In the world of ultra-running, preparation is everything. When I took on the Western States 100 Endurance Run, the world’s oldest 100-mile trail race, I knew temperatures could rise as high as 100 degrees Fahrenheit. I trained for the heat, adjusted my nutrition plan, and packed gear that would help me survive what was expected to be a really hot race day.
The weather had other plans.
That year, the Western States 100 turned out to be the second-coldest on record. Temperatures plummeted, and everything I had prepared for went out the window. My gear was inadequate. My teeth were chattering, my face and hands were freezing and my nutrition strategy faltered. I thought I was done, but in a race where the only way to win was to keep going, I used an old garbage bag just to stay warm enough to keep moving. I survived the day and finished the race, but the experience left me wondering: Could I have avoided this by preparing for all eventualities, even the most unlikely ones?
My experience wasn’t just about finishing the race; it illustrates the challenges we face when our plans meet the unexpected. If you’re an entrepreneur, then you’ve probably already experienced some version of this.
Innovation beyond the horizon
Innovation is often romanticized as a journey into the unknown, a bold venture where visionaries craft new realities from the fabric of their imagination. But what happens when that journey takes a turn into the unexpected? What do you do when the carefully laid plans you’ve prepared, refined and relied upon suddenly become irrelevant? For entrepreneurs, this isn’t just a theoretical question. It’s a real and recurring challenge, one that comes up more often than people think. It’s a question that separates the truly resilient from everyone else.
Entrepreneurs are by nature innovators. They look ahead, anticipate trends and prepare for the future. But in the pursuit of innovation, there’s a risk of over-preparation—of becoming so fixated on a particular journey of the future that they neglect the possibility of unforeseen obstacles.
Take the concept of “seeing around corners,” a term often used in business to describe the act of anticipating the next big thing. Business strategist Rita Gunther McGrath explores this concept and emphasizes the importance of anticipating disruptions before they become obvious to everyone. While it’s essential to look towards the horizon, it’s just as important to recognize that you can’t predict everything. The weather, both literal and metaphorical, can change in an instant, rendering your carefully crafted plans obsolete.
In the world of business, this might show up as a sudden market shift, an unexpected technological disruption, or a global event like a pandemic. When these storms hit, the entrepreneurs who thrive aren’t always the ones who were the best prepared—they’re the ones who are adaptable and flexible.
Embracing uncertainty
So, how can entrepreneurs innovate when the weather turns against them? The answer lies in embracing uncertainty and building resilience—not just in the form of backup plans, but in the form of a mindset that welcomes the unexpected.
Here are three simple strategies that can help entrepreneurs thrive when innovation meets unpredictability:
Prepare for the unpredictable, not just the expected
It’s easy to get caught up in preparing for the challenges you anticipate. But true resilience comes from preparing for the ones you don’t see coming. Build flexibility into your plans and accept that you might need to pivot on the fly.
In ultra-running, this might mean training in all weather conditions, not just the ones you expect. In my coaching practice, I observed this lesson play out when the pandemic hit. I had sent out team coaching proposals to two different companies. Company A decided to stop all unnecessary expenditures and adopted a "wait and see" approach. They decided to revisit the team coaching opportunity once the pandemic had subsided. Company B took immediate action, recognizing that what their team needed most at that moment was support to navigate the uncertainty. The CEO said, "This is exactly what the team needs right now." Instead of conserving resources, they redeployed them to strengthen their team’s resilience during the storm. This experience taught me that being able to pivot and redeploy resources in response to unforeseen challenges is crucial for weathering any storm.
This flexibility and readiness to adapt are closely tied to a culture of continuous experimentation and learning, ensuring that you’re prepared for the unexpected. As the Stoic philosopher Epictetus once said, “It’s not what happens to you, but how you react to it that matters.” This mindset of resilience and adaptability is essential when facing the unpredictable.
Redefine success mid-journey
Sometimes it becomes impossible to achieve your original goal and continuing to pursue it can lead to failure. In these moments, you must redefine success. As I write in my recent book “Ordinary Resilience: Reframing How Effective Leaders Adapt and Thrive,” resilience isn’t about avoiding the rain, it’s learning to dance in the storm.
During the Western States 100, my initial goal was to finish within a certain time. But as the cold set in, I realized that my goal needed to change. I needed to finish, period. In business, this might mean adjusting your objectives when market conditions change or when a product launch doesn’t go as planned.
Reframing success allows you to maintain momentum, even when the path forward is unclear. This flexibility is a hallmark of resilient entrepreneurs.
Leverage the unexpected as a source of innovation
When the weather turns against you, it’s tempting to view the situation as a setback. But these challenges can be your catalyst for breakthrough innovation.
During the Western States 100, when the unexpected cold threatened to derail my race I repurposed a used garbage bag to stay warm. What seemed like a makeshift solution became a crucial survival tool, reminding me that the best innovations often arise from necessity.
A similar lesson unfolded in my coaching practice, which I describe in detail in my book. I once worked with a client—let’s call him Daniel—whose feedback session went awry. Daniel reacted defensively, and soon after that he terminated my contract. It represented 40% of my income, and at first, I felt like a failure.
But rather than dwell on the loss, I reframed the experience.
I asked myself, “What can I learn from this? How can I use this in the future?”
This serendipitous moment also helped me discover a niche: working with "brilliant and misunderstood" clients. What initially seemed like a major setback transformed into a defining moment for my business. Just like the garbage bag in Western States, the unexpected challenge became the source of innovation propelling me forward.
Thriving in the unpredictable
The lesson from my experience in the Western States 100 is clear. No matter how well you prepare, you can’t control everything. This doesn’t mean you can’t succeed. By embracing uncertainty, redefining success and leveraging the unexpected as a source of innovation, entrepreneurs can thrive even when the weather turns against them.
These principles are at the heart of my book which explores how leaders can build resilience by embracing the ordinary challenges of life and business. In the end, the most resilient entrepreneurs are those who don’t just survive the storm—they learn to dance in the rain. And in doing so, they often find that the most significant innovations lie just beyond the horizon, waiting to be discovered.