Scenario analysis

Scenario analysis is a method of anticipating several comprehensive outcomes and using it to guide evolution of a service model, or just to make some financial capital decisions. It requires disciplining what one believes about the future into a set of best cases and worst cases and assigning them probabilities. It necessarily requires considering cases that one does not believe can occur, because no one has perfect cognition, and it takes mutual cognition and discussion of visions and threats to be quite sure that one has really understood the limits of best and worst cases.

"Scenarios should include extremes and those that contradict popular opinion" - Algorithmics Inc., probably the world's most advanced scenario analysis firm.

See w:scenario analysis and w:risk for more general articles on this.