Strong Supply Chains Through Resilient Operations

CHAPTER 13Potential Scenarios of the Future Economy

Nobody can predict the future. But we can describe some scenarios for how it might play out. Of course, there can be an endless number of scenarios depending on how detailed you want to get, but for the purposes of this book, we developed four.

Laying Out Scenarios

To develop the scenarios, we identified the biggest questions that would shape the world between now and 2030—questions that could be answered in polar‐opposite ways.

• Resource availability. Will we live in a scarce or abundant world? We're talking about resources in the tangible sense—materials, funding, technology, data—and also the intangible sense—favorable regulation, business opportunities. And although we ourselves cringe at the dehumanizing aspect of the characterization, we're also talking about resources in the form of labor. (As people ourselves, we know that any individual has far more to offer the world than merely laboring for a paycheck. At the same time, we have all been in situations where, compared to other situations, our and others' labor felt freer, more powerful, more creative, more abundant.)
• Volatility of the business environment. Will we live in a stable or fast‐changing world? We're speaking not of business volatility (will the stock market go up or down?) but volatility of the environments that businesses face. This includes politics, violent conflicts, public health, weather, civil unrest, and institutional erosion, among other conditions. ...