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Summary
This episode was originally recorded during the COVID-19 pandemic, when organisations around the world were forced to rethink how they worked almost overnight. While the immediate context has changed, the underlying challenge has not. Today, businesses face disruption from artificial intelligence, geopolitical uncertainty, changing customer expectations, economic volatility and emerging technologies. The question remains the same: how do we stay relevant when the world changes faster than we expected?
In this opening episode of Staying Relevant, I explore why disruption is ultimately a leadership challenge rather than simply an operational one. More importantly, I share four practical approaches leaders can use to innovate, adapt and build organisations that are better prepared—not just for the next crisis, but for a future of continuous change.
Why this matters
Many of us think of crises as unusual events that interrupt normal life. But increasingly, disruption is the new normal. Whether it’s a global pandemic, rapid advances in AI, supply chain disruptions, geopolitical tensions or changing customer expectations, leaders are being asked to make decisions in environments where certainty is in short supply.
The organisations that thrive are rarely those with the perfect strategy. They’re the ones that learn, adapt and make sense of changing conditions faster than everyone else. Staying relevant isn’t about predicting the future. It’s about developing the capacity to respond thoughtfully when the future refuses to follow the plan.
Big Idea
A crisis doesn’t create the need for innovation—it simply reveals whether we’ve been building organisations that can adapt all along.
The leaders who emerge stronger aren’t necessarily those with the best answers. They’re the ones who help people make sense of uncertainty, align around a shared purpose and keep learning as the situation evolves.
In this Episode
In this episode, you’ll explore:
- Why every crisis is also an opportunity to rethink how your organisation creates value.
- How uncertainty exposes the strengths—and weaknesses—of the systems you’ve built.
- Why purpose becomes even more important when people are anxious and overwhelmed.
- How bureaucracy can quietly become the biggest obstacle to innovation.
- Why experimentation often matters more than perfect planning during periods of rapid change.
- Four practical leadership approaches that help organisations remain relevant long after the crisis has passed.
Episode Notes
Staying relevant is no longer optional
When this episode was first recorded, the world was in the middle of the COVID-19 pandemic. Organisations everywhere were scrambling to move entire workforces online, redesign supply chains and discover new ways of serving customers almost overnight.
Looking back, it was an extraordinary period. But it was also a reminder of something much larger.
Disruption never really went away.
Today, the forces may be different. Artificial intelligence is reshaping entire professions. Geopolitical tensions are affecting global trade. Customer expectations continue to evolve. Technology keeps shortening product lifecycles. Entire industries are being reimagined.
The context changes. The leadership challenge doesn’t. The question every leader continues to face is remarkably simple:
How do we remain relevant when the world around us changes faster than our assumptions?
Change doesn’t begin with a crisis
It’s tempting to think that crises force organisations to change. In reality, change is always happening. Customers evolve. Competitors emerge. Technology advances. Regulations shift. Markets mature. People expect different things from work.
A crisis simply accelerates what was already underway. COVID didn’t create remote work. It accelerated it. AI didn’t create the need for continuous learning. It accelerated it. Geopolitical uncertainty didn’t create supply chain resilience. It exposed how much it mattered.
The organisations that adapted quickly during COVID weren’t necessarily more intelligent than everyone else. They had simply developed the capability to learn and adjust faster. That’s what staying relevant really means. It’s less about having the right answers and more about building the capacity to keep discovering them.
Leadership is tested when certainty disappears
When everything feels predictable, leadership often looks straightforward. Plans can be followed. Processes work. Experience provides useful guidance. But uncertainty changes the rules. Suddenly there are no precedents. Information is incomplete. Every decision carries risk. That’s when leadership shifts from managing operations to making sense of ambiguity. People naturally look to leaders for certainty during difficult times. But certainty isn’t always possible.
What leaders can provide is clarity of purpose, thoughtful decision-making and the confidence to keep moving forward despite incomplete information. That may be one of the most important leadership responsibilities during any crisis. Not pretending to know everything. Helping people navigate what nobody yet knows.
Innovation often begins when old assumptions stop working
One of the most fascinating things about crises is how quickly they remove barriers that previously felt immovable.
During COVID, distilleries began producing hand sanitiser instead of alcohol. Fashion companies shifted to manufacturing protective equipment. Engineers used 3D printing to solve urgent shortages of medical supplies. None of these organisations suddenly became innovative. The capability was already there. The crisis simply created permission to question long-held assumptions.
It forced organisations to ask questions they had postponed for years.
- Do we really need to work this way?
- Is this process adding value?
- Are these approval layers necessary?
- Could technology solve this differently?
- What do customers actually need right now?
Innovation often begins with better questions rather than better ideas.
Four approaches for staying relevant
Through observing organisations during periods of disruption, four leadership practices stand out repeatedly.
1. Align people around a shared purpose
During uncertain times, anxiety spreads quickly. People worry about their jobs, their families, the future of the organisation and the decisions being made around them. Without a clear purpose, that nervous energy often becomes fear. With a shared purpose, it becomes momentum.
Purpose gives people something larger than themselves to contribute towards. It helps individuals move beyond protecting their own interests and begin solving collective problems. I’ve often found that crises uncover ideas that would otherwise remain hidden. People who rarely speak up suddenly offer creative solutions. Teams collaborate across functions. Long-standing barriers begin to disappear. Not because circumstances have improved—but because everyone understands what truly matters.
Purpose doesn’t eliminate uncertainty. It gives uncertainty direction.
2. Look at your organisation from the outside in
Many organisations bring in consultants because external perspectives reveal blind spots. Interestingly, crises perform much the same function. They expose weaknesses that everyday success often hides. Processes that once seemed efficient suddenly become bottlenecks. Technology that felt adequate reveals its limitations. Customer journeys develop unexpected friction. Communication gaps become impossible to ignore.
Rather than viewing these discoveries as failures, leaders can see them as valuable information. A crisis forces us to confront reality. And reality is often the best place to begin improving. One useful question to ask is:
If we were designing this organisation from scratch today, would we build it the same way?
The answer is often surprisingly revealing.
3. Challenge familiar ways of working
Success has an interesting side effect. Over time, organisations develop routines that become increasingly difficult to question. Processes multiply. Approvals increase. Decision-making slows. The very systems that once created efficiency gradually become obstacles to adaptation.
During a crisis, many of these barriers disappear almost overnight because they have to. Communication becomes faster. Teams work across functions. Ideas move more freely. Decisions happen closer to where information exists.
The challenge isn’t doing this during a crisis. The challenge is recognising which of those changes should remain long after the crisis ends. Every disruption presents an opportunity to ask:
Which of our old habits are worth keeping—and which are simply familiar?
4. Create a bias towards learning through action
Uncertainty has a habit of encouraging overthinking. Leaders wait for more information. Teams seek perfect solutions. Plans become increasingly detailed. Meanwhile, the environment continues changing. The organisations that adapt fastest rarely have complete certainty. Instead, they develop a bias towards thoughtful experimentation. They run small pilots. They test assumptions. They learn quickly. They adjust.
Rather than asking, “What’s the perfect answer?” they ask, “What’s the smallest experiment that will teach us something useful?” Action becomes a way of learning. This doesn’t mean acting recklessly. It means recognising that, during periods of uncertainty, movement often produces more clarity than analysis alone.
Staying relevant is really about staying adaptable
Perhaps the biggest lesson from COVID wasn’t about remote work or digital transformation. It was about adaptability. The organisations that emerged stronger weren’t necessarily the largest, richest or most established. They were the ones willing to learn faster than circumstances changed. That lesson feels even more relevant today. Because disruption hasn’t ended. If anything, it’s accelerating.
The future will continue to surprise us in ways we can’t predict. Our competitive advantage won’t come from trying to predict every change. It will come from building individuals, teams and organisations that know how to respond thoughtfully when change inevitably arrives.
Staying relevant isn’t a destination. It’s an ongoing practice of learning, adapting and continually making better sense of the world around us.
Key Takeaways
- Every crisis reveals opportunities that routine often hides.
- Purpose helps people move from fear towards meaningful action.
- Disruption exposes the strengths and weaknesses of the systems we’ve built.
- Organisations stay relevant by learning faster than their environment changes.
- Innovation begins when we’re willing to question assumptions we’ve stopped noticing.
Reflection Questions
- When was the last time a period of uncertainty forced you to rethink an assumption you had taken for granted?
- Which processes or routines in your work exist because they’re effective—and which exist simply because they’ve always been done that way?
- If you were starting your organisation from scratch today, what would you design differently?
- How does your team respond to uncertainty: with experimentation or with hesitation?
- What shared purpose could help your team channel anxiety into constructive action?
Putting It Into Practice
Over the coming week, try one or two of these small experiments:
- Identify one process in your work that feels unnecessarily complex and ask, “If we were designing this today, would we do it this way?”
- Notice where you’re waiting for certainty before acting. What’s one small experiment you could run instead?
- Have a conversation with your team about the purpose behind your current priorities—not just the tasks themselves.
- Reflect on a recent disruption and ask yourself what it revealed about your organisation that normal operations had been hiding.
- At the end of the week, write down one assumption that has changed because of something you’ve learned.
Transcript
Read the Full Transcript
Episode 1 – Staying Relevant in Times of Crisis
I’m excited to bring you the very first episode of this podcast.
Why is staying relevant so important? And what does it mean for business leaders, especially during times of crisis?
The COVID-19 pandemic offered a powerful reminder of the kind of world we live in. Many organisations had already begun adopting digital tools and new ways of working, but the pandemic forced companies to transform almost overnight. Businesses that weren’t prepared struggled significantly, while others adapted quickly and continued operating with employees working remotely.
Technology certainly played a role, but the real difference lay in leadership. Organisations that responded well were led by people who were able to rethink their operating models, make decisions quickly and help their teams navigate uncertainty.
Later in this episode, I’ll share four practical approaches that can help you innovate your way through a crisis.
COVID-19 became a real test of leadership. While leaders had to keep their people safe, connected and productive, they also had another responsibility: finding opportunity within disruption.
I believe every crisis creates conditions for innovation.
We’ve already seen examples around the world. Distilleries shifted production to manufacture hand sanitiser. Engineering companies used 3D printing to produce urgently needed ventilator components. Fashion manufacturers began producing protective equipment for healthcare workers.
When we look back, I believe we’ll recognise this period as one that accelerated innovation across industries—from healthcare and manufacturing to education, collaboration and service delivery.
If you think the world simply returns to the way it was before, I believe that’s unlikely.
Once customers, employees and organisations experience a different way of working, many of those changes become permanent.
The actions leaders take during a crisis shape how their organisations perform long after the crisis has passed.
A company’s reputation is also built—or damaged—during difficult times.
Businesses that support their customers, employees and communities earn trust that lasts beyond the immediate crisis. Those that fail to respond responsibly often find rebuilding that trust much harder.
Ultimately, how an organisation responds to disruption depends on how its leaders interpret the situation. Do they see only problems, or do they also recognise opportunities?
So, how has your organisation adapted? What are you doing to remain relevant?
Let’s explore four practical approaches.
1. Align Around a Purpose
One of leadership’s biggest challenges is creating alignment around a shared purpose.
During a crisis, uncertainty increases and so does anxiety. Leaders who can channel that energy towards a meaningful goal create momentum instead of fear.
People often contribute ideas during difficult times that they may never have voiced otherwise. A clear purpose helps teams move beyond uncertainty and focus on solving problems together.
Purpose matters during a crisis—but it remains equally valuable long after the crisis has ended.
2. See Systems from the Outside In
Organisations often hire external consultants because fresh perspectives reveal opportunities that insiders no longer notice.
Interestingly, crises can serve the same purpose.
They expose weaknesses, outdated processes and hidden vulnerabilities that everyday operations often conceal.
This is an opportunity to step back and ask whether your systems truly serve your customers and your organisation as effectively as they could.
3. Shake Up the Organisation
Over time, organisations naturally develop routines and processes that make them efficient.
Unfortunately, those same routines can also make them resistant to change.
Crises remove many of these barriers. Decision-making speeds up. Communication improves. New ideas emerge more easily.
As a leader, ask yourself whether you’re still relying on familiar ways of working simply because they’re comfortable.
The best ideas often come when communication flows freely across teams rather than being restricted by hierarchy.
4. Create a Bias for Action
Uncertainty can easily lead to hesitation.
Leaders may delay decisions while searching for perfect information.
But crises demand learning through action.
Rather than trying to predict every outcome, experiment. Test ideas quickly. Learn from what works—and what doesn’t.
This willingness to act, learn and adapt is what ultimately drives innovation.
So, to summarise, the four approaches are:
- Align around a purpose.
- See systems from the outside in.
- Shake up the organisation.
- Create a bias for action.
Every crisis presents an opportunity to learn, innovate and grow.
We may not know how long uncertainty will last, but if we choose to treat disruption as an opportunity to experiment, learn and adapt, we’ll emerge stronger, wiser and better prepared for whatever comes next.
That’s all for today’s episode.
A Thought to Leave You With
The circumstances that challenge us will continue to change. Today’s disruption may be artificial intelligence. Tomorrow it may be something entirely different. But the deeper question remains the same: Will we cling to familiar ways of thinking, or will we learn to adapt? Staying relevant isn’t about keeping up with change—it’s about becoming someone who can continue learning, no matter what the future brings.
