What are Mechanisms

Discrete mechanisms

helping organizations improve

value delivery and resilience

for navigating the unforeseeable

to thrive in a rapidly changing world.

The mechanisms in Mechanisms for Resilience, are systems of parts working together to help organizations improve. They can be combined and recombined to balance the context, desired nature and pace of improvement, over time. The vectors of improvement are value delivery, in terms of the organization’s currencies of value, and resilience, intrinsic toughness, elasticity and the ability to recover quickly from disruptive forces. Improved value delivery and resilience enables the organization to navigate unforeseeable opportunities and risks, thereby allowing it to thrive in, and even drive, a rapidly changing world.

Each mechanism is discrete, tangible, measurable, and actionable, and it is therefore the mechanisms that help, simplifying implementation by directly linking action with outcome. Being tangible, mechanisms are free from the challenges associated with esoteric approaches. Organizations can self-serve or make the tactical choice to enlist support from those experienced at implementing the Mechanisms, but such a tactic is independent of the strategic decision to use these Mechanisms.

Being discrete, the Mechanisms enable and encourage combining only the needed Mechanisms. There is no need to implement all of them, not even each in its entirety. Each Mechanism addresses a specific aspect of improvement to a specific degree, and should only be used when that specific improvement will make a difference and only implemented to the extent to which improvement is needed without encountering diminishing returns.

Organizations are the primary target because that is the level at which the Mechanisms are best applied. However, the Mechanisms can equally be employed by individuals, teams, departments within organizations, and even enterprises (organization of organizations). The underlying principles and building blocks, those parts working together, remain the same.

Each Mechanism is designed to help the organization improve so that it is better today than it was yesterday, and better tomorrow than it is today. Improvement is reflective and therefore future agnostic. No matter what tomorrow holds, the ability to improve will ensure a better footing for the next tomorrow.

To function well, each system must be tuned or optimized for a specific outcome. Mechanisms for Resilience are optimized for improving value delivery and resilience. Value can be realized along any number of currencies and some currencies, such as generating sufficient revenue, are shared by most organizations. Other currencies might be organization or even point-in-time specific. Resilience is likely to manifest differently in each organization, but the outcome is always the same. When faced with disruptive forces, the organization should have sufficient elasticity to absorb the disruptive force and enough toughness to recover quickly. The mechanisms are intrinsically geared towards resilience, ideal for navigating the unforeseeable.

Every organization with even a modest level of survivability has enough skills to navigate the foreseeable and manage what it can control. The Mechanisms’ intent is to equip the organization to thrive while navigating the unforeseeable in a rapidly changing world. To the extent where the organization drives and accelerates change, setting itself apart from others.