The Cone of Uncertainty

Let’s all be first to assert our resilience at the start of hurricane season.

Sigh.

It’s not really negative behavior. It’s only human to want to be ready. To be prepared, young scouts. To be a step ahead.

Indeed June 1, here in the USA, starts hurricane season.

OK, so now what.

When we know a threat is on the horizon, that is valuable information. It helps us prepare. Some people, some organizations prepare.

Some don’t.

Either for operational threats, or strategic threats.

For operational threats, we depend on the National Hurricane Center publication of the hurricane forecast maps. These use sophisticated models to predict the path of hurricanes that are legitimate threats to the USA. These are published and made available for free online.

They are not perfect. And we know it.

That they overlay “The Cone of Uncertainty” on their forecast maps, the name says it all.

These maps show the level of confidence in their prediction. Updated twice daily, with the latest data. Each day, one step closer to knowing where the hurricane will make landfall, which organizations, which people will be disrupted.

Afterwards, we know with 100% certainty where the hurricane made landfall, and the level of damage it caused. Whether a mass evacuation of a city was justified, or declared too late, and caused traffic jams on the highways and bridges.

Whether we were actually prepared.

The Cone of Uncertainty applies perfectly to Strategic threats.

With time, we will know whether our forecast was correct. Whether we took the right precautions. Whether we were prepared.

I ask again. So, now what?

Exactly. Do something.

1) Increase your situational awareness. Gather the data and insights available about the strategic threats facing your organization.

2) Pull the team together, who can help assess and respond.

3) Identify the things that are mission critical to your organization. What must we defend? Protect?

4) Allocate resources to actually make these mission critical ‘things’ more resilient. Or at least be ready to allocate resources, knowing they are available, knowing that you are ready. Knowing that you are empowered to act when needed.

5) Test yourselves. Make sure the ‘generators work’ beforehand. Make sure that it won’t overheat after running for 20 minutes. Or that the filter isn’t clogged with diesel gunk. You do actually want this to work, right? After all, we’re only doing this because it’s mission critical. This is not frivolous behavior or an inappropriate allocation of resources.

These might be the most important, yet challenging, allocation of resources a leader can make.

Don’t assert preparedness, if you are not ready.

This is not a marketing exercise.

Customers and Stakeholders will know with 100% certainty, eventually, and markets are smart.