BRYAN'S BLOG

Go Mental on Uncertainty

There is an adage that attack is the best form of defence. I’m very sure it applies when it comes to disruption.

In a past blog of mine, I asked if disruption disturbs or excites you and your colleagues. I also gave you some ammunition so you could budge your colleagues into action if that is what it takes to get them moving. And I promised to give you something, to ensure you are not seen simply as the problem identifier. That something is that attack is the best form of defence. That thinking like a disrupter will mean you can make sense of the potential disruption happening or about to happen in your industry.

Now I have new ways of helping executives think about the risk and opportunities posed by disruption. In my new book Team Think: How Teams Make Great Decisions (currently with the editor!), I explore the use of mental models in decision making. I conclude that a highly effective method for designing strategies in highly uncertain circumstances is through the use of personally developed narratives of the executive team. Narratives based on their mental models of the world.

I meld them together for the team as a whole, to shift mindsets from thinking like a traditional organisation to thinking like disrupters.