Scenarios as platforms of dialogue and dialogue as the way to generate scenarios

Strategy has two components: gathering information on the situation the organization (or department, etc) is in and making decisions for the course to follow. In the classic sense of strategy processes, the two are separated, as the people who do the information gathering do not have to be the people who do the implementing.
An alternative is scenario thinking. There you see involved the people who have to implement the strategy in the gathering of information and ideas which lead up to the strategy, which then they themselves will have to implement.
Crucial to strategy is to be aware of one’s situation and to make the right choices for action. This includes being aware of one’s context (“what is happening with our clients?”, “how is the society in which we operate changing?”, “how have our markets developed?”, etc) and of one’s capabilities (“can we offer what is expected today?”, “have our capabilities developed with the technology?”, etc). This awareness can be specified into ‘facts’, which can be connected and seen in possible developments. These pictures of possible situations are created by the people who will be somewhere in them. These pictures do not give exact knowledge to plan on, but rather the band-with within which the planning will in all likelihood have to take place.
Once scenarios have been arrived at, they serve as “platforms of conversation”. Typically, each scenario has received a name from those who have produced it. This name will serve as a kind of shortcut to a complex of shared meaning. It will make communication more efficient, provided that they from time to time have honest processes of sharing the input that was brought into the scenario by them.

There are several approaches to scenario work, some focussing on the organization and its characteristics and development, others focusing on societal developments, market and stakeholders. Which type of scenario approach to use would be largely depending on the people who have to work with them.