Editing Scenario planning (section)

===Critique of Shell's use of scenario planning===
In the 1970s, many energy companies were surprised by both [[environmentalism]] and the [[OPEC]] cartel, and thereby lost billions of dollars of revenue by mis-investment. The dramatic financial effects of these changes led at least one organization, Royal Dutch Shell, to implement scenario planning. The analysts of this company publicly estimated that this planning process made their company the largest in the world.<ref name="schwartz1991">Schwartz, Peter. ''The Art of the Long View''. Doubleday, 1991.</ref> However other observers{{Who|date=April 2017}} of Shell's use of scenario planning have suggested that few if any significant long-term business advantages accrued to Shell from the use of scenario methodology{{Citation needed|date=April 2017}}. Whilst the intellectual robustness of Shell's long term scenarios was seldom in doubt their actual practical use was seen as being minimal by many senior Shell executives{{Citation needed|date=April 2017}}. A Shell insider has commented "The scenario team were bright and their work was of a very high intellectual level. However neither the high level "Group scenarios" nor the country level scenarios produced with operating companies really made much difference when key decisions were being taken".{{citation needed|reason=The quote needs a source.  Or are the quotation marks in the wrong place.|date=October 2016}}

The use of scenarios was audited by [[Arie de Geus]]'s team in the early 1980s and they found that the decision-making processes following the scenarios were the primary cause of the lack of strategic implementation {{clarify|date=November 2015}}), rather than the scenarios themselves. Many practitioners today spend as much time on the decision-making process as on creating the scenarios themselves<!-- how is this a critique? -->.<ref name="Cornelius et al. 2005">Cornelius, Peter, Van de Putte, Alexander, and Romani, Mattia. "Three Decades of Scenario Planning in Shell," ''California Management Review''. Vol. 48 Issue 1:Fall 2005, pp 92-109.</ref>