Every big company says it wants to be “future-ready.” And yet half of them are still running on systems older than most interns and praying Janet from IT doesn’t retire before she finishes the 97-slide PowerPoint called “Welcome to Microsoft Teams (Please Don’t Touch Anything).”
Because what most organisations actually need isn’t another transformation initiative or a brainstorming session involving Post-its, lukewarm muffins, and the faint sound of collective despair – they need to practice organisational reinvention: learning how to stay commercially and operationally sustainable in a world that’s gone full VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, and Ambiguous).
Even the biggest names are saying it out loud:
- Anglo American, in its 2024 Annual Report, admits, “We are in the midst of a major transformation … to create a far more resilient and valuable business.”
(Anglo American 2024 Annual Report – Chairman’s statement) - Mercedes-Benz Group, in its 2024 Annual Report and Combined Management Report, declared, “We are working flat out to improve the resilience of our business.”
(Mercedes-Benz Annual Report 2024 – Management Commentary) - EY, in its 2024 Value Realised Report, noted that organisations everywhere must “build the resilience to navigate accelerating change.”
(EY Value Realised Report 2024 – Global CEO Insights)
These aren’t marketing lines – they’re distress flares from the bridge. Organisational resilience has replaced growth as the new corporate vanity metric.
As part of my work in reinvention, I leaned heavily on The Chief Reinvention Officer Handbook: How to Thrive in Chaos (here’s a free download of the first few chapters)- a guide to building adaptability instead of merely hoping to survive disruption. Its core message has stayed with me:
“We’re not built to endure change – we’re built to practice it.”
Companies used to last longer than family heirlooms. Now, the average lifespan of an S&P 500 company has dropped from 33 years in 1965 to 17 today, and it’s expected to shrink to just 15 years by 2030. That’s not a business cycle – that’s a corporate half-life. Survival isn’t about heritage anymore; it’s about how fast you can pivot without pulling a hamstring. Peter Drucker, the father of modern management, warned:
“The greatest danger in times of turbulence is not the turbulence itself – it’s to act with yesterday’s logic.”
And yet, somehow, we’ve built entire boardrooms dedicated to doing exactly that. If you ever hear the phrase “It’s how we’ve always done it,” congratulations – you’ve just found the problem. It’s corporate Morse code for “We’ve stopped thinking.”
From Netflix to No-Nonsense
Netflix runs on a principle that would make most compliance teams faint: “Act in Netflix’s best interest.” That’s not a page in the handbook – it’s the handbook’s spine. It gives people permission to make decisions as if they own the company – a terrifying thought in most corporates, where you can’t even expense a pen without three approvals and a blood sample.
At Netflix, someone can spend millions acquiring the rights to a show that might flop, and that’s fine, because some will win. In most companies, that same decision would require:
- a 92-slide PowerPoint deck,
- three months of legal review, and
- a ceremonial blessing from Finance.
Reinvention-ready organisations operate differently. They replace permission with experimentation, fear with accountability, and red tape with trust. They’re practicing leadership reinvention – empowering people to act in the company’s best interest and trusting them enough to mean it.
The Red-Tape Reflex
When leaders cling to the systems that once made them successful, they start building their own iceberg – what the Reinvention Academy call the Titanic Syndrome. It’s the slow, confident belief that what worked before will keep working forever – right up until you’re ankle-deep in freezing water wondering who forgot to spot the iceberg.
I once worked somewhere that required legal sign-off on every single social-media reply.
Every. Single. One.
By the time “Thanks for your feedback 😊” was approved, the internet had already moved on to five new trends and another existential crisis about AI.
Bureaucracy isn’t structure – it’s fear wearing a tie.
A little structure keeps things running; too much turns your company into the business equivalent of a boa constrictor – very organised, but only good at slowly crushing itself. It’s the corporate equivalent of a python that’s just realised it can’t digest its own compliance manual.
This is where breaking bureaucracy becomes survival, not rebellion. Practice makes permanent – and if your organisation keeps practising resistance to change, that’s what it’ll get frighteningly good at.
The Real Cost of Standing Still
Gallup estimates that slow decision-making and low autonomy cost global businesses $8.8 trillion in lost productivity each year – roughly 9% of global GDP. That’s not inefficiency; that’s a global pastime.
Start-ups have their MVPs – Minimum Viable Products.
Big corporates need MVRs – Minimum Viable Risk.
Because right now, the cost of standing still outweighs the cost of motion.
Companies that practise organisational reinvention consistently outperform those that don’t – three times faster revenue growth and five times higher profitability (Reinvention Academy, 2023). The difference isn’t intelligence. It’s that one group moves while the other holds a meeting about whether they should, then schedules a follow-up meeting to discuss why no one had time to move in the first place.
There’s no “best practice” anymore – only next practice.
If you’re still using last year’s logic, congratulations – you’ve just become your own competitor.
Reinvention Before the Plateau
Reinvention requires leaders who can make decisions under uncertainty, not hide behind it. Because if you wait for certainty, you’re already too late.
Momentum has a half-life.
If you stall long enough, that’s the end of you.
Formula 1 is the perfect metaphor. Those cars do 300 km/h – one stall, and the pack swallows you whole. By the time you’ve restarted the engine, the tyres are cold, the rhythm’s gone, and your pit crew are making that “we told you so” face. Meanwhile, your competitors are already halfway round the track, waving as they pass your “strategic review.”
Businesses are the same. Once you lose motion, you lose confidence – and confidence is the fuel of organisational resilience.
Most red tape exists to prove control.
But reinvention isn’t about proving; it’s about choosing.
- Choosing motion over maintenance.
- Learning over perfection.
- Progress over permission.
If your team feels the drag of organisational change fatigue, that’s not a sign to stop – it’s the signal to reinvent.
Frameworks or Straightjackets?
I love a good framework. I build them, teach them, and occasionally whisper them to myself at night. But structure should be a skeleton, not a straitjacket. Because when the meeting to discuss the meeting becomes a recurring calendar invite, you’ve officially mummified the organisation.
Alignment isn’t about everyone doing the same thing; it’s about everyone rowing in the same direction – and occasionally agreeing not to hit each other with the oars.
Reinvention isn’t a rescue mission; it’s a reflex. The organisations that keep practising movement when things are calm are the ones that don’t panic when things go sideways. That’s leadership reinvention in action – leaders building capacity, not control.
Your Audit of Red Tape
If you really want to know how much bureaucracy you’re dealing with, start with your onboarding process. It’s where creativity goes to die – buried under policy documents, compliance slides, and twelve-factor password requirements that would confuse the Pentagon.
Give people what they need to get going, then get out of their way. If they break something, great – at least they’re moving.
Audit your bureaucracy like your finances: line by line, looking for waste.
Because if you wouldn’t burn money that way, why burn momentum?
The Reinvention Curve
Every organisation rides the same curve: momentum → plateau → decline.
The trick is to reinvent before the plateau.
Picture it: a smooth rise of energy and creativity – until bureaucracy starts to thicken around it like glue. Reinvention happens when you lighten the load before the flattening point.
Leadership isn’t about control; it’s about capacity. The goal isn’t perfection – it’s movement.
Because the moment you stop evolving, the market starts planning your memorial service.
Before Your Next Strategy Meeting, Ask Yourself
- What decisions am I personally slowing down?
- Where am I protecting process instead of progress?
- When did my team last experiment without a safety net?
Where to Start the Shift
If you want your organisation to thrive in chaos, stop waiting for certainty.
Start practising change before you need it.
Begin with a Titanic Diagnostic – find your friction points, measure adaptability, and define your Minimum Viable Risk. Because as I learned through the Reinvention Academy, we were never built to survive disruption – we were built to practice it.
Organisational reinvention isn’t just survival – it’s a system for sustainable growth.
The organisations that practise it don’t just weather change; they harness it.
Reinvention isn’t about keeping up with change – it’s about creating it.
The smart ones keep driving; the rest are still arguing over who gets to hold the map.
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