What to do in Strategic Planning When You Don't Know the Unknown Unknowns

摘要

We have published IJRCM for five years and while the world has changed the basic theories underlying risk and uncertainty have remained constant. The unknown unknown dimension of uncertainty makes it difficult to perform risk management because we are missing data values (the unknown probabilities). However, we know of methods to overcome unknown data (and it is not political science). We can use guesses (well maybe some political science) or ranges with pattern characteristics of similar contexts to help us build data in order to transform uncertainty into probabilities which become risks when combined with their socio-economic values (e.g., financial amounts). For example, when was the last time you estimated the risk of travelling from Cape Canaveral FL (USA) to Jupiter - the planet that is, not the city in Florida? We have answers to that question even though there are many uncertainties. The answer is provided by using similar contextual values and then simulating the missing data in order to calculate estimated probabilities. This is simulation and it is one of the most useful techniques in risk management as well as in strategic planning. This is why we selected several articles for this issue of IJRCM to demonstrate how uncertainty and risk analysis is integrated into strategic planning. Every organization should conduct strategic planning but few understand or acknowledge that all planning contains at least some degree of uncertainty. This is why risk analysis is a cross-disciplinary body of knowledge. This line of reasoning inspired our current issue, as will be discussed below.