There Is No Such Thing As Unbiased Scenario Planning

Crawford, Megan

Abstract

A series of lab and field studies were conducted with managers, executives, and postgraduate students to test the hypothesis that an emotional priming effect exists within any given scenario planning workshop (Crawford, 2021). The studies show that priming scenario practitioners with real-world, but biased views of the external business environment can dramatically alter how they view the future and their scenario development. Early indicators also suggest these biases may be internally consistent. If true, consistency based on specific priming effects suggests potentialities for both facilitated nudging (i.e. bias exploitation; Crawford & Wright, 2024) and predictive modelling (i.e. machine learning and AI; Spaniol & Rowland, 2023).

These empirical studies are part of a larger grounded theory investigation. Results support four key claims. First, all scenario planning workshops are susceptible to implicit influences. The assumption that scenario planning can take place under unbiased conditions is false, which should offer a new lens through which we understand past empirical discoveries. Second, workshops can be influenced by the specific messages chosen to inform practitioners. Defining the scope of the project and initial data collection for practitioners all have strong biasing effects and should be understood by the facilitators. Third, there may be as much consistency as inconsistency in scenario thinking across teams. Data collected across six years, nine studies, and three continents, indicate robust scenario thinking differences based on priming effects. Just as surprisingly, plausibility judgments appear to be even more robust, through a shared bias. Finally, these qualities may be consistent enough to predict certain macro-level outcomes within scenario planning. Organisations are already employing generative AI to short-cut early strategy techniques. For such efforts to be meaningful, we need to understand their validity.

• Presentation Conference Type: Conference Paper (unpublished)
• Conference Name: Scenario Planning and Foresight 2023
• Start Date: Jul 10, 2023
• End Date: Jul 11, 2023
• Deposit Date: Jul 14, 2023
• Keywords: scenario planning, foresight, forecasting, future, cognition, biases