Do you possess the three key skills to drive business resilience?

Want to know how to achieve the perfect six-pack, finally lower that golf score, or help your organisation thrive in these unsettled times? While each goal requires different actions, skills, and knowledge, they all share a crucial common factor: resilience. 

Although it’s often seen as a corporate buzzword, resilience has become a top priority for business leaders who are navigating constant disruption. It goes beyond merely maintaining continuity during volatility or change; it involves leveraging uncertainty as a springboard for innovation and competitive advantage. In other words, it’s not about the fact that you ate the chocolate bar or had a rough day on the course – it’s about how you recover from that setback that determines success.  

But resilience isn’t a standalone skill, it comprises a trifecta of virtues that when combined help organisations emerge from any storms better, faster, stronger and be more prepared to face any new challenges head-on.  

Consistency is key 

While not eating for a week might seem a good starting point for that six-pack, the reality is that it takes a combination of the right foods and workouts consistently for months. It’s the same in the corporate world. Building a resilient business takes consistency and perseverance for the long term.  

For example, adopting an Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) strategy is seen by some as a box-ticking exercise. However, savvy channel players are implementing a consistent ESG strategy over 3-, 5- and ten-year periods and using it as a differentiator with customers and prospects, as well as a method of achieving growth, boosting morale, and enhancing community reputation.  

Consequently, it’s not always about the big wins like achieving B Corp status. It’s about consistently achieving marginal gains that drive long-term success. It’s making small improvements, such as car sharing, lights-off policies, and regular local volunteering initiatives, that will have the greatest impact on your ESG credentials and inspire others to get onboard.  

Consistency drives results, and once the results and successes start accumulating, it inspires confidence, not just personally and professionally, but company-wide and reputationally. This confidence should drive courage, which, according to McKinsey is a priority for today’s business leaders and who need to be “courageously pursuing the upside” to drive resilience.  

Dare to be brave 

More than 64 elections are happening this year, including the UK, US, Germany, Russia, Taiwan, and India. Inflation and interest rates are high and seem set to stay that way, and most Western countries are suffering from a cost-of-living crisis. Given this climate, it takes courage to innovate and invest in your organisation.  

While on paper it might make sense to wait, postpone projects and scale back investments, that’s what your competitors are doing. To get the edge, now is the perfect time to think differently and act with courage, a key milestone of resilience.  

McKinsey found in its research on the financial crisis in 2007-08, that the most resilient companies were ones that used innovation to keep moving and made bold decisions to stay ahead of competitors.  

In an outcomes-based market, channel players need to balance pragmatism with proactivity. Gone are the days when VARs stood in the shadows of vendors, and white labelling services was the norm to remain invisible to the end customer. Expectations and the trend for transparency have moved successful channel players front and centre, standing shoulder to shoulder with other organisations in the ecosystem and forming partnerships that drive innovative projects that solve customer problems.   

Authenticity 

Innovation is particularly important in unsettled markets, however, it’s essential not to let this distract your organisation from its core values. Staying true to your brand and being authentic is crucial for building loyalty with new customers, which in turn contributes to business resilience. 

What does your business stand for? What makes you different to your competitors? Why should customers stay loyal to you? By answering these questions, you can get a deeper understanding of your business’s modus operandi. This understanding will help you foster greater customer loyalty and attract new prospects, thereby building greater resilience in times when budgets are tight, supply chains are disrupted, or competition is heightened.  

There will always be external factors that organisations cannot change – elections, inflation, and wind on the golf course. However, it’s the internal factors and decisions that you can control that will help you achieve business resilience and that single-digit handicap.  

Given the challenges the channel has faced over the past five years, it’s likely most businesses are more resilient than they think. Being proactive about certain aspects of your business – staying consistent, being brave and remaining authentic to what the business stands for - will help your organisation be prepared for, and even thrive when, not if, the next big disruption occurs.