Building Resilient Organizations through Change, Chance, and Complexity

215 Pages·2022·17.033 MB·English

by  David Lindstedt

Building Resilient Organizations
through Change, Chance, and
Complexity
A must- read in the wake of COVID- 19, this book unpacks the nature of
resilient organizations and how they prepare for unpredictable, complex,
and profound change.
Organizations that do not adapt and evolve die. To date, however, it
has not been at all clear how to build a resilient organization. That puts
us all in the unenviable position of trying to ready our organizations for
an increasingly uncertain future without the proper guidance to do it.
This book introduces 14 elements of resilience that consistently emerge in
organizations that have thrived amid adversity and volatility. Resilience
is not about determination, grit, cybersecurity, or teams of resilient indi-
viduals; resilience, it turns out, is often confused with robustness. Readers
will discover how resilient organizations build and employ a distinctive
combination of crews, capital, culture, and leadership—a nd, crucially—
how to adapt these combinations for their own organization.
Senior business leaders, consultants, entrepreneurs, students, and
professionals will appreciate this book’s practical, approachable, and
engaging guidance, including insights by leaders from Health Care for
the Homeless, The Ohio State University, NBCUniversal, retail stores,
and more.
David Lindstedt splits his time between business continuity and resilience
consulting, project portfolio management, and research. He founded his
own company, established an industry standard, leads an international
think tank, and serves on the editorial board for the Journal of Business
Continuity and Emergency Planning. He consults with Fortune 100 and
Fortune 500 companies and nonprofit organizations. He has published
dozens of articles, both general and scholarly. He regularly presents
at continuity and risk management conferences, is a frequent guest on
podcasts, and occasionally lectures in university courses on preparedness
and project management.

Building Resilient
Organizations through
Change, Chance, and
Complexity
David Lindstedt
Cover image: © Getty Images/ Cappan
First published 2023
by Routledge
605 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10158
and by Routledge
4 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN
Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© 2023 David Lindstedt
The right of David Lindstedt to be identified as author of this work has been asserted in
accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised
in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or
hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information
storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks,
and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.
Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data
Names: Lindstedt, David, author.
Title: Building resilient organizations through change, chance, and
complexity / David Lindstedt.
Description: New York, NY: Routledge, 2022. |
Includes bibliographical references and index. |
Identifiers: LCCN 2022002827 | ISBN 9781032280813 (paperback) |
ISBN 9781032280820 (hardback) | ISBN 9781003295242 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Organizational change. | Business planning. |
Diversity in the workplace– Management. | Leadership.
Classification: LCC HD58.8 .L556 2022 |
DDC 658.4/ 063– dc23/ eng/ 20220310
LC record available at https:// lccn.loc.gov/ 2022002827
ISBN: 978-1-032-28082-0 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-032-28081-3 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-003-29524-2 (ebk)
DOI: 10.4324/ 9781003295242
Typeset in Sabon
by Newgen Publishing UK
Contents
Acknowledgments vii
Introduction: Fumbling for Resilience 1
1 An Introduction to Crews 6
2 The Nature of Crews 13
3 Entrepreneurs and Intrapreneurs 24
4 Contrarians and Red Teams 34
5 The Recurrence of Crews 39
6 An Introduction to Capital 44
7 Resource Capital 48
8 Relationship Capital 59
9 Information Capital 68
10 Capital Combined 82
11 Transition to an Interlude 86
12 The Cynefin® Sense- Making Framework 88
13 Antifragile 97
vi Contents
14 An Introduction to a Culture of Experimentation 105
15 A Reality- Seeking Culture 110
16 A Safe- to- Fail Culture of Experimentation 119
17 A Culture of Dissimilar Individuals 129
18 An Introduction to Exponential Leadership 137
19 Situational Leaders 146
20 Purposeful Leaders 153
21 Loss- Aware Leaders 161
22 Empowering Leaders 164
23 Caring Leaders 171
24 Conclusion: The Resilient Organization and the
Chief Resilience Officer 182
25 Epilogue: What Is Organizational Resilience? 195
Index 200
newgenprepdf
Acknowledgments
I would like to express my heartfelt thanks and appreciation to everyone
who lent their time and expertise to the interview process for this
book: Liv Gjestvang, Steve Gutkin, Kevin Lindamood, and Dr. Timothe
Lombardo. My additional and earnest thanks to NBCUniversal for all
their cooperation and help.
Thanks also to Judge Barry Bowline and Richard Warne for sharing
their experiences and thoughts on the impacts of COVID.
Thanks to Marcus Dimbleby for reaching out and advising me on
Red Teams.
Thanks to Dr. Todd Gibbs for our early conversations on the psych-
ology of personal resilience.
Special thanks to Fen Lindstedt who helped with data entry during the
research phase of the book.
Thanks to Stephanie Orr who provided data on physical classroom
management during COVID.
And my best wishes and good luck to “Sidar Kroft” who is indeed
very SMRT.

Introduction
Fumbling for Resilience
Eating mysterious vegetables
Organizations that do not adapt and evolve, die.
To date, however, it has not been at all clear how to build a resilient
organization. Worse than that: It has not been at all clear what constitutes
organizational resilience in the first place. That puts us all in the unenvi-
able position of trying to ready our organizations for an increasingly
volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous (VUCA) world without the
proper guidance to do it. Building a resilient organization requires a size-
able investment of effort, money, and time. If we do not know what
resilience is, organizations will naturally squander resources as they chase
after it. It is very easy to waste finite resources by making investments
that “feel” like the right ones but are not. We know we must “eat our
vegetables” to grow stronger but have no idea which vegetables are the
right ones to eat.
I’ll know it when I see it
Inspiring stories of resilience do not sound like this: “There was a signifi-
cant event, everyone behaved as they normally do, and everything went
back to just the way it was.” Pause for a moment to think of an anecdote,
case study, or example of a resilient organization. How does the story
go? What is the key element of the story that makes the organization
precisely resilient, and not, for example, “efficient,” “forthright,” “pro-
ductive,” or any one of several other descriptors? What is the narrative
of a resilient organization?
This is an extremely important question. In order to understand which
elements help an organization to be resilient, we must have a clear con-
ception of what we are aiming after in the first place.
Actual stories of resilience that serve as examples for emulation go more
like this: “There was a significant event, the organization enacted major
changes, and the transformed organization thrived.” More specifically,
DOI: 10.4324/9781003295242-1