In the manager's everyday life - August 2026
Most changes do not come as a surprise. The signals are often there long before the consequences are visible in the results. The question is why so many organizations still act only when the room for action has already shrunk.
Customers change their behavior. Competitors advance their positions. New opportunities arise and old truths lose relevance. Often the organization only discovers this in retrospect, even though the signals have been there all along. In this column, Maritha Holmberg explores why the ability to pick up on and act on early signals can be one of the most crucial leadership issues in a time where the pace of change is constantly increasing.
When management finds out too late
In my previous columns, I have written about why decisions do not always have an impact on everyday life, why follow-up is fundamentally a leadership issue, and about the importance of the management team as a role model.
This time I want to focus on an issue that I feel is becoming increasingly important as the world around us changes more rapidly.
What happens when an organization only sees the change after it has already had an impact on the business?
In meetings with management teams, I often encounter organizations with clear strategies, strong expertise and high ambitions. The direction is clear, the goals are well-established and the will to develop the business is strong. Yet I repeatedly hear the same type of reflections when we look back on events that have affected the business.
Customer needs changed faster than expected. A competitor took a position that no one had really anticipated. An opportunity was only discovered when someone else had already acted. A problem grew bigger than it needed to be.
When we then begin to analyze what actually happened, one thing often becomes clear. The signals were there long before. Someone had noticed them. Someone had reacted to the development. The issue had perhaps even been discussed in several places in the organization.
But the insight never reached all the way to the priorities and decisions that could have made a difference in time.
It's a pattern I see recurring in many different businesses. Not least because it's rarely a matter of lack of knowledge. Quite the opposite. Most organizations today have better decision-making data than ever before. Yet many leaders experience that important changes are discovered later than they would like.
Maybe the challenge isn't about a lack of information at all. Maybe it's about the organization's ability to notice, interpret, and act on the signals that are already present in everyday life.
What I see right now
In conversations with managers, I often hear comments like:
"We already saw that several months ago."
"Actually, it didn't come as a surprise."
"The issue was raised early on, but it never became central enough in our discussions and decisions."
What unites these comments is that they almost always come after the fact. When the outcome is already known, when measures need to be taken, or when the room for manoeuvre has become significantly smaller than it could have been.
In my experience, it is rarely a matter of lack of commitment. Rather, I see how many organizations struggle with the same challenge: everyday life is filled with demands, priorities, and deliverables that require immediate attention.
When the pace is high, the focus is naturally directed towards what is already on the table. The known takes precedence over the uncertain. Issues that require action here and now are often perceived as more important than the signals that suggest that something is about to change later. It is human. At the same time, it means that the organization risks reacting only when the change has already had consequences for customers, employees or business.
What research and the outside world show
As I delve into research on organizational learning, one thing becomes clear.
Organizations that successfully adapt to change rarely excel by having more knowledge than others. What often sets them apart is how early they notice changes in their environment and how quickly they translate those insights into action.
Professor Amy Edmondson's research on psychological safety, for example, shows that high-performing teams do not necessarily make fewer mistakes. The difference is that risks, deviations and problems are made visible earlier, while there is still an opportunity to act. I think that is an important insight. Success is rarely about avoiding all mistakes. It is about discovering what requires attention while it is still possible to influence development. The earlier the signal is picked up, the greater the scope for action.
The business consequence is often that the discussion ends up in culture, communication or information sharing. I think it is more accurate to describe it as a question of decision quality. All strategies are based on assumptions about customers, markets, competition and future opportunities. The better we understand reality, the more likely we are to make decisions that lead in the right direction. When important perspectives get stuck in the way, even well-crafted strategies risk being built on an incomplete picture.
That's why I believe that management teams need to pay as much attention to how insights move through the organization as they do to the analysis of them. Because even the most advanced analysis depends on the quality of the data it's based on. And the quality of the data is ultimately determined by how well the organization manages to capture what's actually happening in everyday life.
What it means for you as a manager
It’s easy to think that this is primarily about employees’ willingness to speak their minds. My experience is that the issue is bigger than that. Leadership teams influence which issues get attention. Managers influence which perspectives are welcomed and taken seriously. Employees, in turn, determine what they choose to highlight and what they choose to leave unsaid. Over time, this shapes the organization’s ability to learn, adapt, and evolve.
That's why I believe this is one of the most important, yet most underestimated, leadership questions right now. Not because leaders are expected to have all the answers, but because leaders greatly influence which signals actually reach the decision-making table.
In many organizations, intensive work is currently underway on strategy, transformation and development. It is both important and necessary. But perhaps there is one issue that deserves more attention than it usually receives. Perhaps therefore the most important issue is not how much knowledge the organization collects. Perhaps the most important issue is how early we understand what the signals are trying to tell us. Because in the end, it is rarely about getting more information. It is about understanding what the organization is already trying to tell us while we still have the opportunity to act.
All good
Maritha Holmberg
Head of Learning & Development