How Do You Know That It’s Working?

The first proof that you’re becoming an anticipant organization is that you’re still alive. For organizations in mid-transition from analog to digital, being able to say that the doors are still open is proof that something is going right. You have not yet been taken out by a nanocrisis. Remember our definition: “a nanocrisis is a predicament or calamity whose origins lie in the dependence of an organization on a digital system, and whose speed and scale preclude immediate mitigation by humans.”

That speed and scale continues to catch even major players unaware. The collapsing U.S. retail sector gives us a sobering example. Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, more than 12,000 physical stores closed amid a social upheaval spawned in large part by the arrival of “online everything.” This disruption—dubbed the retail apocalypse by The Atlantic—continued post- pandemic at a pace not seen since the Great Depression.

Admittedly, organizational life in the post-pivot digital world is risky (even without a global pandemic). Among the strategic responses to the perceived threat of digital disruption, we advise four things for leaders to do.