The credit crisis continues to rage unabated. Delta Lloyd Group, however, feels that this is the right time to look to the future.
The credit crisis continues to rage unabated. Delta Lloyd Group, however, feels that this is the right time to look to the future. In conjunction with scenario-developer Robert Bood, Delta Lloyd Group has developed scenarios as a tool for strategy development.
With “Fragmentation” and “New Balances”, the scenarios presented on 11 May 2009, Delta Lloyd Group aims to prepare itself as well as possible for what the future brings: the changes awaiting us and what they will mean for the financial world, for Delta Lloyd Group, its customers and other stakeholders.
The scenarios presented at Harvard University’s prestigious Harvard Faculty Club in Boston offer a vision of our world in 2025. They look at whether the crisis will persist for years to come and fragment the global (economy) or whether this is the start of new opportunities and new balances.
'Fragmentation' and 'New balances'
In the “Fragmentation” scenario, economic problems escalate, ushering in protracted periods of global stagnation. As social divisions widen and political coalitions disintegrate, lively virtual communities develop. In “New Balances” sustainability and respect predominate around the world and offer new players and initiatives full scope. Governments and businesses invest heavily in sustainable energy and ambitious environmental targets. In the West, well-being gains the upper hand over economic prosperity and forms the basis for fundamental social and economic renewal.
Niek Hoek, chief executive of Delta Lloyd Group, said: "We started developing scenarios for the uncertain future when the credit crisis began flaring up all around the world. There is no doubt that the years to come are going to be defined to a significant extent by the current developments on the financial markets. But we are looking ahead. And through ‘practising for the future’ with the help of these scenarios, we are sharpening our strategy and doing our utmost to make good the pledge we make to our customers: 'The Future Secured'."
Scenario-thinking
We spoke to more than 50 people, both inside and outside the company, to identify the external forces forming Delta Lloyd Group’s future business context. In line with the scenario methodology, the conversations focused on the future social, ecological and economic context in which the financial sector will have to operate as well. The current scenarios follow on from the scenarios which Delta Lloyd Group developed in 2004/05 and which Delta Lloyd Group used to prepare for the current situation in the financial world.
Robert Bood, a partner at Fairsights, had this to say: “Scenario-thinking is an essential tool for businesses to cope with the uncertain future. Contemplation of totally different future scenarios increases insight into the forces that define future environmental dynamics. Can scenarios anticipate everything that the future has in store? The answer to that is 'no, definitely not', scenarios are not predictions in any sense. The purpose of scenario-thinking is not to know what the future is, but to prepare for the requirements of possible, even entirely unforeseen futures.”
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