Accenture Banking Blog

Imagine it’s a beautiful summer day, and you’re on a boat in the middle of the sea. There’s cargo in the hold, crew working, and passengers milling about. Everything’s nice and calm and you know where you’re going. Suddenly the sun clouds over, the sky turns grey, and the waves get choppy. You’re in the middle of a storm.

Do you turn the ship around? Do you abandon ship and hit the lifeboats? Or do you navigate on—and through—the storm?

These are the choices that face organisations in today’s post-digital world. Will you be the disruptor and build a future business? Or will you be disrupted?

Consider that Accenture research on 10,000 companies found that 71 percent are in, or on the brink of, significant disruption. That means about US$41 trillion of enterprise value exposed to disruption. Now, that study was done before the pandemic. I’m guessing those numbers have gone up in the last few months.

I think the key thing is to recognize that change is continual, both in today’s business but also building a business for the future.

I recently joined Elitsa Nacheva on a recent episode of Talking Agility. In it, we talk about agility in the face of disruption, and how organisations can navigate through the storm.

We also dig into what it takes to make it through the storm. For example, it’s easy in the middle of that storm for the crew to lose confidence or passengers to panic. The captain’s demeanour plays a big role, and during disruption, vision and leadership matter more than ever. Ellie and I also talk about how culture and the mindsets and behaviours that can enable agility.

You can listen to the podcast and read Elitsa’s summary here.

To learn more about being agile in the face of disruption, please contact me here, or @andyyoungACN on Twitter.

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