Synopses & Reviews
Scenarios The Art of Strategic Conversation "Kees van der Heijden has written the most comprehensive, detailed and insightful guide to understanding the business environment in a way most useful to business. No one has mastered the art of bringing that insight to bear in the real world of business with greater depth than Kees." Peter Schwartz, Chairman, Global Business Network; author of The Art of the Long View. The only constants in the current business environment are turbulence and change. When initially developed at Royal Dutch/Shell, scenario planning helped companies understand external change - change in markets, the competitive arena, technology, demographics and so on. In this book, Kees van der Heijden takes the art of scenario planning one giant step further. After showing you how to understand how the world around you is changing, he then shows you how to move your organization to meet the future by linking scenario thinking and your Business Idea in an ongoing strategic conversation. The result is a learning organization with the finely honed ability to track the marketplace and business environment. How Scenarios will help you think through the way forward, and keep you thinking as you move.
* Understand the basis of an organization's success - articulate its central business idea
* Break out of the organization's restrictive "thinking box" - take a wider perspective, scenaric view
* Develop scenarios as alternative ways of interpreting the present - see beyond current range of vision
* Become clearer about the many apparently unrelated developments - build a systemic framework using a story line
* Be more secure with the future - understand uncertainty
* Do it by using a practical methodology
* Nurture and sustain an ongoing strategic conversation throughout the organization
"The span of this book is unusually wide: it goes from the philosophy of scenario thinking to the minute practicalities of how to do it. This book is, in my view, the best guide in a field where it is easy to go astray and where guidance is precious." Pierre Wack, Former Head of Scenario Planning, Royal Dutch/Shell
Synopsis
"Artful scenario spinning is a form of convergent thinking about divergent fututes. It ensures not that you are always right about the future but--better--that you are almost never wrong about the future."––Stewart Brand This groundbreaking book from University of Strathclyde professor Kees van der Heijden shows how to use scenarios--a powerful new approach to strategic planning--to pilot your company profitably through unknown territory. When initially developed, scenario planning helped companies understand external change--change in markets, the competitive arena, technology, demographics, etc. In this book, van der Heijden goes one giant step further. After tackling external forces, he shows you how to apply the logic of scenario planning to internal forces.
*A dynamic scenario-based approach to the strategic planning and organizational learning from an internationally respected authority *Arms managers with tools, concepts, and techniques they need to profitable pilot their organizations into an uncertain future
Synopsis
Scenarios Scenarios deals with how managers can set out and negotiate a successful course into the future for the organization in the face of significant uncertainty. Uncertainties about the future are often felt to be uncomfortable and thus "swept under the table" by collapsing them into a single-line forecast. This is tantamount to abdication of managerial responsibility. At worst it means a wild jump in the dark. Facing up to uncertainty changes the perspective on the future completely. The secret of success moves from "finding the best strategy" to "finding the best process". Thinking about scenarios - the different plausible future environments that can be imagined - is the key to thinking the process through and to keep thinking about it as the plans for the future unfold. Scenario planning is dynamic. The focus of attention needs to be on the ongoing "strategic conversation", penetrating both the formal and informal exchange of views through which the strategic understanding develops - and actions result. deals first with the principles of organizational learning and then moves on to describe practical and down-to-earth ways in which the organization can develop its skill in conducting an ongoing scenario-based strategy process. The methods described are based on many years of practical experience of managers in both large and small organizations; and they are grounded in solid logic.
Description
Includes bibliographical references (p. [295]-298) and index.
About the Author
Kees van der Heijden is Professor of General and Strategic Management at the Graduate Business School, Strathclyde University, Glasgow, UK, and Visiting Professor at Nijenrode University, Holland. He is a co-founder of Global Business Network, Emeryville, California, and is currently a Principal. Before joining Strathclyde University he was in charge of Royal Dutch/Shell's scenario planning, as head of the Group's Business Environment Division. This involved the general development of the process of scenario planning in which Shell has taken a worldwide leading role. Prior to that he was head of Shell's internal strategy consulting group, assisting management teams worldwide in strategy development and implementation. He specializes in scenario planning, strategy development and institutional strategic management processes and has consulted widely in all these areas. The painting serves as an icon for the idea projected in the book. strategy is about conversation, which takes place more in corridors than in boardrooms strategy, often treated as an abstract, is in the final analysis about people responding to the needs of other people the image is unconventional for a business book - the hallmark of any successful scenario/strategy project!
Table of Contents
THE CONTEXT.
1965 to 1990: Five Discoveries in Shell.
Three Competing Paradigms in Strategic Management.
THE PRINCIPLES OF SCENARIO PLANNING.
The Business Idea of An Organisation.
Dealing with Uncertainty.
Scenarios and the Business Idea.
Scenario Planning in Organisations.
THE PRACTICE OF SCENARIO PLANNING.
The Practitioner's Art.
Articulation of the Business Idea.
Competitive Positioning.
Scenario Development.
Option Planning.
INSTITUTIONALISING SCENARIO PLANNING.
The Management of Change.
Planning Processes.
Guiding the Strategic Conversation.
Conclusion.
References.
Index.