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Disruption

What Is the Job To Be Done?

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People do not want a quarter-inch drill, they want a quarter inch hole.

– Theodore Levitt

A best practice for growth leaders and entrepreneurs who want to develop a successful new product or service is to first consider the job to be done.

Most innovators search for significant problems in defined markets, and then they think about possible solutions. This is a proven approach to achieving business growth. Unfortunately, many go about it the wrong way.

Here is the reason why: There is a natural bias to start the innovation process by improving existing products or relying on unproven assumptions without validating them first. This common mistake often results in innovations that buyers do not want or value (borrowing from above quote, this is creating an improved quarter-inch drill even though buyers are happy with their old drill). A dramatically better approach is to search for ways to help buyers improve how they want to do their jobs (for example, creating better quarter-inch holes, faster, cheaper!)

This focus on the “job to be done” is a subtle, but very powerful, shift in mindset for innovators. Moving from an inside-out perspective to an outside-in perspective does not always come naturally to growth leaders or entrepreneurs. Learning how to leverage this concept can accelerate your path to finding Product/Market Fit and company growth.

To understand what motivates people to act, you first must understand what it is they to need to get done. In a strategic planning context, you need to know the why behind the what.

Job To Be Done Theory

The late professor and business book author Clayton Christensen popularized the job-to-be-done (sometimes called JTBD for short) framework. His core theory: “People don’t simply buy products or services, they ‘hire’ them to make progress in specific circumstances.”

If the solution does the job well, buyers will “hire” it again. If it performs poorly, they will “fire” it and look for something else to solve the problem.

Christensen went on to write: “Innovation becomes much more predictable — and far more profitable — when it begins with a deep understanding of the job the customer is trying to get done.”

The implication of this shift in thinking can be profound. Growth leaders should stop focusing on their products and instead study the job that people are trying to do. By making the job, rather than the product or the customer, the focal point of your analysis you can create commercially successful products and achieve predictable growth.

Why Is This Approach So Useful?

Short answer: Because most new products and/or services fail.

Innovation has always been a top priority—and a big frustration—for growth leaders. For example, one McKinsey survey found that 84% of global executives reported that innovation was extremely important to their growth strategies. However, 94% were dissatisfied with their organizations’ innovation performance.

These numbers are staggering. How can this be? With the proliferation of technology, and the resulting ability to use it for generating customer insight data, companies today know more about their customers than ever before. Yet these insights seldom lead to better or more targeted innovations.

The hard truth is that the vast majority of innovations fall far short of ambitions. For many organizations, innovation is still an expensive and painful hit-or-miss exercise. Why? Many sellers are so focused on building customer profiles and trying to correlate vast data with behavior that they neglect to do something more important: simply understand why their customers make the choices they do. To create offerings that people truly want to buy, firms instead should focus on the job the customer is trying to get done.

Adopting this job-to-be-done approach can help improve your odds of success by providing actionable insights that lead to improved product or service offerings.

If you do the research to truly understand the “job” for which customers “hire” a product or service, you can more accurately develop solutions that align with what customers are already trying to accomplish. When you nail this, at a price point that is acceptable, you have a winning solution.

Applying the JTBD Methodology

In practice, the JTBD methodology is an useful refinement for the common approach of looking for a problem to solve. By focusing on the job-to-be-done, innovators can gain a much deeper understanding of all the customer’s needs and determine which are unmet.

It turns out that when customers are executing a job, they have a complex set of metrics in mind that they use to define the successful execution of their job. It is very helpful to capture these metrics (or desired outcomes) in the form of actionable customer need statements. This approach replaces the typical suggestions or satisfaction inputs companies ordinarily capture and use to create new products.

With this approach, the customer’s job to be done is translated into one or more uniquely structured statements that describes how customers measure value. When you think about it, creating a value statement is a perfectly logical first step in a process intended to create valued products and services.

Here is a simple 4-part template to follow: (Written from the buyer’s perspective)

  • When I…(provide context for the buyer’s challenge or problem),
  • But…(details on the barrier or obstacle that gets in their way or prevents success),
  • Help me…(this is the job to be done),
  • So I…(the value buyer will realize from the solution).

For example, using the drill/hole example from earlier, here is a JTBD statement: When I need a quarter inch hole for a project, but I don’t own an expensive professional drill, help me to quickly get a perfectly drilled quarter inch hole, so my project is finished quickly and looks great.

Here’s another example for a Peloton exercise bicycle: When I need an option to workout, but I can’t go to my favorite studio, help me to get a convenient and inspiring indoor workout, so I can feel my best for myself and my family.

A slightly simpler, alternative template:

  • When…(the situation),
  • I want to…(the motivation or forces),
  • So I can…(expected outcome).

Regardless of which template you use, a well-crafted JTBD statement creates clarity around a solution that does not exist today. Ultimately, you might end up with a number of these statements, each detailing a potential “job” your product or service could do. Growth leaders should prioritize them based on those with the highest market demand and largest market gap.

Conclusion

Anyone can build new products. (Well, almost anyone!) Not everyone can build products that solve a real problem and land product-market fit.

To better define the problem you are trying to create a solution for, think about the potential customer’s job to be done. This requires putting the customer hat on and looking at the world through their eyes. The JTBD framework will help you better understand customer behavior, and design better solutions as a result.

While conventional marketing focuses on market demographics or product attributes, JTBD theory goes beyond superficial categories to expose the functional, social, and emotional dimensions that explain why customers make the choices they do.

The JTBD approach reinforces something every growth strategist knows: intent matters. Everyone has reasons for the choices they make—a need to meet, desire to fulfill, objective in mind, some metric of success or completion! Successful products are borne from a deep understanding and solution for that intent.

People do not simply buy products or services; they have a “job” they are trying to get done. Understanding this leads to better innovation of new products and drives company growth.

The painful alternative is to invest time and money building products that nobody wants. You decide which is the better approach…

-Onward

About the author: Kimball Norup is the founder of 1CMO Consulting, a business strategy and growth advisory firm based in Sonoma, California. To read prior articles, or sign up to receive future ones by email, click here.

KISS: The Power of Simplicity in a Complex World

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“Any intelligent fool can make things bigger and more complex. It takes a touch of genius – and a lot of courage – to move in the opposite direction”

—Albert Einstein

There are many benefits to keeping things simple in an increasingly complex world.

Successful growth leaders know that it is a constant battle to fight the evil forces of complexity within their organizations. Complexity is the single greatest execution risk for any growth strategy.

Simple is good. Complexity is bad.

KISS

There is an old and often-quoted acronym, called KISS, which is most often interpreted as: Keep It Simple Stupid.

There are many variations of the KISS phrase, including: “keep it simple, sweetheart”, “keep it simple, silly”, “keep it short and simple”, “keep it simple and straightforward”, “keep it small and simple”, “keep it simple, soldier”, or “keep it simple, sailor”.

No matter which version of KISS you prefer, they all have the same core meaning: Simple is good. Complexity is bad.

The KISS acronym is credited to Kelly Johnson, lead engineer at the Lockheed Skunk Works (creators of the infamous Lockheed U-2 and SR-71 Blackbird spy planes, among many others).

The KISS principle states that most systems work best if they are made simple rather than more complicated. Therefore, simplicity should be a key goal in design, and unnecessary complexity is to be avoided.

A great example of the KISS principle in action is a story of Johnson providing a team of his design engineers a handful of simple mechanics tools, with the challenge that the jet aircraft they were designing must be repairable by an average mechanic, in the field under combat conditions, with only these tools. In this context, “stupid” refers to the relationship between the way things break and the level of sophistication available to repair them.

A great lesson that has application to any field.

Simple is good. Complexity is bad.

Norup’s Complexity Theory

During my career I have interacted with many other leaders – both as colleagues, competitors, partners, advisors, prospects, and clients.

With this first-hand experience, I have concluded that all leaders can be categorized into one of two broad buckets:

  • There are those who constantly seem to make things more difficult and complicated. This usually is not malicious – it is just how they think and operate. I like to call them “Complicators.”
  • And, then there are those who constantly try to simplify things and strive for effectiveness. The “Simplifiers.”

Unfortunately, I have also observed that they exist in a 4:1 ratio. In other words, 80% of leaders are Complicators and only 20% are Simplifiers.

The most effective growth leaders are Simplifiers. They strive to build efficient go-to-market processes, communicate clearly to the market, and build effective teams.

All things being equal, simplicity always wins. It is easier to build, maintain, and scale.

During times of massive uncertainty and crisis, even the strongest and most experienced professionals can get overwhelmed and freeze up. Taking complexity out of the equation enables teams to know what to do, where to start, and who to help.

Complexity makes the path forward much more challenging.

Complexity does not scale.

Simple is good. Complexity is bad.

Where to Start

Growth leaders should tackle complexity within their organization by evaluating the major go-to-market processes within their domain.

A useful model is to literally “follow a lead” all the way through a typical buyer’s journey for your organization. Starting with marketing and lead generation, and then moving to sales enablement, on to sales, and all the way through to your post-sale client success function.

At every step and through every stage, pay attention to extra steps that can cause friction or confusion in the process. Remove variables. Provide decision-making guidelines.

Before layering in any form of complexity. Make sure the simple case is optimized.

This approach of slow is smooth, and smooth is fast is a proven way to accelerate growth while reducing execution risk.

People often worry that making something simpler is, in fact, making it simplistic or dumbing it down. In fact, the opposite is true. As Leonardo Da Vinci so eloquently said, “Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.”

Conclusion

Eliminating complexity is not a one-time event.

In the post-pandemic “new normal” business era, the pace of change is accelerating, not slowing down. This relentless level of innovation and pushing boundaries can easily breed complexity if not constantly monitored.

Successful growth leaders should focus on being simplifiers, dedicating continuous effort to refine, simplify, and optimize processes.

Leader that fit in the Complicators category will find it difficult to stay ahead of sudden changes that are often forced on them by unforeseen economic, environmental, buyer, or competitive forces. The complexity of their organizations becomes an anchor – slowing things down and limiting growth.

Simple is good. Complexity is bad.

-Onward

Goodbye 2020, I Will NOT Miss You!

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“I never lose. I either win or learn.” – Nelson Mandela

For starters, wishing you and your family a very happy New Year.

For me personally this past year was extremely challenging. It was filled with professional and personal heartaches, along with some momentous positives. I will skip the details, but suffice it to say that in my lifetime I have never experienced the amount of stress, uncertainty, and angst that 2020 delivered.

Fortunately, every storm passes and the sun eventually emerges to shine again.

To say that I have gained a lot from 2020 is an understatement. This might sound horrible and insensitive, but in many respects, I am very thankful for the last 12 months. While I would not want to live through it again, I have learned and grown tremendously.

Here are some of the key lessons I learned.

Expect the Unexpected

So often in our personal and professional lives, we are surprised and caught off guard by an unexpected external force. Something we did not anticipate, or even imagine possible.

Whether it is an insensitive comment from a friend, a political move by a co-worker, losing a job, a direct assault on our business from a competitor, or, perhaps, even a global pandemic, the world of work is full of VUCA forces (volatility, uncertainty, complexity, uncertainty). These can cause a wide range of impacts from just “having a bad morning” to seriously jeopardizing your livelihood or the viability of your organization.

The best solution to any problem is always to prevent it from happening in the first place. While predicting unknowns is not always possible, developing a good situational awareness of your environment and marketplace is a great place to start.

You might be surprised, as I was, at how many “clues” you missed by rushing through your daily routine and not paying closer attention.

Developing a better understanding of your surroundings will help to better define possible threats. You can then begin to brainstorm their potential impacts, and your response, should they arise. This type of Scenario Planning is a key aspect of VUCA Strategic Planning, and doing it regularly will help to ensure you and your organization are more resilient against any threats.

External forces are very real. We cannot ignore them. However, we also cannot allow them to consume us.

When they hit us, we have to address them, learn from them, and then focus on moving forward.

Crisis Can Lead to Introspection

Another big lesson from all the VUCA forces that hit me this past year was this: The event does not define us. It is how we choose to respond that counts.

I have seen three common response patterns, and depending on the situation, each of them has merit:

  1. You can decide to hunker down and hide. Sometimes we get lucky and the storm will pass by leaving us unscathed. Unfortunately, for many issues in the world of work, hope is not a strategy, and the issue will still likely be there tomorrow.
  2. You can lash out. With the right strategy, fighting back can sometimes be effective. However, if you get it wrong, things can get messy in a hurry.
  3. Or, you can take it as a learning opportunity and figure out how to move on. Sometimes we have to accept the things we cannot change, and pivot.

There is a lot of value to be gained from detaching yourself (taking a neutral and objective view), reviewing what happened (being honest, not overstating it but also not sugarcoating it). This allows you the time and space to figure out what you could or should have done differently (if anything). Which hopefully will lead to internalizing the lesson (so you do not repeat the same mistake again), and then figuring out the plan to quickly move on.

Another lesson that 2020 taught me was I am often guilty of not taking enough time for introspection. I think it is a common executive ailment – everyone is so stretched for time, moving fast, and always focused on solving problems quickly. This merciless cycle does not afford the time we need to process and learn.

Like many professionals, the pandemic forced me to work from home and prevented any business travel since March. This has given me more time to think, to learn, and to strategize about the future than I have had in the past 20 years. As an added bonus, the time with family and a better work/life balance has been priceless.

Crisis can lead to healthy introspection, if you take the time to do it.

Introspection Leads to Reinvention

By allowing ourselves time for introspection, something magical happens. We not only gain clarity, but also a newfound confidence to revisit and challenge the status quo. I have found that the more profound the external force, the greater the potential opportunity for change.

As evidence, we do not need to look much further than what has happened in the world of work over the past 10 months. The global COVID-19 pandemic caused many organizations to make rapid and far-reaching changes to how they get work done. A few examples of this dynamic workforce and workplace reinvention:

  • As evidenced by the unprecedented spike in US unemployment, almost every organization cut headcount in 2020. While we can debate whether some organizations did not cut enough, and others perhaps cut too far, the reality is millions of jobs are likely not coming back in their prior form. Many of these roles will resurface as more flexible, contingent jobs.
  • Some industries (for example, travel) may never come back to the same pre-pandemic level, while others (for example, home delivery) will reach new highs.
  • In 2020 we proved that almost every white-collar role can effectively be accomplished working from home. Many studies I read actually showed an increase in productivity for these newly remote workers. As the pandemic recedes, it will be interesting to see what organizations decide to do with their remote workforces, and their need for traditional office space.
  • Many highly skilled professionals will take advantage of these radical changes in the workplace and reinvent their careers as experts for hire (like how I am helping some awesome growth minded organizations with my 1CMO Consulting services!), achieving new levels of career satisfaction and work/life balance.
  • The research firm Gartner, predicts that by 2024 only a quarter of workplace meetings will take place in person. The meteoric rise of virtual meetings will have far-reaching impacts. Not only eliminating the need for a lot of corporate real estate, but also changing the dynamic of field sales (and all the things that accompany it like business travel and entertainment!)
  • The Gartner Future of Sales 2025 report predicts that by 2025, 80% of B2B sales interactions between suppliers and buyers will occur in digital channels. In other words, not in person.

These are just a few examples of how organizations, and the individuals who work in them, have been forced to challenge their historical assumptions when confronted by a crisis. The ability to test different approaches, see what sticks, and then quickly pivot, is the winning approach.

Reinvention Leads to New Opportunity

I am looking forward to seeing what the year 2021 has in store.

As we begin slowly emerging from our pandemic-forced hibernation, my prediction is that there will be many new opportunities (both personal and professional) in the upcoming year, visible to those who are paying attention to their surroundings and actively looking for them!

My practice of growth strategy consulting is certain to benefit from a rising optimism in the markets. And I suspect many readers of this article will be able to say the same.

With that, I say one last goodbye to the year 2020. I am very thankful and blessed to have survived intact, but I will NOT miss you.

-Onward

How to Navigate and Win Against VUCA Forces

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“Change is the only constant in life. One’s ability to adapt to those changes will determine your success in life.” – Benjamin Franklin

We live in an increasingly VUCA (volatile, uncertain, complex, ambiguous) world. The winds of change are blowing in every direction, in every region, and across every industry.

At this point, there is only one safe conclusion: Current levels of disruption and unpredictability are likely not going away. Change is the only constant. So how best to move forward? How do you navigate through a VUCA environment and win?

In this challenging business climate, traditional strategic planning frameworks have proven to be distressingly inadequate. The speed and ferocity of the health and economic impacts caused by the pandemic caught many organizations flat-footed, and ill prepared to react quickly.

Faced with this uncertain and disruptive environment, a growing number of business leaders and growth strategists have been inspired to develop VUCA Strategic Plans to guide their organizations forward and better plan for an unknown future.

While VUCA has proven to be a valuable framework to visualize the disruptive environment we now operate in, it is not always easy to apply. This article will present some tactical remedies that business leaders and growth strategists can use to counter each of the VUCA forces.

VUCA Overview

As a quick reminder, the definition of VUCA:

  • Volatility – The tendency for things to change quickly and unpredictably, typically for the worse. These challenges are unexpected or unstable, and may be of unknown duration. However, they are not necessarily hard to understand – knowledge about them is often available. The more volatile the world is, the more change there is and the faster that change occurs.
  • Uncertainty – Situations where there is imperfect or unknown information. It applies to predictions of future events, to physical measurements, or to the unknown. Despite a lack of other information, we know the disruptive event’s basic cause and effect. Change is possible, but not a given. Uncertainty refers to the extent to which we can confidently predict the future, therefore the more uncertain the world is, the harder it is to predict.
  • Complexity – Refers to the number of factors that we need to take into account, their variety and the relationships between them. The more factors, the greater their variety and the more they are interconnected, the more complex an environment is. Some information is available, or predictable, but the volume or nature of it can be overwhelming to process. The more complex the world is, the harder it is to analyze and come to rational conclusions.
  • Ambiguity – A lack of clarity about how to interpret something. Situations where information is incomplete, contradicting or too inaccurate to draw clear conclusions. More generally, it refers to fuzziness and vagueness in ideas and terminology. The more ambiguous the world is, the harder it is to interpret. The causal relationships are completely unclear. No precedents exist and you often face many “unknown unknowns.”

Tactical Remedies for Each of the VUCA Forces

The VUCA model has great value as a strategic planning tool. By using it as a framework to interpret the current operating environment, business leaders and growth strategists can think creatively about new strategies for the organization, and begin planning for alternative scenarios.

One common question that many leaders ask is how do you counteract each of the four VUCA forces?

Great question, here is how…

We can describe the best VUCA leaders by their vision, understanding, clarity, and adaptability. These four leadership abilities become the opposing force to each element of the VUCA model.

It looks like this:

  • Vision counteracts Volatility
  • Understanding counteracts Uncertainty
  • Clarity counteracts Complexity
  • Adaptability counteracts Ambiguity

The key to managing in a VUCA environment is to break it down into its component parts. Once we identify volatile, uncertain, complex, or ambiguous situations then we can tackle them. Since each type of situation has its own causes and resolutions, so it is best to deal with them one at a time.

In the next sections, we will look at each of these forces.

Counter Volatility with Vision

Vision – You can counteract the first VUCA force (Volatility) with Vision.

In this context, vision is not referring to sight, or the ability to see. It is an acknowledgement that in turbulent times it is very easy to get distracted. Leaders need to rise above volatility by having a clear vision of the future for their organization.

Leaders with a clear long-term vision of where they want their organizations to be can better weather volatile shorter-term environmental changes such as economic downturns or new competition in their markets. Vision helps them see past the immediate chaos.

Some helpful tips:

  • It almost goes without saying, but leaders much acknowledge that change is the only constant. By embracing change, we can find opportunity. Accept and embrace change, and encourage your teams to do the same. Resistance is futile!
  • Begin with the end in mind. The US Army calls this the “Backward Planning Sequence”, where they plan a mission from the end first (actions on the objective) then work backwards, step-by-step, to the beginning of the operation.
  • Build all strategies and plans on the strong foundation of the organization’s Core Ideology (mission, values, purpose). This “true North” approach to navigating an organization is similar to using a compass instead of the map! It provides clarity and helps prevent external chaotic events from pulling them off course, or abandoning their mission.
  • Leaders should always be thinking, and communicating to their teams, from the perspective of the organization’s Envisioned Future (vision, long-term objectives). By painting a compelling picture of the future, and illuminating the path to get there, they will align people and resources, and provide the motivational push to get it done.
  • While long-term objectives should be solid, it is important that leaders allow their teams some flexibility in how they get there. This latitude allows them to react, in real-time, to changing market conditions.

Beat Uncertainty with Understanding

Understanding – You can counteract the second VUCA force (Uncertainty) with Understanding.

To be effective in a chaotic VUCA environment, leaders have to look and listen beyond their functional areas of expertise and span of control. To make sense of the volatility and to lead with vision they need broad Situational Awareness of their operating environment.

By deliberating practicing a “stop, look, and listen” approach, leaders will gain important decision-making information. To do this effectively requires leaders to communicate with all levels of employees in their organization and to develop and demonstrate teamwork and collaboration skills.

Some useful tips:

  1. When building situational awareness, many leaders make the mistake of only paying attention to information sources and opinions that reinforce their own views. This creates a huge risk of missing alternate viewpoints. Instead, leaders need to cast a wide net. They should get different points of view from many sources by engaging directly with their customers and employees to ensure they learn about changes in their markets. The best leaders wander around the office talking to their teams and get out of the building to spend time with clients, prospects and partners in the marketplace.
  2. Once the encounter uncertainty in their operating environment, leaders can gain an overview by evaluating the PESTEL factors: political, economic, social, technological, environmental, and legislative.
  3. With broad situational awareness of their environment and their vision in mind, leaders also need to have an in-depth understanding of their organization’s strengths and weaknesses. The goal should always be to take advantage of rapidly changing circumstances by playing to strengths while minimizing weaknesses.
  4. Leaders should embrace Scenario Planning as a critical part of their strategic planning process. This useful tool helps leaders and their teams to anticipate future threats and begin preparing contingency plans to respond.

React to Complexity with Clarity

Clarity – You can counteract the third VUCA force (Complexity) with Clarity.

We all know that in a VUCA world, chaos comes quickly and hits you hard. Leaders who can react swiftly and tune out the noise will make better decisions.

To gain clarity effectively, leaders need to break problems down to the basics. By learning to simplify challenges down to their root causes, leaders and their teams can then begin to think creatively and make quick decisions on how to respond.

Some useful tips:

  • Make sure that everyone in the organization understands the vision and long-term objectives you are trying to reach. Leaders should communicate the organization’s vision, purpose, and values often. An emergency is not the ideal time to help your team understand the organization’s direction!
  • The best teams are creative and collaborate often. Leaders need to develop this capability across the organization. VUCA situations are usually too complicated for one person to handle on their own. It takes a team.

Overcome Ambiguity with Adaptability

Adaptability – You can counteract the fourth VUCA force (Ambiguity) with Adaptability.

This concept of adaptability applies perfectly to today’s chaotic VUCA environment. I believe those organizations (and leaders) who are best able to adapt to change will grow and thrive. Those who don’t, won’t!

By taking an agile approach, moving swiftly and adapting to circumstances, leaders and their teams can quickly make decisions and execute. This requires many of the skills and abilities discussed above plus a willingness to experiment, iterate, and figure out what works in the face of adversity. This is what I have

Some useful tips:

  • Effective leaders reinforce to their teams that the only way to make progress towards any objective is to take action. This deliberate effort in the face of hostile VUCA forces is not always easy, or pretty. When in doubt, move fast, and get stuff done!
  • Teams need to try hard, fail fast, and learn. Then rinse and repeat. This adaptation to changing market conditions is the key to competing and winning in any market. Leaders can promote agility and adaptability by encouraging their teams to plan, and consider alternative scenarios.
  • In many organizations, long-range plans are often obsolete by the time they are approved and funded. This does not mean the effort was wasted. Leaders should encourage continuous consideration of alternative strategies, that way there is always a plan B, in case the first strategy does not work out.
  • Leaders should encourage their teams to continuously be learning about themselves, the market, and their teammates. They also need the latitude and flexibility to experiment, without fear of making a mistake or failing.

Thriving in Turbulent Times

Many experts agree that VUCA (volatility, uncertainty, complexity, ambiguity) forces are only going to increase in frequency and intensity. However, that does not mean VUCA is a bad thing. It represents the changing environmental conditions most organizations must now operate within, and overcome if they want to be successful.

Since organizations are largely powerless to stop VUCA – leaders and their teams must learn how to live with, and effectively manage, these forces in their market environment. By learning how to counteract each VUCA force – with vision, understanding, clarity, and adaptability – we can thrive in these turbulent times.

-Onward

Dealing with VUCA Forces

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“Expect the unexpected.” – Bear Bryant

We are accelerating into a new and unpredictable VUCA business environment.

The disruptive forces of volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity are playing out across almost every company and industry.

Against this backdrop, VUCA has proven to be a great organizing framework to help strategic leaders think about potential new threats. However, I have noticed that many organizations struggle to identify VUCA threats and translate them into actionable inputs as they are making their strategic plans.

In this article we’ll start to break down the challenge and work towards an approach for dealing with VUCA forces.

What is VUCA?

The United States Army War College was one of the first organizations to embrace the concept of VUCA, after the so-called Cold War ended. Military planners began to worry about the radically different, unstable, and completely unfamiliar international security environment that had emerged. They coined the acronym VUCA to describe it:

  • Volatile – Change that is rapid and unpredictable in its nature and extent. The challenge is unexpected or unstable, and may be of unknown duration. However, it is not necessarily hard to understand; knowledge about it is often available.
  • Uncertain – The present is unclear and the future is uncertain. Despite a lack of other information, the event’s basic cause and effect are known. Change is possible but not a given.
  • Complex – Many different, interconnected factors come into play, with the potential to cause chaos and confusion. The situation has many interconnected parts and variables. Some information is available or predictable, but the volume or nature of it can be overwhelming to process.
  • Ambiguous – There is a lack of clarity or awareness about situations. Causal relationships are completely unclear. No precedents exist; you face “unknown unknowns.”

For simplicity, let’s look at each element in isololation:

  • In a purely volatile (but not uncertain, complex and ambiguous) world, there is a lot of fast, but predictable change. 
  • On the other hand, in a purely uncertain (but not volatile, complex and ambiguous) world, it is hard to tell how things will develop.
  • In a purely complex (but not volatile, uncertain and ambiguous) world, things are hard to untangle and understand.
  • Finally, in a purely ambiguous (but not volatile, uncertain and complex) world, things are just hard to discern at all.

We see proof of these every day.

Unfortunately, out in the wild these dark forces do not typically present themselves in isolation. Rather, they can come at undesirable times, and in a variety of combinations and sequences. All of which makes the job of leaders infinitely more challenging.

Why is Understanding VUCA So Important?

While its origins lie in military planning, the concept of VUCA transfers perfectly to the world of business. Especially now.

Many experts predict that volatility, uncertainty, complexity, and ambiguity are going to become even more prevalent in the future. To manage teams and create strategic plans for organizations in this “new normal” era of disruption, leaders need to be aware of the changes that this kind of environment can cause.

The turbulent and unpredictable VUCA forces of change will affect all organizations, at all levels. This type of environment poses many threats to an organization, including:

  • Overwhelming your team and making them anxious or nervous about the future.
  • Sapping their energy and motivation to take action.
  • Throwing uncertainty into their career paths.
  • Causing skills to become obsolete and forcing constant retraining.
  • Consuming large amounts of time and resources to understand and combat.
  • Increasing the complexity of making decisions, and the chances of making mistakes.
  • Slowing down the decision-making process.
  • Causing short-term thinking, and knee-jerk reactions.
  • Jeopardizing strategic long-term projects, developments and innovation.

As a result, we need to develop new skills, practice new behaviors, and take better approaches to manage the threat. If this environment affects your industry or organization, you have to reconsider the way you and your business plan and execute.

This is the value of the VUCA Strategic Planning Methodology.

Benefits of Embracing VUCA

Every leader, and every organization, has a basic choice when it comes to VUCA.

You can either allow VUCA forces to “own” you – running the risk of overloading and overwhelming your organization. Or, you can accept and manage it – working vigilantly with your team to plan for and mitigate its effects.

Ironically, if you decide to accept VUCA, you also start to gain immunity to its impact…

When you accept VUCA as something that is not going away, you also make yourself and your people less vulnerable, and you empower everyone to deal better with uncontrollable, unpredictable forces. You are shifting from a reactive to a proactive approach. Practicing forward-looking strategy instead of backward-looking tactics.

VUCA is definitely a challenge for leaders, and presents an opportunity to develop and improve leadership and management skills. It is also an opportunity for individuals and teams to up their game and become more effective.

A Playbook for Managing in a VUCA World

How do you effectively manage teams and organizations with these VUCA forces?

  • The accelerating rate of change (volatility)
  • The lack of predictability (uncertainty)
  • The interconnectedness of cause-and-effect forces (complexity)
  • And the strong potential for misreads (ambiguity).

If we embrace and think about each of these disruptive forces we can begin to develop a playbook for managing and leading in a VUCA world. As we contemplate strategic approaches to combat each VUCA element, a strategic approach begins to emerge.

  1. We can counter volatility with vision. Creating a compelling vision, values, and purpose for your organization.
  2. We can meet uncertainty with understanding. Greater situational awareness, understanding what your competitors and the market are doing.
  3. We can react to complexity with clarity. Clearly structured teams and effective communication from leaders on the strategy and objectives.
  4. We can fight ambiguity with adaptability. An agile approach to developing a strategic plan and execution.

The next article will go deeper into this approach and explore each element in greater detail.

-Onward