The Adaptable Leader: 7 skills to help you succeed during uncertainty

By Danette Fenton-Menzies

Our world is changing fast and leaders are scrambling to keep up with the pace, extent and significance of change.

If you want to lead successfully and make a positive impact, there is no other option. Change is uncomfortable, but it's the path to growth.

To adapt during uncertainty, leaders need high levels of Adaptability Quotient

• Language: English
• Publisher: Danette Fenton-Menzies
• Release date: Nov 28, 2023
• ISBN: 9780645971415

Danette Fenton-Menzies

Danette Fenton-Menzies is a leadership expert, business owner, and executive coach. For more than 20 years, Danette has run businesses with her husband, working with global organisations, large corporates and government departments. Danette has studied and applied AQ extensively and has seen first-hand how these skills help leaders make a positive difference.

Book preview

INTRODUCTION

‘An adaptable leader ACCEPTS what is. They adapt to reality. They don’t fight it or avoid it.’

– Danette Fenton-Menzies

The week before Christmas 2014, I took a call from the manager of our business partner. They had turned up to work and the office was shut. Permanently.

The manager realised that we might not have been informed. We hadn’t.

Overnight, that event took out 90% of our income.

January was usually the busiest time for our business, but moving forward, we would no longer have access to that part of our business or its income stream.

We started our first business together when our five kids were between two and 12. We had worked hard to ensure our success so we could give them a good life. And now, with three of our five kids still at school, an external event had put everything at risk.

It seemed surreal, but it was chillingly real. Initially, we wondered if we should have seen it coming. However, that business partner had successfully passed a financial audit the previous month.

There was no time to wallow. What we learned over the next few years became the basis for our new way of leading and adapting.

Change is normal

What about you? Perhaps you want to step into a leadership role, or you’re already a leader and want to learn to be more proactive and more adaptable. Whatever your reason for picking up this book, welcome.

Over recent years, the world has witnessed how much change can happen in a year, a month or even a day. To successfully navigate change as leaders and future leaders, we must build our adaptability skills to successfully and sustainably lead ourselves and others.

I’ve written this book to help you understand why building your adaptability quotient (AQ) skills is essential. It’s full of practical ways to make this a regular practice.

Let’s start with some fun facts about the rate of change we face.

David Russell Schilling observed that until the beginning of the 1900s, human knowledge doubled once a century. He writes that IBM believes the build out of the Internet of Things (IoT) will lead to the doubling of knowledge every 12 hours.¹

That is not a typo. The doubling of knowledge every 12 hours is hard to comprehend.

Artificial intelligence (AI) and other technologies are contributing to this rapid rate of change.

Human brains aren’t built to navigate this amount of knowledge or rate of change readily.

The brain is designed to avoid significant change as it can become overwhelming.

Why? Firstly, the brain is energy-hungry. It makes up a small percentage of the body’s mass yet uses a disproportionate amount of energy. In fact, the brain is designed to avoid significant change as it can become overwhelming and trigger the threat response, which chews up more brain energy.

You’ve likely seen this in people around you. (Perhaps even in yourself?) Even when it is clear that change needs to happen, they put their heads in the sand and hope the change will disappear. Often, the longer they do so, the worse the situation becomes. Doing nothing doesn’t help.

Being adaptable isn’t new

In 2011, Boston Consulting Group partners Martin Reeves and Mike Deimler wrote, ‘Instead of being really good at doing some particular thing, companies must be really good at learning how to do new things.’²

What is new is the pace of change. And what is required of leaders is to deal effectively with that pace.

As organisations struggle to adapt, stay relevant to their clients’ requirements, and attract great talent, a key driver will be how adaptable the leaders and their teams are.

History is littered with organisations that failed to adapt quickly enough. Emeritus Professor Stephane Garelli writes that big companies used to have a lifespan of 61 years; that has now been reduced to 18 years.³

Former Intel chief Andy Grove’s words, ‘There are two options: adapt or die’, have never been more relevant.

Imagine better

If you have a vision of making a positive impact, then this book is for you. When you learn to develop your AQ as a leader, you can see further ahead than others. You can better anticipate potential risks and opportunities. Even if you don’t foresee all the risks and opportunities, you can act faster because you have adaptability skills.

It’s like world-class athletes who plan and practice until they are match-ready. They work with their teams so everyone is ready. Then, on game day, their game looks effortless as the team works toward a match-winning result.

Imagine being a world-class athlete in your leadership role.

Imagine being a world-class athlete in your leadership role.

You turn up calm, curious and collaborative. Those around you are ready, too, because you have all been working towards being the best adaptable leaders you can be.

Where others are blindsided and reeling from what they see as a disaster, you and your team have already identified the issue. You recognise possibilities to help your organisation take advantage of this situation.

That’s the power of AQ and being an adaptable leader.

Make no mistake. This approach requires effort, and a large part of that involves awareness.

Susan took over a new team at the start of the pandemic. She lamented that what she really wanted to do was to make her team feel comfortable. I suggested that it might feel nice initially but would be a disadvantage in the longer term.

Change is growth

One of my favourite formulas is Change = Uncomfortable = Growth. I developed this to help leaders understand that if they feel comfortable, they probably aren’t growing and learning to adapt.

One of my favourite formulas is Change = Uncomfortable = Growth.

Being uncomfortable indicates that you are outside your comfort zone. Your brain is learning new things.

You won’t always get those things right the first or tenth time. However, if you are comfortable being uncomfortable, you are more able to adapt quickly when situations require this.

Where are you comfortable at work? How often do you stretch yourself to learn new skills and approaches? When do you re-examine current practices to see what can be improved or stopped?

Another factor that drives the need for leaders to be adaptable is the concept of the ‘half-life of knowledge’.

In his book, Samuel Arbesman suggested that facts decay over time.⁴ Pluto is just one example. It was discovered in 1930 and became the ninth planet in our solar system. At school, we were taught to remember the planets in our solar system using the mnemonic, ‘My Very Earthly Mother Just Served Us Nine Pancakes’ (Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Pluto).

Then, in 2006, the International Astronomical Union (IAU) decided that Pluto didn’t meet the definition of a full planet, so it was removed from the list of planets in our solar system. The IAU now describes Pluto as a dwarf planet in the Kuiper belt. Yet many web pages still have Pluto as a planet in our solar system.

In a 2020 article, Markus Schuller and Alexandre Saint suggested that the half-life of financial knowledge, both applied research and knowledge, was five and ten years, respectively. They considered how much time finance professionals should devote to updating their knowledge and calculated it should be between eight and 19 hours per week.⁵ Whilst you may not work in finance, this phenomenon is not unique to that profession. Each profession has its own half-life of knowledge.

Developing your AQ skills is now a business essential if you want to remain relevant as a leader.

How to read this book

I’ve written this book in nine chapters. I recommend starting at the beginning and working your way through as each chapter builds upon the last.

Chapter One covers how developing your AQ will help you in a changing world. This chapter explains how AQ skills keep you relevant.

Chapter Two explores how to work with your brain to navigate change successfully. Your brain doesn’t come with an instruction manual. You often work against your brain, making change harder than it needs to be.

Chapters Three to Nine unpack my ACCEPTS model, which contains the key elements needed to develop and grow your AQ skills.

In the Afterword, you’ll learn how I can help you succeed on your Adaptable Leader journey.

Throughout the book are links to additional resources on my website www.danettefm.com which is continually updated. Keep visiting for new material and to stay in touch.

1

HOW WILL AQ HELP IN A CHANGING WORLD?

‘The secret of change is to focus all of your energy not on fighting the old, but on building the new.’

– Socrates

John had held a senior IT position for more than ten years. He was comfortable with detail, enjoyed routine and had become the company expert in a particular system. He was loyal and well paid.

One day, his company announced a restructure.