Written by: Jodi Orgill Brown, MS, CFRE, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
Don't just bounce back when you can get better with Antifragility.
Pandemic and post-pandemic changes and uncertainties have gurus around the world issuing the call to develop resilience.
The claim of resilience is: the ability to return to original form, to respond and recover from illness, adversity, or crisis. In other words, Resilience = To Bounce Back.
But after living through a global health and economic crisis, should our goal really be to return to the way things were? Should we not aim higher? Indeed, I'd go out on a limb and say we'd all benefit if the pandemic helped us grow stronger, get better, and become more adaptable.
Antifragility
But how do you grow stronger, get better, and become more adaptable from crisis? Just take a note from world-renowned mathematician and statistician, Nassim Taleb, and develop antifragility.
Taleb coined the term in 2012 and he says antifragility is a property of systems that increase in their capability to thrive because of stressors, threats, mistakes, and volatility. He suggests that our systems – whether biological, societal, or economic – need to experience stress, disorder, challenge, and uncertainty. Only then can they grow from the experience.
The resilient bounces back to a previous state after hardship; the robust resists shocks to remain the same; but the antifragile grows stronger and learns to thrive.
While the theory sounds great, how do we know if it works?
Measuring Growth
History continues to be a great teacher if we choose to see the lessons. Notice the tree rings in the picture of lumber from 1918 and 2018.
By comparison, there are more rings closer together in the 1918 wood than in the 2018 wood. Trees in 1918 grew in harsh and competitive climates, where they fought for sunlight and water, and were forced to withstand wind, fire, storms, and natural disasters, all of which made them stronger, longer lasting, and more solid. Today trees that are sheltered, farmed on cleared land, and grown in conditions with plenty of light and water, are actually weaker, with fewer rings, a shorter lifespan, and are less sturdy than their century-old counterparts.
Why?
Time, experimentation, and science have now proven that crisis, hardship, competition, and challenge grow stronger trees. The same can be true with people.
Survival of the fittest used to be the true struggle for existence, wherein only the strong survived. As life became easier, through automation and technology, we expanded mortality rates and life expectancy, giving all of humanity a greater chance at survival. But have we gone too far? As if they were mail packages, we now bubble-wrap people to make sure they arrive to every scenario safely, on-time, and with no complications. While bubble wrap increases the survivability of the fragile, it cannot cushion crushed egos when individuals and companies fail from crises, mistakes, disorder, or volatility.
Personal and Professional Antifragility
The only real way to increase our capability to thrive is to experience, and choose to grow from, the stressors, changes, and challenges of life. I learned this in a personal and profound way when I was diagnosed with a brain tumor between the end of my right auditory canal and brainstem. After three craniotomies, a cerebrospinal fluid leak, facial paralysis, and 35 days in and out of neuro-critical care, I was a changed person ‒ weaker physically by measurement of weight, strength, and functionality. The initial struggle to survive had been won, but my struggle for identity and meaning in my "new" life had just begun.
Each day became a battle ‒ whether mental, physical, social, or emotional ‒ to move forward. Yes, I wanted to bounce back, which took years to do, but that was not enough.
I desperately needed to find purpose from the pain and turn struggle into gain.
When my husband introduced me to the concept of antifragility, I knew it was what I needed to guide me to grow stronger from the storm. Though Taleb's work didn't extend to a personal application, (he focused on large scale systems such as economies and governments), the solid principles of antifragility became my starting points for growth.
Principled
Anti-fragility is behind everything that has evolved with time, including cultures, countries, economies, innovation, political systems, corporate survival, technology, and species survival, including ours. Things that are anti-fragile benefit from uncertainty and variation. In his book, Antifragile, Taleb states, "The excess energy released from overreaction to setbacks is what innovates!"
Innovation, growth, and the ability to thrive all result from developing antifragility, and according to Taleb, the laws of antifragility are fairly simple, as follows:
Build in redundancy and layers (no single point of failure)
Respond and adapt to change quickly
Put your soul in the game
Experiment and tinker — take lots of small risks (and then implement those practices that result in successful outcomes)
Avoid risks that, if lost, would wipe you out completely
Measure, but don’t get consumed by data
Keep your options open
We become antifragile when we stop optimizing for right now and optimize our long game, which includes experimenting, taking small risks, and adapting during and from change.
Sometimes that means being less efficient in the short term in exchange for greater effectiveness in the long term.
Crisis-proofing Leaders and Teams
From my experience working with leaders and teams , when they jump on the antifragility bandwagon together, organizations are strengthened through the individual and collective members. Coverage and cross-training increase (redundancy), teams work together to improve processes and systems (experiment and tinker), and both leaders and team members become part of a community that better support each other through change or crisis (soul in the game).
For Cameron Treu, owner of Bam Bam's BBQ restaurant in Orem, Utah, developing antifragility during COVID meant taking many risks, experimenting for months, and keeping all options open, even when their doors were closed. Cameron's company lost nearly 80% of its business overnight during the pandemic shutdown. They spent those days with their souls bared, tinkering, risk-taking, and creating layers of strength that the restaurant didn't previously have. From an increased focus on branding, to expanded marketing, to tearing the wall downs, before the doors reopened, Bam Bams had drastically changed their business model, crisis-proofing them for the future.
In addition to catering and in-door dining offered during "normal" operations, Cameron's team broke physical barriers and added a drive-thru window, created a delivery drop-off route for customers within a 70-mile radius of the restaurant, and trained team members to step into various roles.
“We totally changed the way we did business. Between all our new efforts, we were able to maintain or beat our house daily sales, and I didn’t have to lay off a single employee. I think that is a miracle – and a win!” said Cameron Treu.
Baring, Sharing, and Becoming
Becoming antifragile may mean exposing vulnerabilities, both personal and organizational, but the long-term strengths are worth the momentary discomforts of uncovering weaknesses. When leaders and teams share with each other, they develop trust and confidence, and ultimately learn to stick together and thrive even when the world is falling apart.
When I decided to share my most vulnerable hospital and life moments in a memoir, The Sun Still Shines, I knew I would be exposing my heart to the world. But I didn't realize I'd be opening myself up for growth, soul-expanding experiences, and for experimentations that would help me learn to thrive in my post brain tumor life.
In fact, it was those very experiments that lead me to change careers and focus on speaking, training, and coaching to grow leaders and teams. Now, a dozen years and 15 surgeries after my brain tumor diagnosis, I can definitively say I am antifragile. The storms of life still come, but now I am: better able to adapt, open to experiment, willing to let go of what's not working, and my soul is all in ‒ to my family, community, and business.
Call to Action
Evaluate the antifragility of your leaders and teams with a few simple questions:
When was the last time we experimented to improve a process or outcome? (And did NOT punish for failed experiments.)
Are our teams cross-trained so members can easily fill in for each other or for other teams?
Do we encourage vulnerability so we can identify and improve?
How quickly do we adapt when faced with crisis or change?
Are you ready to create an antifragile team? Do your leaders live the simple rules to grow an organization that thrives through crisis?
Invest in your future by preparing your teams and leaders today to grow stronger from the storms of life. Global Leader Group is here to help expand your team's toolkit for change with ANTIFRAGILITY principles and techniques, so your people thrive from the board room to the living room.
Click Here to learn more from Jodi on Antifragility and more.
About the Author:
Survivor Meets Strategist: Jodi Orgill Brown was living her white picket-fence life, raising a family, and working as a CFRE-certified nonprofit executive, when a brain tumor nearly took her out of the game for good. She now has a very intimate understanding of how to grow from hardship and increase your positive impact in the world. Jodi strengthens businesses by helping individuals develop antifragility in their organizations, families, and communities. She earned a master’s degree in organizational communication and leadership, a bachelor’s degree in public relations, and is a Certified Fund-Raising Executive (CFRE) and a Certified Guide for the Exactly What to Say program. Her memoir, The Sun Still Shines, is a multiple award-winning book, and an Amazon Prime Reading Pick. She and her husband, Tolan, live in Riverdale, Utah, with their 4 children. She gives credit to God for preserving her life and giving her the opportunity to teach and inspire others.
Global Leader Group, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
Global Leader Group is a leadership firm of proven practitioners who share a deep-rooted desire to make a difference by helping organizations FIND & BUILD leaders to deliver excellence. They do that through three main pillars:
Leadership & Learning: They partner with organizations to accelerate performance and belonging by pushing the boundaries of learning. Offerings: Design and implementation of Leadership and Learning Strategy and Frameworks, World-class Learning Design & Experiences, Coaching, and Speaking (Keynotes & Appearances).
Talent Search (External Retained Recruiting): In addition to helping organizations build current leaders, Global Leader Group adds world-class leaders to managements teams around the globe.
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Their clients include leaders at Citi, AstraZeneca, HSBC, Google, the Governments, Airbus, Manubhai Jewellers, ACUMA, Sensata, numerous RIAs, Banks, Credit Unions, and more.
