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Corporations need a structure for thinking through the development of a new energy/environment strategy and the business implications of different strategy alternatives. This paper aims to investigate how to develop a customized corporate energy strategy.

This four‐step process focuses on the major energy/environment issues requiring corporate decisions; it generates two alternate scenarios of the future that span the possibilities and identifies basic policy choices for corporations and also the tradeoffs to be made.

The paper finds that this process to develop a new energy strategy addresses the prospects that the way an organization manages its energy and environmental threats and opportunities over the next 15 years could invigorate or cripple it. The four major drivers of uncertainty for the future: the dynamics of energy supply and demand, global warming effects, society's environmental‐mitigation and remediation priorities, and world economic development outcomes.

Bill Ralston is the co‐author of the best‐practice guide The Scenario Planning Handbook (with Ian Wilson).

The four‐step process outlined here provides corporate executives the practical means to interpret the global forces buffeting them, to identify new pathways for creating value in the future and to get started.

This process to develop a new energy strategy evaluates the prospects that the way an organization manages its energy and environmental threats and opportunities over the next 15 years could invigorate or cripple it.

This conference session was an in‐depth discussion of how practitioners can get the most value from scenario planning. Participants were Bill Ralston, SRI International; Robert Wilson, Northeast Consulting Resources; and Gerald Harris, Global Business Network. Audrey Schriefer, Strategic Management Associates, moderated the session and has prepared this brief summary.

One of the sessions at the 1995 International Conference featured a panel of scenario experts: Bill Ralston, SRI International (SRI), Robert Wilson, Northeast Consulting Resources (NCRI), and Gerald Harris, Global Business Network (GBN). Audrey E. Schriefer, Strategic Management Associates, moderated the session. In the September/October issue of Planning Review, Ms. Schriefer summarized the opening remarks from this session. Here she presents the highlights of the question and answer portion of the discussion.

Bill Ralston and Ian Wilson have written a unique resource for corporate leaders – The Scenario Planning Handbook: Developing Strategies in Uncertain Times (Thomson/Southwestern, 2006). Strategy & Leadership editor Robert M. Randall interviewed them to ask, for example, Why does scenario planning deserve special top management attention?

The interview covers such topics as: Do executives really need to get involved with the nuts and bolts of scenario development? Will that really help them with the management of strategy which is clearly their prime responsibility?

The authors of the Handbook believe that scenario planning is an excellent way to “rehearse the future.” By thinking continuously about the future, and how a business might react to major changes, managers will be better prepared to respond quickly to extraordinary events when they do occur.

Scenario planning can lead to true organizational learning if leaders facilitate four developments: executives, managers and staff must become convinced that long‐term, superior performance of the organization depends on anticipating and responding to future events, discontinuities, innovations and trends better than the competition; information – about internal and external developments –must flow freely so that the seeds of new businesses can grow as existing businesses compete aggressively for market share; the organization must acquire or develop competencies in external‐environment intelligence, technology innovation, planning under uncertainty, experimenting with new products and services, and executing change; and effective processes must be developed for scanning and monitoring, scenario planning, technology innovation, and decision‐making under uncertainty.

This interview taps the experience the two scenario planning consultants have accumulated from working on scenario projects over several decades.

Reviews the latest management developments across the globe and pinpoints practical implications from cutting‐edge research and case studies.

This briefing is prepared by an independent writer who adds their own impartial comments and places the articles in context.

This review is based on “Strategic thinking about disruptive technologies” by Nick Evans, Bill Ralston and Andrew Broderick. They describe a project carried out by SRIC‐BI for the US government to identify the most important civilian technologies disruptive to US interests up to 2025. Six technologies identified as likely to be the most disruptive were biofuels and bio‐based chemicals, biogerontechnology, clean coal, energy‐storage materials, service robotics, and The Internet of Things.

Provides strategic insights and practical thinking that have influenced some of the world's leading organizations.

The briefing saves busy executives and researchers hours of reading time by selecting only the very best, most pertinent information and presenting it in a condensed and easy‐to‐digest format.

In organisations today it is essential that the budgeting process be not just effective in the determination of the allocation of resources, but also be perceived by all those involved within the organisation to be fair and equitable. The budgeting process must also be participatory, in that, those who will be held accountable for the results are also involved in the determination of the resource allocation.

The purpose of this article is to review the results of the detailed questionnaire which was the core of the field research referred to in the previous article on Applications of ZBB in Academic Institutions.

Introduction The purpose of this article is to examine the literature with respect to the application of ZBB in the private sector and by so doing determine the results obtained from the application. In reviewing the literature, reference will be made to the comparison of private and public sector ZBB; claims and criticisms made by private sector organisations; and a summary of the survey findings conducted in the private sector.

The purpose of this article is to review the surveys and comments made with respect to ZBB applications in academic institutions. In addition, the results of the writer's masters dissertation on “The use and usefulness of ZBB in Academic Institutions” are summarised here. However, the detailed results of the Mail Questionnaire are included in the next article of the series.

Introduction The purpose of this article is briefly to review the theoretical concepts and practical applications of group participative decision making (GPDM), especially at the executive and middle management levels. It is not proposed that GPDM be used in all situations, since it is inappropriate in emergency and simple task functions, and in situations where no commitment and acceptance is required by others to ensure effective implementation of the decision. However, there is no question that GPDM could be used more often than it is at present. Further, in the future, GPDM as a management style will be expected to be the mode of dealing with strategic, tactical, and change issues by managers in the organisation. This then necessitates the organisational top management preparing today a total organisational environment conducive to future participation. GPDM is not easy, since it is impacted by many variables, and this writer believes that all participants will require training and education to obtain that sense of “balance” in individual and group characteristics, group process and organisational environment, to ensure that the benefits are obtained and the problems avoided. In short, today's managers will have to adopt a more co‐operative, supportive, and people‐oriented behaviour style and blend this in with the traditional competitive, aggressive and task‐oriented behaviour (that is balanced behaviour) in order to survive in the future.