What are Shell Scenarios?
Shell has been developing possible visions of the future since the early 1970s, helping generations of Shell leaders, academics, governments and businesses to explore ways forward and make better decisions. Shell Scenarios ask 鈥渨hat if?鈥� questions, encouraging leaders to consider events that may only be remote possibilities and stretch their thinking.
A word on scenarios
What we present here are scenarios. To get the most from them, it is important to know what these are and what they are not. They are an exploration of how the world could possibly evolve under different sets of assumptions. They are informed by data, constructed using models and contain insights from leading experts in the relevant fields. The process of creating scenarios involves considering different versions of possible futures. Some of these may seem unlikely or even surprising, yet they could still be possible. Other scenarios explore the possible outcomes of choices the world already appears to be making. This perspective offers the reader the chance to evaluate those choices. It is by exploring the assumptions behind such possible futures that readers can expand their world view and consider the options for significant change.
The value to Shell of producing scenarios is to help senior management think about the long-term challenges the business could face. In this way, the thinking in Shell鈥檚 scenarios may influence the company鈥檚 strategy 鈥� as one of many inputs 鈥� but that is as far as it goes: scenarios are not expressions of Shell鈥檚 strategy, they are not Shell鈥檚 business plan and they do not necessarily reflect the thinking or behaviour of the business. Shell also publishes some of its scenario thinking to help governments, academia and business to think about the long-term challenges that they, and the world at large, could face.
As useful as scenarios are, however, they are not created by using a crystal ball. So, while scenarios may contain a great deal of valuable information and insight, they are absolutely not predictions or expectations of what will happen, or even what will probably happen. Nor are they statements of what should happen. In short, scenarios are possible worlds built from incomplete and uncertain information. That is true of all scenarios, not just those created by Shell. All scenarios probably hold truth, but all of them are likely to be wrong in one way or another.
Ultimately, for all readers, scenarios are intended as an aid to making better decisions. They stretch minds, broaden horizons and explore assumptions.
For a more formal explanation of scenario thinking, visit 鈥� the definitions and cautionary note below.
Learn what others say about the importance of Shell Scenarios
40 years of Shell Scenarios
Published in 2013, this book is a commemoration of four decades of the scenario making practice in Shell. It contains case studies on significant scenarios that have helped expand our leaders thinking on economic, political and social challenges of their time.
