We need strategy. The world is changing, the future uncertain. What is required is vision: What might the future bring? Where is our business going? What are our fundamental business values? This book is a manual for all those who want to apply strategy in organisations. It is intended for everyone who wants to put the future on the agenda, to look beyond the short term and beyond mere profit. It describes in practical terms the eight questions we must continually discuss in order to pursue a future-proof strategy in a dynamic and uncertain world: mission, trends, scenarios, options, vision, roadmap, action and monitoring. If you are dissatisfied with an approach to strategy based on simple backward looking analysis, management controls and problems solving after the fact, but would like to make a positive contribution to thinking about the future, Scenario-based Strategy offers the instruments to turn your intention into practice. The text provides examples from commercial to government and trade organizations; showing how others have undertaken future explorations and how they used these explorations to create a dynamic strategy. Paul de Ruijter has a deep insight into the theory, alongside practical experience working with some of the most highly regarded and resilient organizations. The result is a rich combination of methodology and practical, engaging examples that shows you how to go about creating an agenda for the future.

Paul de Ruijter is Managing Director of De Ruijter Strategy, and he has been involved with scenario based strategy projects with clients ranging from cities, NGOs, ministries, trade associations, multinationals and global institutions. Paul is Executive Lecturer at Nyenrode University, Delft University and the University of Amsterdam and is a renowned speaker at international congresses and seminars. He is co-author of a book about business opportunities in South-Africa (1992), a book about Industrial Policy in the Netherlands (1999) and a book about scenarios at Rabobank (2004). He has written a chapter in Scenarios for Success (2008) and was the lead author of a handbook on using scenarios in the public sector (2004) and of a book about scenarios and strategy for trade associations (2006).