Over the last decade, a complex web of economic, social, political, and environmental crises has challenged the conventional laws of organizational physics, calling into question our relentless pursuit of operational efficiency. As a result, many leaders who spent their careers operating and investing in relative stability were caught off-guard, and many enterprises may not have survived the Great Recession or the Covid-19 pandemic without massive government support.
Building Resilience into Your Family Business
Perhaps the most resilient family business are those that understand the existential need for sustained investment in organizational agility, even at the expense of efficiency and profitability. Their unique approach to managing risk provides an innovative playbook for leaders everywhere, as we enter an uncertain future. Many of these families have operated for decades and even centuries in emerging and frontier markets, where uncertainty is the rule rather than the exception. In these more volatile environments, threats to property and security are more pervasive, access to capital more limited, corruption more rampant, supply chains more fragile, planning horizons much shorter, and talent harder to find. This article addresses how enterprising families everywhere can learn from these companies to survive and even thrive in the face of these chronically-elevated risks.