Beware the trap of repeating patterns.

I had discussions with three different executive teams this week, and in each case, the conversation came around to economic cycles, headwinds, and the need for more accountability.

To varying degrees, each company had made significant investments (and tangible improvements) over the past years empowering teams and instituting new, more agile ways of working.

Everyone agreed they did not want to go back to "the way things were," but complex systems, like people, have muscle memory and tend to snap back to old patterns when disruption increases.

One way leadership teams can mitigate this dynamic is to consciously architect a third-way. Adjusting your current ways of working without reverting to the old patterns that had you create them in the first place.


Grab a few flip charts and discuss these three questions at an upcoming team meeting:

1️⃣ What aspects of our current ways of working must we preserve and protect? How will we communicate this to our teams and role model this in our behavior and actions?

2️⃣ What would be the visible signs that unwanted patterns are creeping back in? What would we see, notice, and hear from our people? How can we create an "early warning system" that would alert us to pattern creep?

3️⃣ What calibration or shifts to our current ways of working might be needed in the months ahead? How will we preserve the benefits of our current culture while acknowledging a need for more accountability and fiscal discipline? What specifically will we do, say, and tolerate (or not)?

Take 20 minutes at an upcoming meeting to test your alignment. Absent an intentional third-way architecture, you'll likely bounce right back into the patterns you worked so hard to change.

Image credit: Gary Larson