consequently be seen as resulting from a required final state that might never become actual. In such an approach, anticipating risks seems only a particular case of actors' projection in strategic situations likely to lead to rule shifts or on the contrary to be solved within the current rule.

According to Marchais and Roubelat (2007), scenarios can be designed as action processes to anticipate new rules to be played in prospective futures. Now, should we align our strategies with our action based scenarios, or should we adapt our new scenarios according to our strategies? Do scenarios reshape our strategies, or they are a redesigned by our policies?

Reference:
Mannermaa, M. (1991). In search of an evolutionary paradigm for futures research, Futures,
Vol. 23, no. 4, pp. 349-372.
Marchais, A. and Roubelat, F. (2007). Designing action based scenarios, Futures, doi:10.1016/j.futures.2007.06.008
Roubelat, F. (2006). Scenarios to challenge strategic paradigms: lessons from 2025, Futures, vol. 38, no 5, pp. 519-527.
Van der Heijden, K. (2004). Can internally generated futures accelerate organizational
Learning?, Futures, vol. 36, no 2, pp. 145-159.