dotlah! dotlah!
  • Cities
  • Technology
  • Business
  • Politics
  • Society
  • Science
  • About
Social Links
  • zedreviews.com
  • citi.io
  • aster.cloud
  • liwaiwai.com
  • guzz.co.uk
  • atinatin.com
0 Likes
0 Followers
0 Subscribers
dotlah!
  • Cities
  • Technology
  • Business
  • Politics
  • Society
  • Science
  • About
  • Cities
  • Society

Coronavirus: Could The World Have Prepared Better For A Pandemic?

  • May 11, 2020
Total
0
Shares
0
0
0

As much of the world gets used to social distancing, school closures and restrictions in movement in response to the coronavirus pandemic, obvious questions are being asked about how governments and companies can prepare themselves for these sorts of extreme events.

One technique that has gained prominence in helping business people and officials deal with events that have a low probability but high impact is called scenario analysis or scenario planning. There are a number of different methods that can be used to model scenarios, but in essence these all involve developing stories about a number of possible ways that the future could unfold.

Probably the best known and most widely used approach, which was developed within Shell during the 1970s, involves groups of stakeholders discussing what happens when two unrelated but highly uncertain drivers of change interact in extreme ways. The eminent scenario analyst Kees van der Heijden, a former head of scenario planning at Shell, has described how one of the company’s early scenario-planning exercises examined the government approach to the energy sector and the potential discovery of significant natural gas reserves.

This approach does not aim to predict the future, and in fact recognises that this is a fundamentally impossible and futile thing to do. Instead, it encourages what van der Heijden has called “strategic conversations”, which allow those involved to have their world views challenged. The hope is that this makes business people and officials more aware of when things are not going according to plan – and so better able to respond.

Not a black swan event

There is little doubt that this sort of agile thinking has helped some officials and companies respond earlier and more decisively to the changing events of recent weeks. In some ways, the COVID-19 pandemic is a prime example of a black swan event – a term coined by the writer Nassim Nicholas Taleb to describe very high impact events that are unimaginable before they happen.

But the COVID-19 pandemic should not really be a black swan event. Epidemiologists have been warning for decades that a pandemic of a novel flu strain was inevitable. There have been a number of scares over the past two decades, such as the SARS outbreak in 2002-04, which was concentrated in southern China and Hong Kong, the swine flu pandemic that originated in Mexico in 2009, and H5N1 avian flu in the 2000s.

While all of these epidemics were serious, they weren’t on the same scale as COVID-19. This may well have led to business and political leaders focusing their attention on what they perceived to be more pressing priorities in recent years. In the US, for example, the Trump administration cut funding to disease security programmes as recently as 2018.

The behavioural economists Amos Tversky and Daniel Kahneman have developed the idea of the availability heuristic, which suggests that people overestimate the probability of things that are high profile and memorable, such as terrorist attacks.

However, the reverse is also the case, and the sustained absence of a pandemic such as COVID-19 – a high-impact, once-in-a-generation event – has led people to underestimate its likelihood and impact. A number of think tanks and consultancies provide early warning services about low-profile, high-impact events, such as conflict in the South China Sea. However, if they feature events that are considered far fetched, they risk losing credibility among their clients and readers.

Out ahead

It’s probably no accident that a number of the countries that have responded effectively to the COVID-19 outbreak are in east Asia, where the SARS outbreak and H5N1 scares are relatively recent memories. For example, Taiwan has been praised for taking early action to contain the potential spread of the virus.

One key lesson that can be taken from the response to the pandemic so far is that companies and countries that are able to respond quickly, and change strategies in response to rapidly changing events, will do well. For example, videoconferencing software producer Zoom has made premium versions of its system available for free to educational institutions that are forced to teach online. This will expose large numbers of students to the company’s platform and brand, as well as generating significant positive publicity, which is likely to prove beneficial once normal life resumes.

Scenario analysis and some of its related underlying principles can offer some tools to prepare for and deal with highly disruptive events. However, they cannot predict where and when such events will take place, nor can they completely overcome the psychological traps that cause us to underestimate them, and as a result be underprepared. Perhaps our best hope is that by being more aware of these issues, and the fact that uncertainty dominates so much of our lives, we might be a little bit better able to respond to unexpected events, big and small.The Conversation

 

Neil Pyper, Associate Professor, School of Strategy and Leadership, Coventry University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Total
0
Shares
Share
Tweet
Share
Share
Related Topics
  • Coronavirus
  • COVID-19
  • Pandemic
  • Scenario Planning
majulah

Previous Article
  • Cities
  • People

How Cities Can Reopen After The Pandemic

  • May 11, 2020
View Post
Next Article
  • People
  • World Events

Coronavirus: Could The World Have Prepared Better For A Pandemic?

  • May 11, 2020
View Post
You May Also Like
View Post
  • Cities
  • Technology

Meralco PowerGen’s PacificLight starts up 100 MW fast-response plant in Singapore

  • dotlah.com
  • June 20, 2025
View Post
  • Cities

Renewable energy, carbon credits are priority areas of cooperation for Singapore, Philippines: Lawrence Wong

  • dotlah.com
  • June 4, 2025
View Post
  • Cities
  • Politics

Singapore businesses eye more investments in PH, says PM Wong

  • Dean Marc
  • June 4, 2025
View Post
  • Cities
  • Research

Mathematicians uncover the logic behind how people walk in crowds

  • dotlah.com
  • April 3, 2025
“Toyota Woven City,” a Test Course for Mobility, Completes Phase 1 Construction and Prepares for Launch
View Post
  • Cities
  • Technology

“Toyota Woven City,” a Test Course for Mobility, Completes Phase 1 Construction and Prepares for Launch

  • John Francis
  • January 6, 2025
View Post
  • Cities

Popes were once confined to Rome. Now they travel the world – and Francis’ current journey is particularly significant

  • dotlah.com
  • September 13, 2024
Singapore
View Post
  • Cities
  • Economy

South Africa’s new pension rules: Australia, Chile and Singapore show how personal savings can grow the economy

  • dotlah.com
  • August 30, 2024
Singapore
View Post
  • Artificial Intelligence
  • Cities
  • Technology

These 5 cities are making innovative use of generative AI

  • dotlah.com
  • July 29, 2024


Trending
  • 1
    • Science
    • Technology
    From 20,000 Miles Up, Our Home Planet Is A Hypnotic Swirl Of The Familiar And The Sublime
    • August 6, 2019
  • 2
    • Technology
    NParks And SNDGG Trial SPOT Robot For Safe Distancing Operations At Bishan-Ang Mo Kio Park
    • May 9, 2020
  • Parliament Hall by Frederick Koberl 3
    • Features
    • People
    • Technology
    Inside International Institutions And Their Hierarchy
    • July 17, 2023
  • europe-map-krzysztof-hepner-TH7TW20de9s-unsplash 4
    • Cities
    • Climate Change
    • People
    5 Key Predictions For The Future Of Talent Migration
    • November 22, 2022
  • 5
    • Lah!
    Two Historic Shipwrecks Discovered In Singapore Territorial Waters, Maritime Archaeological Research Ongoing
    • June 18, 2021
  • 6
    • Cities
    • Society
    How Cities Shape Pandemics
    • March 12, 2020
  • 7
    • Cities
    CapitaLand Pledges Up To RMB1 Million In Donations To Support Flood Relief Efforts In Chongqing
    • August 25, 2020
  • 8
    • Environment
    • People
    Do Face Masks Really Prevent You From Catching Coronavirus?
    • March 13, 2020
  • 9
    • Cities
    DBS Named World’s Safest Commercial Bank
    • September 19, 2021
  • 10
    • Lah!
    Too Good To Be True: Let’s Fight Scams
    • May 3, 2019
  • 11
    • Cities
    Life In A Big City When You Are A Student
    • March 25, 2020
  • 12
    • Lah!
    Close To 800 F&B Establishments On GrabFood Now Available For Islandwide Delivery
    • April 17, 2020
Trending
  • 1
    Meralco PowerGen’s PacificLight starts up 100 MW fast-response plant in Singapore
    • June 20, 2025
  • 2
    A Father’s Day Gift for Every Pop and Papa
    • June 14, 2025
  • 3
    Apple services deliver powerful features and intelligent updates to users this autumn
    • June 12, 2025
  • 4
    Apple supercharges its tools and technologies for developers to foster creativity, innovation, and design
    • June 11, 2025
  • 5
    It’s time to stop debating whether AI is genuinely intelligent and focus on making it work for society
    • June 8, 2025
  • 6
    PBBM asks Singapore to invest more in PH renewable energy projects
    • June 6, 2025
  • 7
    Singapore PM Wong arrives in Malacañang
    • June 4, 2025
  • 8
    Renewable energy, carbon credits are priority areas of cooperation for Singapore, Philippines: Lawrence Wong
    • June 4, 2025
  • 9
    Singapore businesses eye more investments in PH, says PM Wong
    • June 4, 2025
  • 10
    The Summer Adventures : Hiking and Nature Walks Essentials
    • June 3, 2025
Social Links
dotlah! dotlah!
  • Cities
  • Technology
  • Business
  • Politics
  • Society
  • Science
  • About
Connecting Dots Across Asia's Tech and Urban Landscape

Input your search keywords and press Enter.