Strategylet Overview

Cross-Impact Analysis

Strategylet is a powerful and user-friendly tool for systems analysis. It helps organisations to identify and plan strategic actions for the achievement of particular goals. Strategylet software has been developed to improve methods such as cross-impact analysis, structural analysis and stakeholders’ interests map. A basic reason for undertaking cross-impact analysis is that it allows looking at trends and events interconnections and possible influence on each other. By bringing systemic thinking into the planning process it is possible to identify incompatibility between opinions, conflict of interests and common views about what are the best decisions you can make to reach specific objectives.

Global and local trends in modern society make most events and developments somehow connected to each other. Such interdependencies between developments (i.e. trends, drivers, variables) and stakeholders should be considered in order to reach a more coherent and realistic understanding about the future. Foresight activities sometimes rely only on methods such as Delphi, brainstorming and scenario writing which generally lack of a mechanism for detecting mutually exclusive or conflicting issues. Cross-impact analysis is a method that Foresight has borrowed from other disciplines in order to stimulate imagination, reduce incoherent behaviour, and create a common language and structure for collective. In other words, it gives a comprehensive view of the future in the light of the present and it generates the necessary insights that help an organisation take control over its future and not merely react to outside stimulation.

It is important however to include in such analysis those developments whose expected impact on the future of system is believed to be somehow significant. For this reason methodologists suggest to consider in the planning process a number of 20 to 35 developments. Each development should include a short definition in order to avoid misunderstands and reduce overlapping meanings. The following list indicates the most common steps in cross-impact analysis:

• Define the study time horizon (present or future-oriented simulation).
• Define the variables (trends, drivers, events and objectives) and stakeholders to be included in the analysis.
• Input those variables and stakeholders into Strategylet system. The software will automatically create cross-impact matrices to define the interdependencies between variables (trends, drivers, events and objectives) and stakeholders.
• Identify and enter into Strategylet the group of knowledgeable experts who will fill in the cross-impact matrices:
  • For the structural analysis matrix that is, for example, information on how the technological trends influence on social or political ones;
  • For the stakeholders’ analysis matrix that is, usually, information on how stakeholders influence on each other;
  • For the stakeholders’ interest matrix that is information on how stakeholders agree or disagree with the given set of objectives).
• After points 1, 2, 3 and either 4a, 4b or 4c have been completed you should START (activate) Strategylet’s consultation functions. The software will generate all necessary questionnaires and send customized confidential access codes (via email) to the group of experts participating in the study.
• Perform a validation discussion on final matrices.
• Perform the cross-impact calculations (This will be done automatically by Srategylet).
• Evaluate results (key drivers, key stakeholders, conflictive objectives, possible alliances and feasible objectives, among others).
• Prepare policy recommendations and strategic actions.
• Inform decision-makers.

Strategylet therefore can be used to identify and understand the correlation between variables. It has been implemented in French and Latin American foresight exercises as a tool to identify how technological developments in a particular area could affect other areas.

On the whole, the major benefit of using cross-impact analysis is the ability to bring systemic thinking into play. This is especially important since many other foresight methods produce information in isolation without considering a wide range of interdependencies among variables (i.e. trends, drivers or technologies).

To sum up, Strategylet is a Web-architected, universal strategic planning tool developed to simplify expert consultation in cross-impact analysis and improve evaluation of rests to help your organisation identify a whole range of new strategic actions.

Comprehensive Feature Set

• Uses web-based expert consultation to detect the relationship of forces amongst the actors conforming the system
• Uses multi-level component hierarchy to allow infinite number of projects and members as system components
• Uses dynamic questionnaire setup which allows:
  • unlimited number of fields and subfields
  • field-level expert assignations
  • dynamic value assignations with named values.
• Overcomes two great stumbling problems in strategic analysis:
  • How to carry out systemic expert consultation?
  • How to maintaining maximum confidentiality?
• Plots charts of:
  • key and emerging drivers/trends/technologies/stakeholders
  • direct and indirect (hidden) interconnections between variables
  • conflictive objectives
  • achievable objectives
  • indifference of actors
  • possible conflicts among stakeholders
  • possible alliances or power fronts (by agreements or through indifference)
• Allows evaluation of results by experts or experts' specialties (E.g. opinion of politicians, scientists, businessmen, researchers, etc.)
• Reflections on the results normally allow the formulation of key questions about the future.
• Other features:
  • browser independency
  • questionnaire tracking
  • expert activity tracking
  • expert load planning
  • expert assignment planning
  • system evaluation by experts or experts' specialties
  • project pause and restart
  • powerful update of on-going project, etc.