So, how do we talk about the long term future? Most long term (strategic) planning discussions falter. Managers seldom work through long term planning scenarios.

Long Term is a discussion outside the bounds of tangible concrete circumstances. It is a conceptual discussion.

For years, I have used a planning template and approach which I recently found compiled and published by Alexander Osterwalder in an open source project called Business Model Generation. The central piece of the project is a long term planning template called the Business Model Canvas.

In its one page form, it allows a group to deconstruct the elements of its business model into nine elements.

• Key Partners
• Key Resources
• Key Activities
• Cost Structure
• Value Proposition
• Customer Segments
• Customer Relationship
• Customer Channels
• Revenue Streams

This Business Model Canvas provides the structure for an orderly discussion, an orderly conceptual discussion about the way the business is put together. And that’s our Inventory, as of today.

The second step of this process is to examine external forces (trends, competitive pressure, economics, demographics, regulatory pressures) that will impact on each of the nine elements.

The third step is to redefine the nine elements in response to those external forces. This third step is the work product of the long term planning discussion.

A structured conceptual discussion, strategic planning.