Photograph We are rapidly approaching the three-year anniversary of the start of the pandemic. Anybody running a business during this period has experienced the stomach-churning ride of this roller-coaster economy\u2014the freefall at the outset, followed What did you do to pull it off? Can it be replicated? What did you learn?<\/p>\n
It\u2019s an exercise that many leaders I\u2019ve interviewed talked up even before the pandemic. \u201cI\u2019ve learned to question success a lot more than failure,\u201d said Kat Cole, who is the president and chief operating officer of Athletic Greens, a nutrition company. As she told me in an interview years ago, \u201cI\u2019ll ask more questions when sales are up than I do when they\u2019re down. I ask more questions when things seem to be moving smoothly, because I\u2019m thinking: \u2018There\u2019s got to be something I don\u2019t know. There\u2019s always something.\u2019 This approach means that people don\u2019t feel beat up for failing, but they should feel very concerned if they don\u2019t understand why they\u2019re successful.\u201d<\/p>\n
Successes can feel like moments for celebration, rather than furrowed-brow scrutiny. But it is precisely those moments of interrogation that can lead to insights and longer-term competitive advantages. Today\u2019s shorter economic cycles create more momentum, both good and bad, and you want to be riding a wave rather than trying to paddle against it.<\/p>\n
For example, in this environment, longer-term strategies\u2014which were a reasonable proposition in the comparatively stable pre-pandemic world\u2014have, out of necessity, increasingly been replaced with shorter-term bets. Understanding why some succeed can help companies figure out strategies to address pressing challenges like finding the right return-to-office policy or developing new products and services to help accelerate a digital transformation.<\/p>\n
Successes can feel like moments for celebration, rather than furrowed-brow scrutiny. But it is precisely those moments of interrogation that can lead to insights.<\/p>\n
A company\u2019s leadership may be so pleased to share good news that they lack the emotional distance to ask the probing questions about their successes, or about whether, for example, market insights about the popularity of a new product require shifts in the way capital is being allocated.<\/p>\n
\nBoards of directors are well-positioned to provide much-needed scrutiny. As George Barrett, who led Cardinal Health for nearly a decade and now serves as a director at companies such as Target,\u00a0told\u00a0me,\u00a0leadership teams and boards are quick to engage in tough conversations about performance when there are challenges. But the bigger challenge can come when things are going well. \u201cThe really important questions are often not asked at the right moments,\u201d he said. \u201cAsking probing questions when things are going well can illuminate important insights. For example, this might allow you to understand that our actual numbers look good, but there\u2019s a tailwind that is masking a problem. Or now this solid performance tells us we\u2019re onto something really important, and if we don\u2019t leverage this, our competitors are going to be right there with us in two months, so how do we accelerate this or scale this differently? It\u2019s that burning question of \u2018why?\u2019\u00a0It\u2019s important to celebrate successes, but it is important to ask tough questions.\u201d<\/p>\n
Leaders shouldn\u2019t have to wait for their board meetings to start this type of interrogation. Even with an ever-lengthening list of urgent challenges to address, leaders should place the word \u201cwhy?\u201d at the top of it, as a reminder to get to the bottom of unexpected triumphs. Questioning successes as much as failures is timeless leadership advice that feels particularly timely now.<\/p>\n