Utilizing Scenario Planning Within the SMEACS Framework

Security planning has always suffered from one fatal weakness and that is assuming tomorrow will cooperate. Scenario planning exists to fix that, not by predicting the future, but by preventing surprises from becoming full-blown disasters.

SMEACS (Situation, Mission, Execution, Administration, Command & Control, Communications) is built on clarity, sequence, and responsibility. It works because it forces planners to define reality in order rather than hiding behind abstractions. But its value increases when organizations test the framework against possible futures rather than a single imagined one.

For Security Personnel, this matters even more. Big agencies can afford failure, bury it in committees, and fund recovery later. Small businesses can’t. Their margins are too thin, their reputations too fragile, and their liabilities too personal. The question for Security is not if disruption will strike, but which one you failed to imagine.

The Situation statement is where most plans quietly break. Traditional planning lists conditions as they currently exist, like staffing, landscaping, perimeter, threats, or hazards. Scenario-informed planning adds the obvious follow-up: “What shifts here when incentives change?”

Human behaviour provides most of the answers. Data on crime patterns repeatedly shows that offenders gravitate toward targets offering concealment, weak supervision, low friction, and predictable routines. When planners identify how those incentives express themselves visually, as in masked juveniles clustering in shadows, after-hours testing of doors, loitering bubbles forming where sightlines die, that becomes the baseline for planning that actually deters.

A scenario-ready Situation brief includes likely shifts -

• Higher trespass around holidays when ambient security and guardianship drops.

• Opportunistic theft where service counters, lighting, or seating invite concealment.

• Routine breakdowns when multiple small failures overlap.

  
  

A mission that survives only calm weather is not a mission. It’s a gamble. The objective must hold true in every scenario, and that usually means anchoring missions to deterrence principles rather than good intentions.

A resilient mission for any security plan looks like this:

Preserve visibility, ownership, early interruption, and communications integrity, no matter how loud the environment becomes.

Offenders must see supervision before they see weakness. Crowds must see direction before they see confusion. Control must be physical before it becomes administrative. Security win when their mission statements are simple and impossible to misunderstand.

Execution detail is where innovation breathes. Modern CPTED upgrades environmental design from passive to intelligent:

• Forward-placed service counters collapse loitering bubbles by increasing witnesses.

• Smart lighting grids eliminate concealment zones rather than decorating them.

• Impact-resistant glazing and fail-safe bollards stop ram-raid incentives without adding hostility.

• Sensor-assisted perimeters (thermal, LiDAR, acoustic, pressure laminate) transform doors, glass, and fences into information assets rather than convenient liabilities.

  
  

These measures work because they build friction against misconduct early, where failure costs pennies instead of press releases.

Administration under scenario planning means organising people and resources before disruption demands it.

Security should assume staffing and assets must solve three problems:

1. Escalation: when disorder spreads because friction was low.

2. Displacement: when misconduct moves somewhere easier.

3. Convergence: when several minor issues become one big failure.

   
   

Forward planning ensures logistics are pre-solved:

• Minimum safe staffing levels per scenario.

• Asset allocation that removes ambiguity fastest.

• Contingency paths that deter without theatrics.

  
  

Command and communication integrity aren’t bureaucratic niceties, they are choke points.

In scenarios, they fail first under stress. Scenario rehearsing identifies those weak links early, so routing discipline remains intact.

Two rules make communications impactful:

• Centralize decisions, decentralize eyes.

• Communicate actions early, explain them rarely.

  
  

Surveillance without interruption is voyeurism. Barriers without clear communications are stage props. Scenario-ready SMEACS gives small organisations a fighting chance, not by making the future predictable, but by making failure avoidable.

Small organizations that imagine only one future spend the rest of their time apologising. Organisations that modelled enough futures stop apologising entirely.

Preparedness beats prediction. Order beats ambiguity. Early friction beats late tragedy. That’s not philosophy, that’s operational math. And math in my experience always wins. From the author.

The opinions and statements are those of Sam Wilks and do not necessarily represent whom Sam Consults or contracts to. Sam Wilks is a skilled and experienced Security and Risk Consultant with 3 decades of expertise in the fields of Real estate, Security, and the hospitality/gaming industry. Sam has trained over 1,000 entry level security personnel, taught defensive tactics, weapons training and handcuffs to policing personnel and the public. His knowledge and practical experience have made him a valuable asset to many organisations looking to enhance their security measures and provide a safe and secure environment for their clients and staff.