ENVIRONMENTAL SCANNING

Scanning is generally defined as acquiring information. In the context of organizational planning environmental scanning involves monitoring changes and developments in the environment that have potential impact on the organization. It is essential for formulating plans. According to Azhar Kazmi '' The process by which organizations monitor their relevant environment to identify opportunities and threats affecting their business is known as environmental scanning.

In essence, environmental scanning is the process of actively monitoring the environment through activities like such as observation and reading. Extensive environmental scanning is likely to reveal issues and concerns that could affect an organization's current or planned activities. Research has shown that companies with advanced environmental scanning systems increased their profits and revenue growth.

The task of environment scanning is normally given to executive management, although managers from all levels may be involved in this activity. Through scanning broad strategies, long term policies, plans of actions, and operating programs are formulated.

Environmental scanning is absolutely necessary for strategy formulation. As the environment is complex environmental scanning should be cautiously dealt. Various authors have mentioned the methods and techniques for environmental scanning variously. Jain(1981) has proposed following scanning methods:

1. Extrapolation Methods
2. Historical Analogy
3. Intuitive Reasoning
4. Scenario Building
5. Cross Impact Matrices
6. Morphological analysis
7. Network Methods
8. Missing Link Approach
9. Model Building
10. Delphi Techniques