一段非常生动的四分钟视频解释什么是“情景规划法”

当前的供应链问题更加容易吸引我们的注意力，我们很多时候会发现，为了解决当下问题而发起的改善项目，等到完成项目后，发现整个世界又变化了。而这些变化中，有一些情况又似乎曾经出现在我们的讨论中。对于长远的未来，我们难以准确预测，这也不现实。我们要做的是为多种可能未来做好相应的预案。

壳牌公司通过熟练运用“情景规划法”，使得其在1973年至1974年冬季OPEC（石油输出国组织）宣布石油禁运政策时，壳牌有良好的准备，成为唯一一家能够抵挡这次危机的大石油公司。从此，壳牌公司从世界七大石油公司中最小的一个，一跃成为世界第二大石油公司。

无独有偶，在1986年石油价格崩落前夕，壳牌情景规划小组又一次预先指出了这种可能性，因此壳牌并没有效仿其他各大石油公司在价格崩溃之前收购其他的石油公司和油田扩大生产，而是在价格崩落之后，花35亿美元购买了大量油田，这一举措为壳牌锁定了20余年的价格优势。

情景规划法是一套在高度不确定的环境中帮助企业进行高瞻远瞩的方法，它不仅能够帮助决策者进行一些特定的决策，同时也使得决策者对需要变革的信号更为敏感。

下面一段视频，将有助于我们理解这一工具。

*视频版权归MIT所有

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Planning is a complicated activity.

计划是一项复杂的活动。

It requires an organization to make its best estimate of what the future will be.

它需要一个组织对未来做出最好的估计。

At any point in time, all the planners have to work with is what happened in the past.

在任何时候，所有的计划人员都必须与过去发生的事情一起工作。

They face the challenge of translating this knowledge into a useful forecast of the future.

他们面临着将这些知识转化为对未来有用预测的挑战。

For shorter planning horizons, most widely used forecasting methods such as time series analysis or regression use the most recent history to project into the future.

对于较短的规划范围，最广泛使用的预测方法（如时间序列分析或回归）使用最新的历史数据来预测未来。

This is like boxing where planners assume the current trends and conditions will continue into the foreseeable future.

这就像拳击一样，计划人员假定当前的趋势和条件将在可预见的未来继续下去。

For relatively short periods, like a month, a quarter, or a year or two, it is usually OK to assume that the near future will be similar to the recent past.

对于相对较短的时期，如一个月、一个季度或一两年，通常可以假定近期的未来与近期的过去类似。

These traditional methods, however, do not perform as well for longer term horizons-- 10, 20, 30 years out or more.

然而，这些传统方法在长期范围内（10年、20年、30年或更长时间）的表现并不好。

The question is, how should we plan over these long time frames?

问题是，我们应该如何规划这些长期框架？

Using traditional methods over a long planning horizon will only lead to a longer projection of the current conditions and trends.

在长期规划中使用传统方法只会导致对当前条件和趋势的长期预测。

Over a longer period of time, current trends simply will not hold.

但是在较长的一段时间内，当前的趋势根本无法保持。

Step changes and unforeseen events will occur.

步调变化和不可预见的事件将发生。

Natural disasters, political unrest, economic upheavals,technological innovations, any one of these can cause tremendous changes.

自然灾害、政治动乱、经济动荡、技术革新，这些都会造成巨大的变化。

Traditional forecasting methods are simply not designed to handle these unforeseen step changes.

传统的预测方法根本不能用来处理这些不可预见的步骤变化。

This brings us back to the problem of how to make long-term plans.

这使我们回到了如何制定长期计划的问题上。

Obviously, boxing or extending the current trends does not make sense for a long-term horizon.

显然，拳击或扩展当前的趋势对于长期的前景来说是没有意义的。

For these long-range plans, traditional forecasting techniques are like throwing darts at a board.

对于这些长期计划来说，传统的预测技术就像是向棋盘投掷飞镖。

Fortunately, there is a different approach called scenario planning.

幸运的是，有一种称为场景规划的不同方法。

Instead of trying to predict the one future that will occur, it might make sense to consider multiple possible futures all at once.

与其试图预测将要发生的一个未来，不如同时考虑多个可能的未来。

Scenario planning is based on the idea that organizations are better at preparing than they are at predicting.

场景规划是基于这样一个理念：组织比预测更擅长准备。

If I tell an organization exactly what the future will be like, they can usually do a great job preparing for it.

如果我告诉一个组织未来会是什么样子，他们通常会做好准备。

Scenario planning is a way to prepare for multiple potential futures.

场景规划是为多个潜在的未来做准备的一种方法。

This is more like judo.

这更像柔道。

Instead of boxing or projecting forward to a fixed future based on the recent past, planners prepare to respond to any one of several possible futures.

规划者们准备应对几种可能的未来中的任何一种，而不是根据最近的过去进行拳击或预测一个固定的未来。

They do this by answering the question, what should I be doing today given that this particular future is going to happen?

他们通过回答这个问题来做到这一点，考虑到这个特殊的未来将会发生，我今天应该做什么？

In scenario planning, it is key to keep in mind that each future we choose is just one potential future out of many.

在场景规划中，关键是要记住，我们选择的每一个未来都只是众多未来中的一个潜在未来。

We do not seek to predict exactly which future will come to pass because there are an infinite number of potential, possible, and plausible futures out there.

我们并不试图准确预测未来会发生什么，因为未来有无限多的潜在的、可能的和可信的未来。

Because it is impossible to explore all of them, we must create a handful of plausible, alternative futures that together capture the most relevant uncertainties and driving factors.

因为不可能探索所有这些因素，我们必须创造一些合理的、可替代的未来，共同捕捉最相关的不确定性和驱动因素。

Think of these as describing the potential, feasible region for the future.

把这些看作是描述未来潜在的、可行的区域。

When we look forward from the present, we can't tell in which direction we will end up moving, but by carefully designing potential scenarios, a lot of ground can be covered.

当我们从现在开始展望的时候，我们不知道我们会朝哪个方向前进，但是通过仔细设计潜在的场景，我们可以覆盖很多领域。

In scenario planning, there is no need to predict specific events.

在场景规划中，不需要预测特定事件。

It is more important to identify the smaller number of relevant effects that these events can trigger.

更重要的是要确定这些事件能够触发的相关影响的数量较少。

For example, for a firm that sources material from a specific region of the world, any number of events in that region-- an earthquake, a pandemic, economic collapse, or an industrial disaster-- will all have the same effect of reducing the flow of product from it.

例如，对于一家从世界某一特定地区采购材料的公司来说，该地区发生的任何事件——地震、流行病、经济崩溃或工业灾难——都将具有减少产品流动的相同效果。

There's no need to predict all of these events when all they do is shape a handful of important effects.

没有必要预测所有这些事件，因为它们所做的只是形成一些重要的影响。

In the end, this offers a real benefit for planners. Scenario planning allows them to replace the futile job of predicting future events with a more feasible task of preparing their organizations to face the most relevant effects.

最后，这为规划者提供了真正的好处。场景规划允许他们用一项更可行的任务来取代预测未来事件的无用工作，即让他们的组织准备面对最相关的影响。