Critical Threshold
EVERY THREAT HAS A CRITICAL THRESHOLD
I help businesses anticipate external threats before they become critical.
The threat you don’t see is the one you can’t prepare for.
Plans are built on assumptions. Strategies are built on assumptions. Business models are built on assumptions.
Most organisations analyse their markets and manage their internal operations. But the forces capable of changing everything may come from somewhere else entirely.
The world outside your organisation is constantly changing.
I help organisations ask a different question:
What could happen that would change everything?
They say what you don’t know won’t hurt you.
They’re wrong.
I LOOK OUTSIDE THE FRAME.
Your organisation already knows its business. You know your market, your operations and the problems in front of you. So do consulting firms.
I look somewhere else. Outside the SWOT. At the political, social, technological, environmental and geopolitical changes that could alter the conditions your business depends on.
Out of the blue?
NOPE!
Crises have a lead time too
Major disruptions rarely begin on the day they become visible.
No one saw it coming
SOME DID!
Surprise is expensive
The early warning signs always exist. The challenge is knowing where to look, and what they mean.
Unforeseeable.
OR UNEXAMINED?
Threats leave a trace
You can’t examine every possibility. But you can examine the ones that could impact your business.
WHAT I ACTUALLY DO
I identify external threats that could have a serious impact on your business and examine how they intersect with the things your business depends on in short, mid and long term horizons.
What could happen?
What does your business depend on that could be affected?
How could that affect your operations, revenue or ability to deliver?
What conditions could cause the threat to materialise?
What would tell us it was moving towards a critical threshold — early enough to mitigate the impact?
At what point would you need to act? Mitigation measures & Contingencies
The long-term is already being shaped
Insights from Our Client Partnerships
Below are examples of large-scale threats. But the threats that do the most damage are not always the loudest or most obvious. Sometimes they are smaller developments, unfolding over time, interacting with one another until the combined effect becomes critical.
That is what I look for: the obvious, the overlooked, and the connections between them. and time.
CAN YOU PREDICT WHAT AI WILL CHANGE ?
Not precisely. But we do know it will bring significant change across business and social contexts.
You can analyse the obvious and less obvious ways AI could change the conditions your business operates in.
A direct threat might be automation.
A less obvious one might begin somewhere else: AI changes search behaviour. That changes how customers discover businesses. That changes the value of existing marketing channels. That changes customer acquisition costs. Job loss might eventually cause social
Eventually, it reaches you.
For example, I might track changes in capability, adoption, regulation, investment, labour markets and user behaviour. I would examine which developments are accelerating, what new sub-threats they create, and which pathways could materially affect your business across short-, medium- and long-term horizons.
I identify the developments most relevant to your business, map the plausible chains of consequence, and monitor the markers and indicators that show which pathways are strengthening, weakening or changing direction.
You do not have to know exactly what exact impact AI will have or even when. You do need to know what you need to monitor and why to manage the inevitably consequences for your business of such a major and unprecedented technological and societal transformation.
CAN YOU PREDICT A WAR?
Not precisely.
But war rarely begins with the first shot. Before conflict comes geopolitical manoeuvring, shifts in alliances, economic pressure, military positioning, sanctions, resource competition, domestic political pressure and calculated power moves.
War is one of history’s most powerful forces of disruption.
A direct threat to your business might be disruption to a supplier in the region.
A less obvious one might begin somewhere else: a power struggle changes an alliance. That changes sanctions policy. Sanctions alter trade routes. Shipping and insurance costs rise. Manufacturers change sourcing. Scarcity pushes up prices.
Eventually, it reaches you.
For example, I might track geopolitical manoeuvring, alliance shifts, sanctions, military positioning, resource pressures and domestic political tensions. I would examine how those developments could interact, which scenarios they make more plausible, and how the resulting consequences could reach your business, before the war happens.
You do not have to know exactly when a war will begin. You need to understand the forces moving towards it — and what it could do to your business if it happened.
Then you need to act on that knowledge. What can be mitigated now? What can be diversified, protected or changed before the threat crosses its threshold?
Analysis without action is useless.
CAN YOU PREDICT THE NEXT PANDEMIC?
Not precisely.
As epidimeologists like to say, the questions is not whether there will be another pandemic or not, but rather when.
But outbreaks do not emerge in a vacuum. Before global disruption comes transmission, mutation, mobility, health-system capacity, public behaviour, government response, supply constraints and information — or misinformation.
A direct threat might be workforce absence.
A less obvious one might begin elsewhere: restrictions change consumer behaviour. That changes demand. Supply chains adapt. Governments intervene. Labour markets shift. Some temporary behaviours become permanent.But you can analyse the obvious and less obvious ways AI could change the conditions your business operates in.
Eventually, it reaches you.
For example, if I am monitoring this threat for a company, I might track the biological and epidemiological picture alongside preparedness, health-system capacity, public-health policy and outbreaks emerging elsewhere in the world. I would examine how those signals could combine, which scenarios they make more plausible, and what each scenario could mean for the speficic business I am working to protect.
I analyse the obvious and less obvious pathways through which a biological threat could affect your business, then monitor the markers and indicators that show which pathways are strengthening, weakening or changing direction. I work with scenarios and potential outcomes & impact.
Building the potential consequence scenarios for your business helps make better strategic decisions to mitigate in time. Preparing for another pandemic is the smart thing to do. Hope saved no one.
