By John Caslione in Business in Society, Economic Analysis at October 6th, 2009
While the news of the increased unemployment isn’t the best for the US (and the world), let’s keep it in perspective and find the “silver lining” in it, albeit it in the future, as there is none at the present moment. As we quoted in Chaotics, “It isn’t that they can’t see the solution. It’s that they can’t see the problem.” Seeing the problem will take a bit more time, so don’t be surprised if unemployment in the US tops 10 percent by the end of 2009 and stays there into 1Q10.
More and more companies will eventually begin to realize that what we’re experiencing is not merely a deep, prolonged recession, but rather a wholesale restructuring of the economy—and moreover, that we’ve entered The Age of Turbulence—which will require new business platforms—Chaotics Platforms—to handle turbulence and minimize or prevent chaos. Once business and government leaders begin to understand what they must do, I’m confident that the unemployment figures will begin to reverse direction.
Also, once transitional unemployment begins to settle down sometime next year—to somewhere around or just above 8 percent, that the US, and the world, economies will be on firmer footing. While the idea of a floor of 8 percent unemployment may be troubling to many, let’s focus on the 92 percent that will be employed on a more solid footing, and be better able to hold up the US economy during turbulence — and even heightened turbulence.
By John Caslione in Business in Society, Business strategies, Chaotic Strategies, Chaotics, Economic Analysis at July 4th, 2009
On the front page of the Financial Times July 2nd, the lead article was titled Signs of global recovery in data . It stated that any euphoria about the encouraging data is muted by serious concerns that any “recovery” will not be sustained.
Moreover, the positive news was more couched in terms of the global financial crisis ending as opposed to than the global recession ending, particularly in Western markets in the US and North America, the UK and Europe, Japan, Australia, etc.
By the end of the day, markets in America had sufferred a crushing blow based on worse than expected employment data. Today’s FT headline: US jobs data scupper lingering optimism over speedy recovery
The Age of Turbulence is in full force. The best businesses will manage accordingly.
By John Caslione in Business strategies, Chaotic Strategies, Climate Change, Economic Analysis, New Normality, Recommendations, Turbulence at May 28th, 2009
I was so pleased to read a brief just released by Economist Intelligence Unit http://www.eiu.com/site_info.asp?info_name=orgagility&page=noads&rf=0. The brief mirrors our own Chaotics formula for success stressing organizational flexibility as key to navigating troubled waters. Organisational agility: how business can survive and thrive in turbulent times examines the challenges and rewards of organisational agility, particularly in tough economic times. Their major findings are:
- Organisational agility is a core differentiator in today’s volatile business environment… 88% of global executives surveyed believe that organisational agility is critical for global business success. One-half of all chief executive officers and chief information officers polled agree that rapid decision-making and execution are not only important, but essential to a company’s competitive standing, particularly in these times of economic uncertainty.
- …Yet most companies admit they are not sufficiently flexible to compete successfully. Although the overwhelming majority of executives view organisational agility as a competitive necessity, actual business readiness is more mixed. More than one-quarter (27%) of respondents say that their organisation is at a competitive disadvantage because it is not agile enough to anticipate fundamental marketplace shifts.
- Internal barriers hamper agile change efforts. More than 80% of survey respondents have undertaken one or more change initiatives in order to improve agility over the past three years, yet 34% say they have failed to deliver the desired benefits. The main obstacles to progress are slow decision-making, conflicting departmental goals and priorities, risk-averse cultures and silo-based information.
- Technology can play an important supporting role in enabling organisations to become more agile. Technology should function as a change agent in the use and adoption of best-in-class knowledge-sharing processes, so companies can improve their use of critical data.
You can download the full report on the EIU website. It is a worthwhile read and reinforces the principles we have outlined in our book.
By John Caslione in Chaotics, Economic Analysis, New Normality at May 18th, 2009
I am amused a bit to read a post on today’s Wall Street Journal Economics Blog http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/ titled, “From Recession to Recovery Five Steps Under Strain.” The post begins with the line “As more economists expect a recovery to begin later this year…”
It reminds me that just as the whole notion of “recession” needs to be redefined, so does the notion of “recovery” need to be redefined.
The post outlines the five major factors that push a recession into a recovery. Yet if you look closely at the five factors, you can see the inherent volatility in each.
Economists and investors will become increasingly frustrated when they finally realize that the long awaited, 5-7 year sustained up cycle won’t materialize — not in 3 months, not in 6 or 12 months — not in the forseeable future.
This is the “new normality”, which investors will have to eventually accept and adjust to if they want to finally move forward with new, fresh investment strategies investing into companies who have also made their own adjustments to the “new normality”.
The sooner investors, business leaders and political leaders realize this, the sooner we will be able to get onto a new track of long term, sustainable prosperity (vs short-sighted, knee-jerk disruptive short term profit taking) driven by investment strategies that factor in turbulence, chaos, risk and uncertainty that will be with us for the foreseeable future in this, The Age of Turbulence.
Loading... 
