Scenario planning in Strategic Planning

  • Release version: Australia
  • Updated March 12, 2026
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    Summary of Scenario Planning in Strategic Planning

    Scenario planning in Strategic Planning allows organizations to create, evaluate, and approve strategic scenarios that align with their goals and business outcomes. This process enables visualizing various planning approaches, assessing their impacts, and making informed decisions prior to implementing a live plan.

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    Key Features

    • Scenario Creation: Generate simulated plans to explore different strategic approaches without impacting the live plan.
    • In Plan Toggle: Prioritize or de-prioritize planning items within the scenario; this toggle is enabled for items marked as Prioritized or Done with applicable date ranges.
    • Date Management: Start and End dates are automatically populated from the planning items and can be updated; deviations from acceptable ranges are highlighted.
    • Comparative Analysis: Assess multiple scenarios side by side to evaluate goal alignment and trade-offs, helping identify the most suitable scenario.
    • Budget Evaluation: Set target portfolio budgets and review the financial benefits of prioritized items against proposed budgets.

    Key Outcomes

    By utilizing scenario planning, organizations can effectively anticipate challenges, optimize strategic decisions, and ensure that their chosen plan aligns with strategic objectives. This approach facilitates informed decision-making and enhances the overall Strategic Planning process.

    Create and evaluate strategic scenarios to explore different planning approaches. Approve the optimal scenario that aligns with the organizational goals and strategic priorities.

    Scenario planning overview

    Scenario planning in Strategic Planning enables organizations to create, evaluate, and approve the best strategic scenario that aligns with their strategic goals and intended business outcomes. This process helps in visualizing different approaches, assessing their impacts, and making informed decisions before implementing the live plan. By using scenario planning, organizations can anticipate potential challenges.

    What is a scenario

    A scenario in Strategic Planning is a simulated version of a plan that enables you to explore a strategic approach without affecting the live plan. It provides a safe environment to prioritize items, adjust timelines, and evaluate the potential impacts of each approach.

    As compared to a plan, a scenario additionally has the following:

    Compared to a plan, a scenario additionally has the In Plan toggle, Start dates, and End dates
    • In Plan toggle: The In Plan toggle enables you to prioritize or de-prioritize the planning items in the scenario you’re creating. By default, when you create a scenario, the In Plan toggle is turned on for planning items that have all of the following field values:
      • Planning state as Prioritized or Done
      • Start and end dates within the portfolio plan dates.
    • Date fields: The Start date and End date fields for the scenario are automatically populated based on either the planned or actual start and end dates of the planning items. You can update these dates during the scenario planning process. Once the scenario is approved, the updated dates are recorded as the approved dates for the planning items. If the updated dates fall outside the acceptable range, they’re highlighted in yellow.

    For more information on portfolio plans, see Portfolio plans in Strategic Planning.

    By comparing scenarios side by side, you can assess the differences in goal alignment and trade-offs between each scenario. This comparative analysis helps identify the scenario that best meets strategic objectives. For more information on comparing the scenarios, see Compare scenarios.

    Scenario planning workflow in Strategic Planning

    Using the Scenario Planning feature in Strategic Planning, you can perform the following activities:

    • Create a scenario to explore different strategic approaches and business outcomes. For more information, see Create a scenario.
    • Adjust and compare multiple scenarios side by side to evaluate differences in goal alignment, trade-offs, and financial benefits. For more information, see Compare scenarios.
    • Approve the best scenario that aligns with the organizational goals. For more information, see Approve a scenario.
    • Set a target portfolio budget for each of your planning cycle, which can be for fiscal period, quarter, yearly, or portfolio timeline.
    • Evaluate the target vs proposed budget of In-plan items and review the monetary benefit from the prioritized items.

    Prioritization tab: Adjust dates of the planning items and mark them in plan

    Roadmap tab: Adjust schedule of planning items

    Financials tab: Set targets and adjust the budget of planning items.

    Scenario Planning workflow overview

    The scenario planning workflow involves an execution owner and a portfolio owner. The following illustration illustrates how scenario plans are created based on the planned or actual dates of planning items and how the In-plan toggle is adjusted based on the states of these planning items.

    Figure 1. User journey in Scenario planning
    Flowchart explaining the flow of user journey in scenario planning from creating to approving a scenario.

    For more detailed guidance on using scenario planning to enhance your Strategic Planning process, see Optimizing planning with scenario planning in Strategic Planning Workspace.