Lead

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ANTICIPATE

“LEADERSHIP is knowing what to do, when you don't know what to do.”

THE EIGHTH ABSOLUTE FOR LEADERS:

Thanks to the ever-increasing velocity of change in today's endlessly interconnected world, the immediate future holds both more threats and more opportunities than at any time in history. And that's why anticipation, the ability to see the road ahead and act intelligently on the insights that vision reveals, has become so critical.

The surprising fact is that many leaders are actually not that good at anticipating. The reason it seems to be such a rare skill is that even paragons of strategy fall victim to tunnel vision. IBM failed to recognize the massive market for operating systems that would be created by the emergence of the PC. (The beneficiary of IBM's over' sight was Microsoft.) Sony couldn't imagine that VHS might pose some competition to its superior video recording product, Betamax. GM failed to anticipate how unstable oil prices would drive a new market for smaller cars.

Overly focused on short-term financial projections, operational excellence, and the legacy of what they've done before, even the best companies can lose their power of anticipation. In other ...