Term Paper on Management - Advantages of Scenario Planning

Scenario planning helps individuals in moving away from their daily businesses. Most of the times, people are absorbed with things which require urgent attention plus other daily issues. Scenario sessions assist people in thinking of the potential futures and talk of the things that might happen in the world. It needs a different mindset as compared to what people engage in daily basis. Additionally, it helps in seeing bigger picture of how a firm can be in the future. Therefore, this is inspirational and it can assist on the day-to-day activities in a wider scope.

Is your time best spent reading someone else’s essay? Get a 100% original essay FROM A CERTIFIED WRITER!

Save 25%

Scenario planning also helps in understanding different cultural views and respecting others. The reason is that scenarios do show extreme possibilities. Additionally they represent different cultural views and believe that most of the people in the world hold. Discussing the impacts of scenarios give people the chance of talking of how people see the future. This strategy indicates the differences of a group in a non-threatening way since the subject has hypothetical futures. Furthermore, it gives people the chance of having an open concerning the believe systems which occurs rarely while discussing business case in a company. Therefore, scenario planning plays a significant role in culture as viewed by different people.

Scenario planning helps in discussing the future that most of the people consider impossible in one hundred years. In most cases, people react to scenarios, as no way it will never happen. However, the responses are considered valuable because it show resistance and blind spots in ones thinking. The reason is because scenarios are regarded as hypothetical and individuals can discuss the impacts, as they believe that it will never happen. This type of discussion does not only prepare the strategic thinking of people concerning the future but it also assist in analyzing the resistance of people to certain scenarios and open their eyes.

Scenario planning can also challenge on to use his or her imagination as they talk about the future that does not exist. They also talk concerning the things that might happen there including how people work, recreate, commute, and live. For instance, when one is given a pencil, he or she may start writing. However, some of the individuals have not used such items before in their childhood. Therefore, scenario planning is something, which revitalizes the imagination of people. Imagination of the things the future hold gives an organization the chance of anticipating and discussing more of such possibilities.

In considering a range of possibilities and considering them in an organizational decision making, the firm will have the chance of making informed decisions. The strategy of talking concerning the impacts of multiple plausible and extreme futures help in creating broad view of things that might happen in future. Furthermore, the weak signals of turns in the current affairs have been laid out. Therefore, scenario planning helps an organization to discuss the initial warning of various black swan events, which are things that may not be in the table during the regular boardroom meetings.

The use of a scenario-planning manager gives an organization the chance of having systems thinking. For instance, the chess players usually have various scenarios in the subsequent steps , scenario planning makes a manager to have a preventative mechanism before problems happen. Additionally, before a problem occurs, the manager can introduce possible scenarios basing on various empirical and logic facts through the business expertise. Additionally, through systems thinking the managers can consider different factors that they think might influence decision making to avoid personal bias.

Scenario planning also gives companies the chance of predicting future scenarios for the managers to know the external environment, status of the company, and future directions. Additionally, it gives companies the chance of matching the internal resources to the external environment to help in effectively and rationally allocating resources. When resources are allocated well to the external environment, all the people will have the chance of having a share of the resources. Scenario planning also plays an important role in risk reduction. The reason is because it helps in understanding a better tomorrow as it is god to assist firms deal with the uncertainties that might occur in the future by being aware of the weak signals. It helps in planning better to the new situations and keeps a business flourishing.

Scenario planning also keeps a firm alert to change. Change usually starts at the margin instead of the top. Thus, any individual in various levels of the firm should be first in detecting a new development that might affect a company. Therefore, the completed scenarios should be the living documents that are known for the staff in the organization. Scenario planning also forces managers and executives in accepting uncertainties, which exist in the environment and consider if they are taking a holistic view of the environment. It also provides key decision makers recognizing the chain of events resulting in important changes in the environment. Thus, reacting better to all the scenarios including the ones that are not part of planning. Furthermore, managers usually get a better understanding of the issues and disagreements that happen in an organisation through the process of scenario planning.