In 1968, even before a man landed on the moon, Peter Drucker wrote The Age of Discontinuity. As usual, he was way ahead of his time. Discontinuity is the marked break in sequences, a sharp change in the manner in which people and processes interact and move forward (or not). His point was that we were facing unprecedented change and had better become accustomed to it.

He could have written it about the circumstances we face today.

Discontinuity is also uncomfortable as most of us live with a “continuity mindset,” in which we want to perpetuate current conditions, which are within our comfort zone, even if this doesn’t achieve the optimal the path to success.

Which is why the Covid-19 pandemic has been so uncomfortable for many, including business owners.

But consider this: many of the changes that have affected businesses this year were happening anyway. The pandemic has just accelerated the pace of change. The latest bank, TSB, to announce branch closures and redundancies said, “The pandemic has only accelerated the shift from over-the-counter to digital banking.”

The shift towards online shopping has been happening for several years, streaming video rather than visiting a cinema, and getting takeaway from your favourite restaurant have both been possible for some time. One of the success stories of 2020 is the number of high-end restaurants that now deliver to your home.

High street retailers and restaurants aren’t closing because of the pandemic, they are just closing more quickly than they would have done.

The mindset of successful business owners, on the other hand, is one of exploration, innovation, and risk. You can’t grow, or even survive, by merely “fixing” things, and just because something is working now doesn’t mean it can’t be “fixed” to perform better.

The mindset of entrepreneurs today has to be one of providing volatile and disruptive courses of action for your clients and prospects. You can buy and sell cars from your home, without ever going out, you can deposit a cheque in your bank account by photographing it,  you can hire personal shoppers to do your shopping or shop online, and you can coach people via Zoom anywhere in the world . After all, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, and Zoom are not exactly bad examples.

What can you do to “upset” the market in which you operate and create disruption and volatility so that your competitors are always off balance?

Noel Guilford