Four Planning Factors To Help Navigate An Ambiguous Business Environment

Originally published on Forbes Technology Council.

As we head into the second half of 2025, and the decade, for that matter, it’s interesting to reflect on the many changes and challenges that businesses have faced over the past five years. Leaders have found ways to adapt to many uncertain situations, assess potential risks, adjust plans and, in some cases, even find opportunities to test out innovations or move their business in a new direction.

Initially, many of us felt there would be an eventual return to the way things were, but the myriad economic, geopolitical and weather-related disruptions that we’ve faced indicate that uncertainty and ambiguity may continue to be the new business as usual.

While we may be navigating a more precarious business landscape and dealing with a completely different set of issues from one year to the next, we still need to plan for the future while also managing the more immediate concerns that impact our business. So what should enterprises keep in mind for their mid- to long-term business planning when the path ahead doesn't always seem straightforward?

Here are four factors to consider to keep your mid- to long-term plans on track.

1. Develop a clear vision

The strength of a company's mission statement can be a critical aspect of its overall strategic planning and ability to successfully meet (and hopefully exceed) long-term goals. It can act as a "North Star" for cross-functional teams to align their department's priorities, fostering collaboration and helping employees tap into the purpose of how their specific roles help achieve a company's continued growth and success.

When developing a clear vision that can guide the company's long-term path forward, it's important to consider:

• How do you want to operate 10 years from now, and what strategies and actions need to be prioritized to achieve that goal?
• What values do you want to embody, and how do your company culture, operations and products or services align with this?
• What value proposition helps position your company to stand out in your industry?

In an ambiguous business environment, setting a clear vision can help everyone remember the big-picture goals, even as they find ways to handle and mitigate near-term business and supply chain risks.

2. Factor in your external stakeholders.

Your company's long-term planning should extend to your external stakeholders, such as business partners, investors, board members and suppliers. Doing so can bring new perspectives to your long-term goals, make you aware of potential business risks that may emerge and point out opportunities worth prioritizing.

This is an opportune time to develop stronger relationships with suppliers, especially if both parties are facing similar challenges or headwinds. By collaborating in the long-term planning process, the relationship becomes more strategic as both parties are more inclined to share information and data that might be mutually beneficial to both companies.

Additionally, while navigating short-term uncertainties or business disruptions, the time that you've put into strengthening your supplier relationships will pay off, as you may receive priority order fulfillment during a supply constraint or other benefits that give you an advantage over your competition.

3. Invest in resiliency

In times of ambiguity, continuing to build resiliency across the business and supply chain can be a linchpin to keep your long-term strategic planning on track in spite of short-term disruptions. Typically, strengthening supply chain resiliency involves building greater end-to-end visibility into your multi-tier network to better identify supply chain risks and disruptions earlier. This improves flexibility in how potential risks are managed and enhances relationships with suppliers to help proactively and strategically coordinate supply chain planning efforts so that each party mutually benefits.

To achieve this, many companies implement digital transformation initiatives and invest in technology platforms that derive market insights from internal business data and external drivers, ensuring that teams have access to accurate, real-time insights that can be applied to all phases of business and supply chain planning.

A 2022 McKinsey report, The Data-driven Enterprise of 2025, predicted that more businesses would be investing in technologies that enable greater access to real-time data insights, especially as the computational power and advanced analytics of cloud-computing technologies become more efficient, and the cost becomes more affordable as well.

4. Incorporate 'what if' scenario planning

When dealing with disruptions that may not have a clear-cut solution, it's critical to ask three questions, which my company, o9 Solutions, refers to as the 3Ws:

• What happened and why?
• What is likely to happen?
• What cross-functional actions should be taken to improve the plan?

While these questions are imperative when handling near-term uncertainties, incorporating "what if" scenario planning into your mid- to long-term planning efforts can help your organization proactively handle ambiguity that can emerge down the road.

Effective scenario planning that builds on historical business data (sales, inventory, etc.) and also incorporates real-time data from across the n-tier supply chain (supply constraints, shipping delays, inventory costs, etc.) can provide an accurate snapshot of what is likely to happen on a mid- to long-range timeline and what actions can be taken to mitigate potential risks.

While the main focal point of planning in ambiguity is about mitigating the potential risks that arise from uncertainty, on a more optimistic note, the same approaches can be used to find new opportunities, test new innovations, develop new products and ultimately continue growing your company in a positive way.