All unchange

It’s curious how strategic plans rarely allow for the seismic changes that may profoundly affect an organisation. How many well-considered business plans envisaged sky-high energy prices, equity values that plummeted starkly before nervously beginning a slow revival, public ownership of great financial institutions or swathing cuts in public sector spending?

We lived through an exceptionally long and heady economic cycle and have now had two years to re-think our plans based on our experience of the past and best judgments for the future. We have worked through disruption and discontinuity and are picking our way through a new political and economic landscape.

So how come so many organisations still seem to have no better strategy that cutting costs or ‘keeping our heads down’? Why are short-term considerations still dominating corporate thinking when it’s pretty clear that short-termism played a major role in the events that fractured the markets and undermined the growth forecasts of nearly every western government?

The most common corporate reaction has been to slash and burn: cut costs and preserve the illusion of firm management and short-term profitability. This has been a time to let go of irreplaceable people, stop hiring bright grads, cut back on R&D and can the advertising. Counter-cycle theorists have failed to be heard despite a reasonable weight of evidence in their favour.

For many companies, drastic downsizing may have appeared to be the only choice although it would have been good if the marketers, HR managers, product developers and strategic planners had been given the opportunity to offer creative options to the strident calls for cuts from the finance department and, ironically, the bankers.

Now that most businesses have dealt in one way or another with short-term survival, this could be a good time to reconsider what needs to be done to achieve economic, social and environmental sustainability. This is certainly a great time to think about what makes your people tick and how to make the most of their capacity for growth.

We can wait for outside pressures to change the way we act or we can hope that the taxpayer has enough left spare cash to bail us out after paying his gas bill. Alternatively, we can use this time to drive positive change from within. This could be the time for companies to make the best of their human and physical assets to put themselves in control of change rather than at its mercy.

Not surprisingly, at Change Agency, change is our business. Low overheads, no debt and a wealth of talent have put us in good shape to help public, private and voluntary sector organisations to develop a positive agenda while others are still adjusting their tin helmets in the bunker or waiting for the spending review to do its worst.