LEADERSHIP LESSONS
insights
LIFESCIENCELEADER.COM NOVEMBER 2014
50
MAKING YOUR COMPANY ANTI-FRAGILE
What we need to do is make our compa-
nies "anti-fragile." No, this is not just a
new word for robust; Nassim Taleb pub-
lished a seminal book on the subject in
November 2012.
The difference between anti-fragile
and robust is that the robust (e.g., com-
pany) is just waiting for a big enough
wave to overpower it, since you can
never be sure you are robust enough. In
contrast, the anti-fragile gets stronger
with every wave, stress, and shock. To a
very large extent, I'm anti-fragile; I get
stronger by exercising. So, how should
you do the same for your company?
First, you probably need to do a fragil-
ity audit. Remember that, frequently,
the more efficient your systems, the
more fragile they are. Then, consider
mechanisms for enhancing anti-fragil-
ity within your governance, strategy,
people/culture, processes/operations,
technology, supply chain, and other key
dimensions of your organization.
Making each of these dimensions anti-
fragile is potentially a real challenge,
since you often need to borrow from
existing good approaches while steer-
ing clear of a lot of bad management
doctrine peddled by consultants and
the business schools.
Anti-fragility is about learning, devel-
opment, and growth — not about the
corporation forgetting to think or suf-
fering from bad governance, as so often
happens in large organizations. The
world is a dangerous place, and it's time
to take stock.
L
ll leaders know there's a
lot to be said for the old
adage, "Good judgment
comes from experience,
but experience comes from bad judg-
ment." Conventional wisdom says it's
not strictly true, of course. You don't
have to have gotten something wrong
for the world to deliver you — and your
company — a crushing blow. It just
takes overlooking the possibility, how-
ever slight, that something may hap-
pen that could impact your company.
What is worse is that we now live in
a world of rare, hard-to-predict events
of monumental consequences, such as
the financial crisis. Such events are
almost ignored by our conventional
risk analyses, since these don't account
for everything you cannot conceive of.
When chaos happens these days, it's
often a new type of chaos. And it's
happening with increasing frequency,
diversity, and impact.
So, what to do? Doing nothing is not
an option. Shareholders and stake-
holders rightly expect more, or at
least hold leaders accountable when
the unpredictable happens. Not every-
one gets a second chance anymore. A
reasonable start is to look at the fail-
ures of others, but that alone is far
from enough.
A
Professor Tony Bendell is an MD and Lead
Trainer at the Anti-Fragility Academy. His book
Building Anti-Fragile Organisations was published
in June 2014 by Gower. He can be contacted at:
tony@theanti-fragilityacademy.co.uk
Am I
Learning
from the
Failure
of Others?
T O N Y B E N D E L L
www.theanti-fragilityacademy.com
AM
I
LEARNING
FROM
THE
FAILURE
OF
OTHERS?
By
T.
Bendell