One problem that can be the death of any strategic planning exercise is peoples’ propensity to deny that a potential unfortunate event could ever happen. They continue to deny despite evidence that suggests it could well happen. Sometimes history has strong lessons to be learned about the future, but those too are denied:
The virus will fade away when the weather warms up.
Oil will never again go below $50 a barrel.
The Wall Street banks are too big to fail.
People won’t stop buying our product.
Digital photography will never replace film.
The Red Sox will never win the World Series.
People won’t want to post things about themselves on the Internet.
“There’s no chance that the iPhone is going to get any significant market share. No chance.” – Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, 2007.
What unspoken rule is at work here?
