Lessons from a Pandemic: Learning from the Future to transform [for the] better
“Organizations don’t just prepare for the future. They make it.”
In times of great uncertainty, accelerated by rapid technological change, growing economic interdependence, mounting political instability and the pandemic, risk analysis and predictive tools reach their limits.
In this increasingly complex context, strategic foresight – the capacity to sense, shape, and adapt to what happens – offers a way forward ; helping disoriented leaders [who can not only draw on experience anymore] envision the future and make better decisions.
To formulate an efficient strategy, we must design a process of constant exploration and fil the gap between today’s actions and tomorrow’s thoughts. Good judgment and scenario planning become the outcome of experience, analogies and decompartmentalization – reasserting the value of mad skills, diversity and inclusion.
Moments of uncertainty also hold great entrepreneurial potential.
As Wack once wrote for HBR, “It is precisely in these contexts – not in stable times – that the real opportunities lie to gain competitive advantage.” The imperative is now to disrupt or be disrupted. Yet it takes courage to stand up against the tyranny of the present and invest in imagination. But doubling down on efficiency at the expense of innovation, favoring the present at the expense of the future, would definitely be the wrong strategy.
Thus these days offer leaders, through strategic foresight, a chance for legacy while enabling us to identify opportunities and amplify our ability to seize them. After all, we will be judged not only by what we do today but by how well we chart a course toward tomorrow.
Thus, when unchartered waters ahead, the question is: Who will be the one catching the [next] wave and leading the way?
Picture: Photo de Drew Beamer sur Unsplash