Please anticipate don’t react to change.

“What is better than dealing with a crisis you might ask?.” How about planning for a crisis or, even better still, anticipating a crisis and being prepared. Let me refer you to two models that I use frequently. They are about change and crisis, performance and timing. They each point out the dangers facing a leader who is late to respond to change.

Crisis Curve (Strategic Analysis and Action (5th edition) © 2002 Pearson Education Canada) plots Strategic Performance (Poor – Good) on one axis and Timing (Early – Late) on the other axis. It makes clear that the later you respond to a needed change the lower your performance will be.

Change Penalties Curve (Fry & Killing, 1988) also plots Performance and Timing. However it points out the late change penalty that will be exacted for those who wait to change until there is a crisis.

Questions you might ask about changes you think are needed include:

• Why is change needed?
• What happens if we don’t change?
• What does success look like?
• Who will or won’t be effective allies in the change?
• Will the change require a “No” to someone or something?
• This is the next in our series of resources you can find on my website. Hopefully, it will resonate with you.
• Are you prepared to pay the penalties in performance? What do you think?