Adaptive Business Continuity is challenging. I know this from personal experience. But, by choosing to fully embrace it and working through the struggles of abandoning all my old notions, I’ve come to a place where I can confidently say it has the power to revolutionize the work of organizational preparedness.

This is the second article in my new series. Join me. But be prepared.

Method (n): a way of doing anything, esp. according to a defined and regular plan; a mode of procedure in any activity, business, etc.

Over the past 20-30 years, the work of business continuity and organizational preparedness has been defined by methodology. Methods define what needs to be done. How it is done is left up to the practitioner. Because of the fact that professionals are given a wide degree of latitude in how they execute there is a common belief that this makes the traditional methodology quite flexible and not dissimilar to adaptive. This is wildly inaccurate.

Adaptive Business Continuity does not define any method. Full stop. There are no actions or deliverables defined within the Adaptive canon. There are tools, to be sure, such as the aperture. And the work is based on theories developed by my fellow Adaptive conspirator, David Lindstedt. One may implement the tools or execute based upon the theories we promote. But these are not requirements of Adaptive. They are simply offered to better equip and enable the practitioner in the execution of their work.

Principle (n): A fundamental truth or proposition on which others depend; a general statement or tenet forming the (or a) basis of a system of belief, etc.

Adaptive is based on Principles. Methods define the ‘What’ of execution. Principles define the ‘How’. In the development of Adaptive Business Continuity, David and I deliberately defined the ‘How’ while leaving out the ‘What’. This leaves practitioners free to execute according to what works best for them and their organizations. This means that not a single deliverable required by traditional methods must be executed to be successful within Adaptive Business Continuity. Or they can all be executed and still be considered Adaptive. That, my friends, is what flexibility looks like.

Challenges Abound…

Given the Principles themselves, it may seem disingenuous to say that Adaptive does not prescribe any methods for this work. Additionally, performing work based on principles, without methods, presents challenges. I would be remiss if I did not acknowledge and address these criticisms.

Don’t the Principles Define a Method?

An argument could be made that many of the Adaptive Principles are a ‘What’ in and of themselves. Examples include “Measure and Benchmark”, “Learn the Business” and “Obtain Incremental Direction from Leadership”. These may be taken as actions but that is not the intention. Practitioners can – and should – take steps that encompass many Principles simultaneously. Obtaining incremental direction from leadership should serve as a form of “Learn the Business” as well as “Engaging at Many Levels within the Organization”. It may even be used as a form of “Measurement and Benchmarking” if one approaches such discussions from the perspective of understanding leadership’s competence and understanding of resources or strategies. Yes, Principles may be executed as actions, but no single Principle should ever be interpreted as requiring a dedicated action. Work – any work – that is done to achieve the mission of improving recovery capabilities and within the parameters of the Principles, satisfies the Adaptive Business Continuity framework.

Does Adaptive Invite Chaos?

Adaptive does not come with a roadmap. There are no milestones, deliverables or actions to check off a list. This is an uncomfortable truth that rarely comes up in discussions about Adaptive. Adaptive practitioners must develop the skills needed to determine for themselves that they are operating correctly. There is a presentation from 2019 that I absolutely love. It is delivered by Sarah Powell and Emma Stocker, Director of Emergency Management at Temple University and Director of Emergency Management at Oregon State, respectively, at the time. In the presentation, Sarah mentions that Adaptive does not define how it should be implemented. This is expressed as a bug when, in fact, it is a feature of Adaptive. One we deliberately built in. I don’t have any misgivings about this but I can empathize with Sarah and Emma’s struggles. In the end, both took different approaches to solve for their respective programs. This is the essence of Adaptive. We’ve deliberately avoided explaining how implementation should look in order to free up practitioners to implement their own vision based on their knowledge and skillset as well as the culture, values and priorities of the organizations they serve.

Without a clear outline of how work should be done, Adaptive can seem like a free-for-all. Principles act as guardrails, preventing preparedness work from devolving into chaos while providing enough latitude for the work be performed in a very wide variety of meaningful ways. The purpose is to free up the unique problem-solving skills of the professional while encouraging experimentation and risk-taking. As confident as I am in my own approach, I genuinely believe it can be improved upon and that additional solutions exist that I have not yet thought of. This lies at the heart of Adaptive. It demands a lot from the practitioner, but the rewards are significantly greater. We should embrace both the inherent difficulty of Adaptive and the value it enables as a result.

How To Think About This Differently

There is one more hurdle: perception. Experienced business continuity practitioners have a firmly held view of how preparedness is achieved. With that view comes a whole host of beliefs and assumptions, most or all of which must be abandoned in order to properly understand Adaptive. This is a problem. It greatly limits how successful the Adaptive business continuity practitioner can be. And I know this first-hand, having lived through it for my first several years attempting to implement an Adaptive program. It can be done but it is difficult. At least it was for me. If I had the equivalent of Morpheus’s red pills , I would hand them out like jelly beans. Unfortunately, I don’t. You have to put in the time and the work. But the results are far more rewarding than is possible following the traditional recipe.

If you find yourself among those struggling with this concept, I invite you to reach out to me directly. Otherwise, please continue to follow me here. I always do my best to share every upcoming presentation and podcast while varying my approach with each delivery. I’m confident that one of them will resonate with you, if you are willing to give it time. If, like so many others, you struggle to deliver value following common practices, I am offering another path. A difficult one, to be sure, but one that ends at a far brighter destination.

Stay curious, friends!