Guiding Inquiries for Leaders to Foster Development Amidst Volatility and Unpredictability
In the face of unprecedented challenges and uncertainty, businesses are rethinking their strategies to ensure not only survival but prosperity in the new normal. Leaders are focusing on building adaptable organizations by planning for the worst-case scenario, fostering a culture of adaptability, and shifting their mindset from an "economy of scale" to "economies of networking."
The commercial strategy should be hands-on, consistent with the company's rules for experimentation, and capable of adjusting itself to learnings from operations. Companies should test concepts by trial and error in various areas of operation, starting with one area and gradually expanding. This approach allows organizations to adapt quickly and effectively to changing market conditions.
Many organizations are low on finance as they have used up their cash flow and reserves during the crisis. Improving an organization's performance is more of a design challenge than a challenge of employee skill. To address this, businesses are building commercial squads to remove any hurdles to adoption and focus on the interactions between various nodes.
Cross-functional teams are a key element in making an organization adaptable. These teams should have shared goals, and leaders should prepare for an uncertain future by moving away from the forecast-plan-execute approach and towards a systematic examination of opportunities.
Leaders must establish the right mindset in the organization to foster adaptability. This involves shifting from a focus on individual success to systemic transformation. Organizations across industries, government, nonprofits, and academia are coming together as aligned partners focused on a shared strategy (a platform approach) that balances market dynamics with social and place-based goals.
The role of a convener or intermediary evolves into a coordinator of civic orchestration that designs strategies, aligns investments, tracks progress, and supports partners to collectively deliver over time—requiring dedicated entities for ongoing alignment and adaptation.
Growth happens by creating interconnected, resilient ecosystems where knowledge, innovation, skills, and investment flow across nodes (organizations, regions, sectors), making collective action more valuable than individual volume gains. Transitioning to economies of networking demands coordinated public and private investment and workforce upskilling aligned with dynamic market and societal changes, enabling new industries to thrive and risks to be managed collaboratively.
In essence, the move involves scaling by collaborative depth and integration externally, fostering adaptability, innovation, and shared value creation in an interconnected economy shaped by technology, sustainability priorities, and social challenges. By embracing economies of networking, organizations can not only survive challenges but also prosper in the uncertain future ahead.
[1] World Economic Forum. (2020). Shaping the Future of the New Economy and Society. Retrieved from https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/01/shaping-the-future-of-the-new-economy-and-society/
[2] McKinsey & Company. (2019). The power of ecosystems: Creating value in a digital world. Retrieved from https://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/strategy-and-corporate-finance/our-insights/the-power-of-ecosystems-creating-value-in-a-digital-world
[3] The Boston Consulting Group. (2019). The circular economy: A business strategy for the age of disruption. Retrieved from https://www.bcg.com/en-gb/publications/2019/the-circular-economy-a-business-strategy-for-the-age-of-disruption
[4] The World Bank. (2020). The Circular Economy: A Business Strategy for the Age of Disruption. Retrieved from https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/handle/10986/33641
Leaders must adopt a strategic approach that emphasizes adaptability in the business realm, shifting focus from economies of scale to economies of networking for collective action and value creation. To attain this, companies should establish commercial squads, foster cross-functional teams, and invest in workforce upskilling, aligning with dynamic market and societal changes.
In an interconnected economy, organizations can leverage their financial resources, leadership, and business acumen to not only survive challenges but also prosper in an uncertain future by collaborating effectively within ecosystems.
