181 lines
176 KiB
HTML
181 lines
176 KiB
HTML
<!DOCTYPE html><html lang="en"><head><meta charSet="utf-8" data-next-head=""/><meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width" data-next-head=""/><meta name="viewport" content="initial-scale=1, width=device-width" data-testid="meta"/><script async="" src="https://assets.adobedtm.com/c0857d0b892a/3c820ea800e4/launch-48df4fd9029b.min.js" data-next-head=""></script><script async="" src="https://cdnapisec.kaltura.com/p/506471/embedPlaykitJs/uiconf_id/55694072" data-next-head=""></script><script data-testid="iasscript" async="" src="//static.adsafeprotected.com/iasPET.1.js"></script><script async="" src="//securepubads.g.doubleclick.net/tag/js/gpt.js"></script><script async="" src="//buy.tinypass.com/api/tinypass.min.js"></script><script async="" defer="" crossorigin="anonymous" src="https://connect.facebook.net/en_US/sdk.js#version=v19.2&appId=1761258887507575&xfbml=false&status=true"></script><link rel="dns-prefetch" href="//assets.adobedtm.com" data-next-head=""/><link rel="dns-prefetch" href="//platform.hbr.org" data-next-head=""/><link rel="dns-prefetch" href="//securepubads.g.doubleclick.net" data-next-head=""/><link rel="dns-prefetch" href="//buy.tinypass.com" data-next-head=""/><link rel="dns-prefetch" href="//connect.facebook.net" data-next-head=""/><link rel="dns-prefetch" href="//geoip-js.com" data-next-head=""/><meta property="og:type" content="article" data-next-head=""/><link rel="preload" href="/assets/mfe-core/fonts/GT-America-Standard-Bold.449f1ad7.woff" as="font" type="font/woff" crossorigin="anonymous" data-testid="preload-link"/><link rel="preload" href="/assets/mfe-core/fonts/GT-America-Standard-Light.0f59caef.woff" as="font" type="font/woff" crossorigin="anonymous" data-testid="preload-link"/><link rel="preload" href="/assets/mfe-core/fonts/GT-America-Standard-Regular.ee9c3d0d.woff" as="font" type="font/woff" crossorigin="anonymous" data-testid="preload-link"/><link rel="preload" href="/assets/mfe-core/fonts/tiempos-headline-semibold.b4e52635.woff2" as="font" type="font/woff2" crossorigin="anonymous" data-testid="preload-link"/><link rel="preload" href="/assets/mfe-core/fonts/tiempos-text-regular.b9f678ed.woff2" as="font" type="font/woff2" crossorigin="anonymous" data-testid="preload-link"/><link rel="preload" href="/assets/mfe-core/fonts/GT-America-Extended-Regular.f6ff533d.woff2" as="font" type="font/woff2" crossorigin="anonymous" data-testid="preload-link"/><title data-next-head="">How to Avoid Catastrophe</title><link rel="canonical" href="https://hbr.org/2011/04/how-to-avoid-catastrophe" data-next-head=""/><meta name="test" content="rollback" data-next-head=""/><meta name="msapplication-config" content="none" data-testid="meta"/><meta name="ox-group" content="537063787" data-testid="meta"/><meta name="page-type" content="ITEM" data-testid="meta"/><meta name="twitter:card" content="summary_large_image" data-testid="meta"/><meta name="twitter:creator" content="@harvardbiz" data-testid="meta"/><meta name="twitter:site" content="@harvardbiz" data-testid="meta"/><meta name="robots" content="max-image-preview:large" data-testid="meta"/><meta name="uid" content="28FA1DC59350BA3EDC440C9249BDD7BE" data-testid="meta"/><meta name="article-type" content="" data-testid="meta"/><meta name="article-content-type" content="Magazine Article" data-testid="meta"/><meta name="description" content="Reprint: R1104G Most business failures—such as engineering disasters, product malfunctions, and PR crises—are foreshadowed by near misses, close calls that, had luck not intervened, would have had far worse consequences. The space shuttle Columbia ’s fatal reentry, BP’s Gulf oil rig disaster, Toyota’s stuck accelerators, even the iPhone 4’s antenna failures—all were preceded by near-miss events that should have tipped off managers to impending crises. The problem is that near misses are often overlooked—or, perversely, viewed as a sign that systems are resilient and working well. That’s because managers are blinded by cognitive biases, argue Georgetown professors Tinsley and Dillon, and Brigham Young University’s Madsen. Seven strategies can help managers recognize and learn from near misses: They should be on increased alert when time or cost pressures are high; watch for deviations in operations from the norm and uncover their root causes; make decision makers accountable for near misses; envision worst-case scenarios; be on the lookout for near-misses masquerading as successes; and reward individuals for exposing near misses." data-testid="meta"/><meta name="item-name" content="How to Avoid Catastrophe" data-testid="meta"/><meta name="page-category-name" content="Strategic planning" data-testid="meta"/><meta name="shopper-attributes" content="state:guest" data-testid="meta"/><meta name="twitter:image" content="" data-testid="meta"/><meta name="article:section" content="Strategic planning" data-testid="meta"/><meta name="item-id" content="tag:hbr.org,1922-01-01:201104.47716-R1104G" data-testid="meta"/><meta property="article:publisher" content="https://www.facebook.com/HBR" data-testid="meta"/><meta property="og:site_name" content="Harvard Business Review" data-testid="meta"/><meta property="og:type" content="article" data-testid="meta"/><meta property="og:description" content="Reprint: R1104G Most business failures—such as engineering disasters, product malfunctions, and PR crises—are foreshadowed by near misses, close calls that, had luck not intervened, would have had far worse consequences. The space shuttle Columbia ’s fatal reentry, BP’s Gulf oil rig disaster, Toyota’s stuck accelerators, even the iPhone 4’s antenna failures—all were preceded by near-miss events that should have tipped off managers to impending crises. The problem is that near misses are often overlooked—or, perversely, viewed as a sign that systems are resilient and working well. That’s because managers are blinded by cognitive biases, argue Georgetown professors Tinsley and Dillon, and Brigham Young University’s Madsen. Seven strategies can help managers recognize and learn from near misses: They should be on increased alert when time or cost pressures are high; watch for deviations in operations from the norm and uncover their root causes; make decision makers accountable for near misses; envision worst-case scenarios; be on the lookout for near-misses masquerading as successes; and reward individuals for exposing near misses." data-testid="meta"/><meta property="og:image" content="" data-testid="meta"/><meta property="og:title" content="How to Avoid Catastrophe" data-testid="meta"/><meta property="article:published_time" content="2011-04-01T04:00:00.000+00:00" data-testid="meta"/><meta property="page-id" content="300" data-testid="meta"/><meta property="article:modified_time" data-testid="meta"/><meta property="page-category-id" content="391783" data-testid="meta"/><meta property="intromercial" content="false" data-testid="meta"/><meta property="issue-id" content="[object Object]" data-testid="meta"/><meta property="article:tag" content="Organizational culture" data-testid="meta"/><meta property="article:tag" content="Crisis management" data-testid="meta"/><meta property="article:tag" content="Psychology" data-testid="meta"/><meta property="article:tag" content="Strategy" data-testid="meta"/><meta property="article:tag" content="Space vehicles" data-testid="meta"/><link rel="apple-touch-icon" type="image/png" href="/resources/images/apple-touch-icon.png" sizes="152x152"/><link rel="icon" type="image/png" href="/resources/images/android-chrome-192x192.png" sizes="192x192"/><link rel="icon" type="image/png" href="/resources/images/android-chrome-512x512.png" sizes="512x512"/><link rel="preload" href="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/chunks/19qqo6ngleb1v.css" as="style"/><link rel="preload" href="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/chunks/0t42t02nxur6y.css" as="style"/><link rel="preload" href="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/chunks/30rzrq256r8kv.css" as="style"/><link rel="preload" href="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/chunks/1oeo7k2bmf4s7.css" as="style"/><link rel="preload" href="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/chunks/02t5_17983coq.css" as="style"/><link rel="preload" href="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/chunks/3p9_u7ke-1ng6.css" as="style"/><link rel="preload" href="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/chunks/2r_l8ljy5d6gg.css" as="style"/><script data-testid="mobile-ad-script">
|
||
window.googletag = window.googletag || {cmd: []};
|
||
googletag.cmd.push(() => {
|
||
window.googletag.defineSlot('/34363400/HBR_300x600', [[300,600],[300,250],[600,1200],[600,500]], 'mobile-ad')
|
||
.addService(googletag.pubads())
|
||
.setTargeting('position', '3')
|
||
.setTargeting('inventory', 'BTF')
|
||
.setTargeting('isHidden', window.innerWidth > 767 ? 'true' : 'false')
|
||
})
|
||
</script><script id="GPT-targeting" data-testid="adscript">
|
||
window.__iasPET = window.__iasPET || {};
|
||
window.__iasPET.queue = window.__iasPET.queue || [];
|
||
window.__iasPET.pubId = '931756';
|
||
|
||
var __iasResolve;
|
||
window.__iasGate = new Promise(function(resolve) {
|
||
__iasResolve = resolve;
|
||
});
|
||
var __iasTimeoutId = setTimeout(__iasResolve, 2000);
|
||
|
||
window.googletag = window.googletag || {cmd: []};
|
||
window.adEventHandlers = window.adEventHandlers || {};
|
||
|
||
const getTopicAffinity = (index) => {
|
||
const match = document.cookie.match(new RegExp('(^| )' + 'analytics_TopicAffinity' + '=([^;]+)'))
|
||
return match ? match[2].split('|')[index] ?? '' : ''
|
||
}
|
||
const getTopicsFollowed = (topics) => {
|
||
return topics?.length > 0 ? topics?.map((topic) => {
|
||
const topicName = topic.name.toLowerCase();
|
||
return (
|
||
topicName.charAt(0).toUpperCase() +
|
||
topicName.slice(1)
|
||
);
|
||
}).join('|') : ''
|
||
};
|
||
|
||
const getNewsletterNames = (newsletters) => {
|
||
return newsletters.length > 0
|
||
? newsletters.map((newsletter) => newsletter.name).join('|') : '';
|
||
};
|
||
|
||
|
||
googletag.cmd.push(function() {
|
||
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('subscribed-enls', getNewsletterNames([]));
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('pid', '300');
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('iid', 'tag:hbr.org,1922-01-01:201104.47716-R1104G');
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('page-type', 'ITEM');
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('ox-group', '537063787');
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('industry', "");
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('job-title', "");
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('company-size', "");
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('sub_access', "");
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('topics_followed', getTopicsFollowed([]));
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('topic_affinity', getTopicAffinity(0));
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('second_affinity', getTopicAffinity(1));
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('third_affinity', getTopicAffinity(2));
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('fourth_affinity', getTopicAffinity(3));
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('fifth_affinity', getTopicAffinity(4));
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('sub_status', "");
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('title', 'How to Avoid Catastrophe');
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('url', window.location.pathname);
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('dev', '0');
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('hostname', window.location.hostname);
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('sub_only', 'false');
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('category', 'Strategic planning');
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('cid', '');
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('item', 'How to Avoid Catastrophe');
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('item-name', 'How to Avoid Catastrophe');
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('article-type', 'Magazine Article');
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('author', '');
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('type', '');
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('Government_visitors', '');
|
||
googletag.pubads().setTargeting('F100_visitors', '');
|
||
|
||
|
||
window.googletag
|
||
.defineSlot('/34363400/HBR_970x90', [[970,90],[728,90],[1940,180],[300,50],[320,50],[600,100],[300,250],[600,500]], 'library-header-ad')
|
||
.addService(googletag.pubads())
|
||
.setTargeting('position', '1').setTargeting('inventory', 'ATF')
|
||
|
||
|
||
window.googletag
|
||
.defineSlot('/34363400/HBR_300x250_WelcomeAd', [[300,250]], 'library-interstitial-mobile-ad')
|
||
.addService(googletag.pubads())
|
||
|
||
|
||
|
||
window.googletag
|
||
.defineSlot('/34363400/HBR_640x480_WelcomeAd', [[640,480]], 'library-interstitial-desktop-ad')
|
||
.addService(googletag.pubads())
|
||
|
||
|
||
|
||
window.googletag
|
||
.defineSlot('/34363400/HBR_460x460', [[230,230],[460,460]], 'library-partnercenter-ad-first')
|
||
.addService(googletag.pubads())
|
||
.setTargeting('position', '11').setTargeting('inventory', 'BTF')
|
||
|
||
|
||
window.googletag
|
||
.defineSlot('/34363400/HBR_460x460', [[230,230],[460,460]], 'library-partnercenter-ad-second')
|
||
.addService(googletag.pubads())
|
||
.setTargeting('position', '12').setTargeting('inventory', 'BTF')
|
||
|
||
|
||
window.googletag
|
||
.defineSlot('/34363400/HBR_460x460', [[230,230],[460,460]], 'library-partnercenter-ad-third')
|
||
.addService(googletag.pubads())
|
||
.setTargeting('position', '13').setTargeting('inventory', 'BTF')
|
||
|
||
|
||
window.googletag
|
||
.defineSlot('/34363400/HBR_460x460', [[230,230],[460,460]], 'library-partnercenter-ad-fourth')
|
||
.addService(googletag.pubads())
|
||
.setTargeting('position', '14').setTargeting('inventory', 'BTF')
|
||
|
||
|
||
window.googletag
|
||
.defineSlot('/34363400/HBR_970x250', [[300,250],[600,500],[970,250],[728,90],[1940,500]], 'primary-ad-slot')
|
||
.addService(googletag.pubads())
|
||
.setTargeting('position', '1').setTargeting('inventory', 'ATF')
|
||
|
||
|
||
window.googletag
|
||
.defineSlot('/34363400/HBR_300x600', [[300,600],[300,250],[600,1200],[600,500]], 'right-ad')
|
||
.addService(googletag.pubads())
|
||
.setTargeting('position', '2').setTargeting('inventory', 'ATF')
|
||
|
||
|
||
window.googletag
|
||
.defineSlot('/34363400/HBR_970x250', [[300,250],[600,500],[970,250],[728,90],[1940,500]], 'DFP_IC_pos7')
|
||
.addService(googletag.pubads())
|
||
.setTargeting('position', '7').setTargeting('inventory', 'BTF')
|
||
|
||
|
||
window.googletag
|
||
.defineSlot('/34363400/HBR_970x250', [[300,250],[600,500],[970,250],[728,90],[1940,500]], 'DFP_IC_pos8')
|
||
.addService(googletag.pubads())
|
||
.setTargeting('position', '8').setTargeting('inventory', 'BTF')
|
||
|
||
|
||
window.googletag
|
||
.defineSlot('/34363400/HBR_970x250', [[300,250],[600,500],[970,250],[728,90],[1940,500]], 'DFP_IC_pos9')
|
||
.addService(googletag.pubads())
|
||
.setTargeting('position', '9').setTargeting('inventory', 'BTF')
|
||
|
||
|
||
googletag.pubads().enableSingleRequest();
|
||
googletag.enableServices();
|
||
|
||
googletag.pubads().addEventListener("slotRenderEnded", (event) => {
|
||
const slotId = event.slot.getSlotElementId();
|
||
const handler = window.adEventHandlers[slotId]
|
||
if (handler) {
|
||
handler(event);
|
||
};
|
||
});
|
||
|
||
var gptSlots = googletag.pubads().getSlots();
|
||
var iasPETSlots = gptSlots.map(function(slot) {
|
||
return {
|
||
adSlotId: slot.getSlotElementId(),
|
||
size: slot.getSizes().map(function(s) {
|
||
return (s.getWidth && s.getHeight) ? [s.getWidth(), s.getHeight()] : [1, 1];
|
||
}),
|
||
adUnitPath: slot.getAdUnitPath(),
|
||
};
|
||
});
|
||
window.__iasPET.queue.push({
|
||
adSlots: iasPETSlots,
|
||
dataHandler: function() {
|
||
clearTimeout(__iasTimeoutId);
|
||
window.__iasPET.setTargetingForGPT();
|
||
__iasResolve();
|
||
},
|
||
});
|
||
})
|
||
</script><script data-next-head="">window.digitalData = {"page":{"pageInfo":{"date":"09-11-2026","time":"08:05 PM","deviceType":"Desktop","pageURL":"https://hbr.org/2011/04/how-to-avoid-catastrophe","referringURL":"","language":"en","contentType":"Magazine Article","pageName":"How to Avoid Catastrophe","pageType":"Article","pageCategoryID":"391783","pageCategoryName":"Strategic planning","pageDescription":"Reprint: R1104G Most business failures—such as engineering disasters, product malfunctions, and PR crises—are foreshadowed by near misses, close calls that, had luck not intervened, would have had far worse consequences. The space shuttle Columbia ’s fatal reentry, BP’s Gulf oil rig disaster, Toyota’s stuck accelerators, even the iPhone 4’s antenna failures—all were preceded by near-miss events that should have tipped off managers to impending crises. The problem is that near misses are often overlooked—or, perversely, viewed as a sign that systems are resilient and working well. That’s because managers are blinded by cognitive biases, argue Georgetown professors Tinsley and Dillon, and Brigham Young University’s Madsen. Seven strategies can help managers recognize and learn from near misses: They should be on increased alert when time or cost pressures are high; watch for deviations in operations from the norm and uncover their root causes; make decision makers accountable for near misses; envision worst-case scenarios; be on the lookout for near-misses masquerading as successes; and reward individuals for exposing near misses."},"attributes":{"articleEditorialDistinction":null,"articleContentType":"Magazine Article","articleType":"Magazine Article","articleAuthor":[{"authorName":"Catherine H. Tinsley"},{"authorName":"Robin L. Dillon"},{"authorName":"Peter M. Madsen"}],"articleID":"tag:hbr.org,1922-01-01:201104.47716-R1104G","articleTitle":"How to Avoid Catastrophe","articlePrimaryTopic":"Strategic planning","articlePublishDate":"2011-04-01","articlePostingDate":"2011-04-01","primaryAuthor":"Catherine H. Tinsley","articleSubTopics":[{"subTopicName":"Strategic planning"},{"subTopicName":"Organizational culture"},{"subTopicName":"Crisis management"},{"subTopicName":"Psychology"},{"subTopicName":"Strategy"},{"subTopicName":"Space vehicles"}],"articlePrimaryEditor":"","articleTags":"Magazine Article","configSubscriberOnly":false,"configNoIntromercial":false,"configExemptFromPaywall":false,"editorTags":[{"tagValue":"Import Notice"},{"tagValue":"Missing Image"}],"articleFindingMethod":"External","giftedArticle":false,"noaPlayerDisplayed":"False","configHBRExecExclusive":"False","hbrExecType":""}},"users":[{"profile":{"dateLastVisit":"2026-09-12","daysSinceLastVisit":"Less than one day","guid":"482C9D54943C9A0766089D57AB45302F","userState":"Guest","quota":{"limit":2,"remaining":1},"feeds":[],"marketingCampaigns":[],"newsletters":[]}}],"pageInstanceID":"How to Avoid Catastropheproduction"}</script><script id="structured-data" data-testid="script" type="application/ld+json" data-nscript="beforeInteractive">{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"Article","headline":"How to Avoid Catastrophe","description":"Failures happen. But if you pay attention to near misses, you can predict and prevent crises.","abstract":"Reprint: R1104G Most business failures—such as engineering disasters, product malfunctions, and PR crises—are foreshadowed by near misses, close calls that, had luck not intervened, would have had far worse consequences. The space shuttle Columbia ’s fatal reentry, BP’s Gulf oil rig disaster, Toyota’s stuck accelerators, even the iPhone 4’s antenna failures—all were preceded by near-miss events that should have tipped off managers to impending crises. The problem is that near misses are often overlooked—or, perversely, viewed as a sign that systems are resilient and working well. That’s because managers are blinded by cognitive biases, argue Georgetown professors Tinsley and Dillon, and Brigham Young University’s Madsen. Seven strategies can help managers recognize and learn from near misses: They should be on increased alert when time or cost pressures are high; watch for deviations in operations from the norm and uncover their root causes; make decision makers accountable for near misses; envision worst-case scenarios; be on the lookout for near-misses masquerading as successes; and reward individuals for exposing near misses.","datePublished":"2011-04-01T04:00:00.000+00:00","url":"https://hbr.org/2011/04/how-to-avoid-catastrophe","articleBody":"The Idea in Brief Most business failures, such as engineering disasters, product malfunctions, and PR crises, are preceded by near misses—close calls that, had it not been for chance, would have been worse. Managers often misinterpret these warning signs because they are blinded by cognitive biases. They take the near misses as indications that systems are working well—or they don’t notice them at all. Seven strategies can help managers recognize and learn from near misses. Managers should: (1) be on alert when time or cost pressures are high; (2) watch for deviations from the norm; (3) uncover the deviations’ root causes; (4) hold themselves accountable for near misses; (5) envision worst-case scenarios; (6) look for near misses masquerading as successes; and (7) reward individuals for exposing near misses. Most people think of “near misses” as harrowing close calls that could have been a lot worse—when a firefighter escapes a burning building moments before it collapses, or when a tornado miraculously veers away from a town in its path. Events like these are rare narrow escapes that leave us shaken and looking for lessons. But there’s another class of near misses, ones that are much more common and pernicious. These are the often unremarked small failures that permeate day-to-day business but cause no immediate harm. People are hardwired to misinterpret or ignore the warnings embedded in these failures, and so they often go unexamined or, perversely, are seen as signs that systems are resilient and things are going well. Yet these seemingly innocuous events are often harbingers; if conditions shift slightly, or if luck does not intervene, a crisis erupts. Consider the BP Gulf oil rig disaster. As a case study in the anatomy of near misses and the consequences of misreading them, it’s close to perfect. In April 2010, a gas blowout occurred during the cementing of the Deepwater Horizon well. The blowout ignited, killing 11 people, sinking the rig, and triggering a massive underwater spill that would take months to contain. Numerous poor decisions and dangerous conditions contributed to the disaster: Drillers had used too few centralizers to position the pipe, the lubricating “drilling mud” was removed too early, managers had misinterpreted vital test results that would have confirmed that hydrocarbons were seeping from the well. In addition, BP relied on an older version of a complex fail-safe device called a blowout preventer that had a notoriously spotty track record. Why did Transocean (the rig’s owner), BP executives, rig managers, and the drilling crew overlook the warning signs, even though the well had been plagued by technical problems all along (crew members called it “the well from hell”)? We believe that the stakeholders were lulled into complacency by a catalog of previous near misses in the industry—successful outcomes in which luck played a key role in averting disaster. Increasing numbers of ultradeep wells were being drilled, but significant oil spills or fatalities were extremely rare. And many Gulf of Mexico wells had suffered minor blowouts during cementing (dozens of them in the past two decades); however, in each case chance factors—favorable wind direction, no one welding near the leak at the time, for instance—helped prevent an explosion. Each near miss, rather than raise alarms and prompt investigations, was taken as an indication that existing methods and safety procedures worked. For the past seven years, we have studied near misses in dozens of companies across industries from telecommunications to automobiles, at NASA, and in lab simulations. Our research reveals a pattern: Multiple near misses preceded (and foreshadowed) every disaster and business crisis we studied, and most of the misses were ignored or misread. Our work also shows that cognitive biases conspire to blind managers to the near misses. Two in particular cloud our judgment. The first is “normalization of deviance,” the tendency over time to accept anomalies—particularly risky ones—as normal. Think of the growing comfort a worker might feel with using a ladder with a broken rung; the more times he climbs the dangerous ladder without incident, the safer he feels it is. For an organization, such normalization can be catastrophic. Columbia University sociologist Diane Vaughan coined the phrase in her book The Challenger Launch Decision to describe the organizational behaviors that allowed a glaring mechanical anomaly on the space shuttle to gradually be viewed as a normal flight risk—dooming its crew. The second cognitive error is the so-called outcome bias. When people observe successful outcomes, they tend to focus on the results more than on the (often unseen) complex processes that led to them. Recognizing and learning from near misses isn’t simply a matter of paying attention; it actually runs contrary to human nature. In this article, we examine near misses and reveal how companies can detect and learn from them. By seeing them for what they are—instructive failures—managers can apply their lessons to improve operations and, potentially, ward off catastrophe. Roots of Crises Consider this revealing experiment: We asked business students, NASA personnel, and space-industry contractors to evaluate a fictional project manager, Chris, who was supervising the launch of an unmanned spacecraft and had made a series of decisions, including skipping the investigation of a potential design flaw and forgoing a peer review, because of time pressure. Each participant was given one of three scenarios: The spacecraft launched without issue and was able to transmit data (success outcome); shortly after launch, the spacecraft had a problem caused by the design flaw, but because of the way the sun happened to be aligned with the vehicle it was still able to transmit data (near-miss outcome); or the craft had a problem caused by the flaw and, because of the sun’s chance alignment, it failed to transmit data and was lost (failure outcome). How did Chris fare? Participants were just as likely to praise his decision making, leadership abilities, and the overall mission in the success case as in the near-miss case—though the latter plainly succeeded only because of blind luck. When people observe a successful outcome, their natural tendency is to assume that the process that led to it was fundamentally sound, even when it demonstrably wasn’t; hence the common phrase “you can’t argue with success.” In fact, you can—and should. Organizational disasters, studies show, rarely have a single cause. Rather, they are initiated by the unexpected interaction of multiple small, often seemingly unimportant, human errors, technological failures, or bad business decisions. These latent errors combine with enabling conditions to produce a significant failure. A latent error on an oil rig might be a cementing procedure that allows gas to escape; enabling conditions might be a windless day and a welder working near the leak. Together, the latent error and enabling conditions ignite a deadly firestorm. Near misses arise from the same preconditions, but in the absence of enabling conditions, they produce only small failures and thus go undetected or are ignored. Latent errors often exist for long periods of time before they combine with enabling conditions to produce a significant failure. Whether an enabling condition transforms a near miss into a crisis generally depends on chance; thus, it makes little sense to try to predict or control enabling conditions. Instead, companies should focus on identifying and fixing latent errors before circumstances allow them to create a crisis. Little Near Misses and Small-Scale Failures We’ve used dramatic cases such as oil spills and shuttle disasters to illustrate how near misses can foreshadow huge calamities. But near misses are relevant to managers at all levels in their day-to-day work, as they can also presage lesser but still consequential problems. Research on workplace safety, for example, estimates that for every 1,000 near misses, one accident results in a serious injury or fatality, at least 10 smaller accidents cause minor injuries, and 30 cause property damage but no injury. Identifying near misses and addressing the latent errors that give rise to them can head off the even the more mundane problems that distract organizations and sap their resources. Imagine an associate who misses deadlines and is chronically late for client meetings but is otherwise a high performer. Each tardy project and late arrival is a near miss; but by addressing the symptoms of the problem—covering for the employee in a variety of ways—his manager is able to prevent clients from defecting. By doing this, however, she permits a small but significant erosion of client satisfaction, team cohesiveness, and organizational performance. And eventually, a client may jump ship—an outcome that could have been avoided by attending to the near misses. Your organization needn’t face a threat as serious as an oil spill to benefit from exposing near misses of all types and addressing their root causes. Oil rig explosions offer a dramatic case in point, but latent errors and enabling conditions in business often combine to produce less spectacular but still costly crises—corporate failures that attention to latent errors could have prevented. Let’s look at three. Bad Apple. Take Apple’s experience following its launch of the iPhone 4, in June 2010. Almost immediately, customers began complaining about dropped calls and poor signal strength. Apple’s initial response was to blame users for holding the phone the wrong way, thus covering the external antenna, and to advise them to “avoid gripping [the phone] in the lower left corner.” When questioned about the problem by a user on a web forum, CEO Steve Jobs fired back an e-mail describing the dropped calls as a “non issue.” Many customers found Apple’s posture arrogant and insulting and made their displeasure known through social and mainstream media. Several filed class action lawsuits, including a suit that alleged “fraud by concealment, negligence, intentional misrepresentation and defective design.” The reputation crisis reached a crescendo in mid-July, when Consumer Reports declined to recommend the iPhone 4 (it had recommended all previous versions). Ultimately Apple backpedaled, acknowledging software errors and offering owners software updates and iPhone cases to address the antenna problem. The latent errors underlying the crisis had long been present. As Jobs demonstrated during a press conference, virtually all smartphones experience a drop in signal strength when users touch the external antenna. This flaw had existed in earlier Phones, as well as in competitors’ phones, for years. The phones’ signal strength problem was also well known. Other latent errors emerged as the crisis gained momentum, notably an evasive PR strategy that invited a backlash. Consumers’ enduring the iPhone’s problems for years without comment was a sign not of a solid strategy but of an ongoing near miss. That consumers had endured the performance issues for years without significant comment was not a sign of a successful strategy but of an ongoing near miss. When coupled with the right enabling conditions—Consumer Reports’ withering and widely quoted review and the expanding reach of social media—a crisis erupted. If Apple had recognized consumers’ forbearance as an ongoing near miss and proactively fixed the phones’ technical problems, it could have avoided the crisis. It didn’t, we suspect, because of normalization bias, which made the antenna glitch seem increasingly acceptable; and because of outcome bias, which led managers to conclude that the lack of outcry about the phones’ shortcomings reflected their own good strategy—rather than good luck. Speed Warning. On August 28, 2009, California Highway Patrol officer Mark Saylor and three family members died in a fiery crash after the gas pedal of the Lexus sedan they were driving in stuck, accelerating the car to more than 120 miles per hour. A 911 call from the speeding car captured the horrifying moments before the crash and was replayed widely in the news and social media. Up to this point, Toyota, which makes Lexus, had downplayed the more than 2,000 complaints of unintended acceleration among its cars it had received since 2001. The Saylor tragedy forced the company to seriously investigate the problem. Ultimately, Toyota recalled more than 6 million vehicles in late 2009 and early 2010 and temporarily halted production and sales of eight models, sustaining an estimated $2 billion loss in North American sales alone and immeasurable harm to its reputation. Complaints about vehicle acceleration and speed control are common for all automakers, and in most cases, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the problems are caused by driver error, not a vehicle defect. However, beginning in 2001, about the time that Toyota introduced a new accelerator design, complaints of acceleration problems in Toyotas increased sharply, whereas such complaints remained relatively constant for other automakers (see the exhibit “Toyota Pedal Problems”). Toyota could have averted the crisis if it had noted this deviation and acknowledged the thousands of complaints for what they were—near misses. Here, too, normalization of deviance and outcome bias, along with other factors, conspired to obscure the grave implications of the near misses. Only when an enabling condition occurred—the Saylor family tragedy and the ensuing media storm—did the latent error trigger a crisis. Misreading the Evidence Errors in process or product design are often ignored, even when the warning signs clearly call for action. The more times small failures occur without disaster, the more complacent managers become. Jet Black and Blue. Since it began operating, in 2000, JetBlue Airways has taken an aggressive approach to bad weather, canceling proportionately fewer flights than other airlines and directing its pilots to pull away from gates as soon as possible in severe weather so as to be near the front of the line when runways were cleared for takeoff—even if that meant loaded planes would sit for some time on the tarmac. For several years, this policy seemed to work. On-tarmac delays were not arduously long, and customers were by and large accepting of them. Nonetheless, it was a risky strategy, exposing the airline to the danger of stranding passengers for extended periods if conditions abruptly worsened. The wake-up call came on February 14, 2007. A massive ice storm at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport caused widespread disruption—but no carrier was harder hit than JetBlue, whose assertive pilots now found themselves stuck on the tarmac (literally, in some cases, because of frozen wheels) and with no open gates to return to. Distressed passengers on several planes were trapped for up to 11 hours in overheated, foul-smelling cabins with little food or water. The media served up angry first-person accounts of the ordeal, and a chastened David Neeleman, JetBlue’s CEO, acknowledged on CNBC, “We did a horrible job, actually, of getting our customers off those airplanes.” The airline reported canceling more than 250 of its 505 flights that day—a much higher proportion than any other airline. It lost millions of dollars and squandered priceless consumer loyalty. For JetBlue, each of the thousands of flights that took off before the competition during previous weather delays was a near miss. As the airline continued to get away with the risky strategy, managers who had expressed concern early on about the way the airline handled flight delays became complacent, even as long delays mounted. Indeed, the proportion of JetBlue weather-based delays of two hours or more roughly tripled between 2003 and 2007, whereas such delays remained fairly steady at other major U.S. airlines (see the exhibit “JetBlue Tarmac Trouble”). Rather than perceiving that a dramatic increase in delays represented a dramatic increase in risk, JetBlue managers saw only successfully launched flights. It took an enabling condition—the ferocious ice storm—to turn the latent error into a crisis. Recognizing and Preventing Near Misses Our research suggests seven strategies that can help organizations recognize near misses and root out the latent errors behind them. We have developed many of these strategies in collaboration with NASA—an organization that was initially slow to recognize the relevance of near misses but is now developing enterprisewide programs to identify, learn from, and prevent them. 1. Heed High Pressure. The greater the pressure to meet performance goals such as tight schedules, cost, or production targets, the more likely managers are to discount near-miss signals or misread them as signs of sound decision making. BP’s managers knew the company was incurring overrun costs of $1 million a day in rig lease and contractor fees, which surely contributed to their failure to recognize warning signs. The high-pressure effect also contributed to the Columbia space shuttle disaster, in which insulation foam falling from the external fuel tank damaged the shuttle’s wing during liftoff, causing the shuttle to break apart as it reentered the atmosphere. Managers had been aware of the foam issue since the start of the shuttle program and were concerned about it early on, but as dozens of flights proceeded without serious mishap, they began to classify foam strikes as maintenance issues—rather than as near misses. This classic case of normalization of deviance was exacerbated by the enormous political pressure the agency was under at the time to complete the International Space Station’s main core. Delays on the shuttle, managers knew, would slow down the space station project. Despite renewed concern about foam strikes caused by a particularly dramatic recent near miss, and with an investigation under way, the Columbia took off. According to the Columbia Accident Investigation Board, “The pressure of maintaining the flight schedule created a management atmosphere that increasingly accepted less-than-specification performance of various components and systems.” When people make decisions under pressure, psychological research shows, they tend to rely on heuristics, or rules of thumb, and thus are more easily influenced by biases. In high-pressure work environments, managers should expect people to be more easily swayed by outcome bias, more likely to normalize deviance, and more apt to believe that their decisions are sound. Organizations should encourage, or even require, employees to examine their decisions during pressure-filled periods and ask, “If I had more time and resources, would I make the same decision?” 2. Learn from Deviations. As the Toyota and JetBlue crises suggest, managers’ response when some aspect of operations skews from the norm is often to recalibrate what they consider acceptable risk. Our research shows that in such cases, decision makers may clearly understand the statistical risk represented by the deviation, but grow increasingly less concerned about it. We’ve seen this effect clearly in a laboratory setting. Turning again to the space program for insight, we asked study participants to assume operational control of a Mars rover in a simulated mission. Each morning they received a weather report and had to decide whether or not to drive onward. On the second day, they learned that there was a 95% chance of a severe sandstorm, which had a 40% chance of causing catastrophic wheel failure. Half the participants were told that the rover had successfully driven through sandstorms in the past (that is, it had emerged unscathed in several prior near misses); the other half had no information about the rover’s luck in past storms. When the time came to choose whether or not to risk the drive, three quarters of the near-miss group opted to continue driving; only 13% of the other group did. Both groups knew, and indeed stated that they knew, that the risk of failure was 40%—but the near-miss group was much more comfortable with that level of risk. Managers should seek out operational deviations from the norm and examine whether their reasons for tolerating the associated risk have merit. Questions to ask might be: Have we always been comfortable with this level of risk? Has our policy toward this risk changed over time? 3. Uncover Root Causes. When managers identify deviations, their reflex is often to correct the symptom rather than its cause. Such was Apple’s response when it at first suggested that customers address the antenna problem by changing the way they held the iPhone. NASA learned this lesson the hard way as well, during its 1998 Mars Climate Orbiter mission. As the spacecraft headed toward Mars it drifted slightly off course four times; each time, managers made small trajectory adjustments, but they didn’t investigate the cause of the drifting. As the $200 million spacecraft approached Mars, instead of entering into orbit, it disintegrated in the atmosphere. Only then did NASA uncover the latent error—programmers had used English rather than metric units in their software coding. The course corrections addressed the symptom of the problem but not the underlying cause. Their apparent success lulled decision makers into thinking that the issue had been adequately resolved. The health care industry has made great strides in learning from near misses and offers a model for others. Providers are increasingly encouraged to report mistakes and near misses so that the lessons can be teased out and applied. An article in Today’s Hospitalist, for example, describes a near miss at Delnor-Community Hospital, in Geneva, Illinois. Two patients sharing a hospital room had similar last names and were prescribed drugs with similar-sounding names—Cytotec and Cytoxan. Confused by the similarities, a nurse nearly administered one of the drugs to the wrong patient. Luckily, she caught her mistake in time and filed a report detailing the close call. The hospital immediately separated the patients and created a policy to prevent patients with similar names from sharing rooms in the future. 4. Demand Accountability. Even when people are aware of near misses, they tend to downgrade their importance. One way to limit this potentially dangerous effect is to require managers to justify their assessments of near misses. Remember Chris, the fictional manager in our study who neglected some due diligence in his supervision of a space mission? Participants gave him equally good marks for the success scenario and the near-miss scenario. Chris’s raters didn’t seem to see that the near miss was in fact a near disaster. In a continuation of that study, we told a separate group of managers and contractors that they would have to justify their assessment of Chris to upper management. Knowing they’d have to explain their rating to the bosses, those evaluating the near-miss scenario judged Chris’s performance just as harshly as did those who had learned the mission had failed—recognizing, it seems, that rather than managing well, he’d simply dodged a bullet. 5. Consider Worst-Case Scenarios. Unless expressly advised to do so, people tend not to think through the possible negative consequences of near misses. Apple managers, for example, were aware of the iPhone’s antenna problems but probably hadn’t imagined how bad a consumer backlash could get. If they had considered a worst-case scenario, they might have headed off the crisis, our research suggests. In one study, we told participants to suppose that an impending hurricane had a 30% chance of hitting their house and asked them if they would evacuate. Just as in our Mars rover study, people who were told that they’d escaped disaster in previous near misses were more likely to take a chance (in this case, opting to stay home). However, when we told participants to suppose that, although their house had survived previous hurricanes, a neighbor’s house had been hit by a tree during one, they saw things differently; this group was far more likely to evacuate. Examining events closely helps people distinguish between near misses and successes, and they’ll often adjust their decision making accordingly. Managers in Walmart’s business-continuity office clearly understand this. For several years prior to Hurricane Katrina, the office had carefully evaluated previous hurricane near misses of its stores and infrastructure and, based on them, planned for a direct hit to a metro area where it had a large presence. In the days before Katrina made landfall in Louisiana, the company expanded the staff of its emergency command center from the usual six to 10 people to more than 50, and stockpiled food, water, and emergency supplies in its local warehouses. Having learned from prior near misses, Walmart famously outperformed local and federal officials in responding to the disaster. Said Jefferson Parish sheriff Harry Lee, “If the American government had responded like Walmart has responded, we wouldn’t be in this crisis.” 6. Evaluate Projects at Every Stage. When things go badly, managers commonly conduct postmortems to determine causes and prevent recurrences. When they go well, however, few do formal reviews of the success to capture its lessons. Because near misses can look like successes, they often escape scrutiny. This article also appears in: HBR’s 10 Must Reads on Making Smart Decisions The chief knowledge officer at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Edward Rogers, instituted a “pause and learn” process in which teams discuss at each project milestone what they have learned. They not only cover mishaps but also expressly examine perceived successes and the design decisions considered along the way. By critically examining projects while they’re under way, teams avoid outcome bias and are more likely to see near misses for what they are. These sessions are followed by knowledge-sharing workshops involving a broader group of teams. Other NASA centers, including the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which manages NASA’s Mars program, are beginning similar experiments. According to Rogers, most projects that have used the pause-and-learn process have uncovered near misses—typically, design flaws that had gone undetected. “Almost every mishap at NASA can be traced to some series of small signals that went unnoticed at the critical moment,” he says. 7. Reward Owning Up. Seeing and attending to near misses requires organizational alertness, but no amount of attention will avert failure if people aren’t motivated to expose near misses—or, worse, are discouraged from doing so. In many organizations, employees have reason to keep quiet about failures, and in that type of environment they’re likely to keep suspicions about near misses to themselves. Political scientists Martin Landau and Donald Chisholm described one such case that, though it took place on the deck of a warship, is relevant to any organization. An enlisted seaman on an aircraft carrier discovered during a combat exercise that he’d lost a tool on the deck. He knew that an errant tool could cause a catastrophe if it were sucked into a jet engine, and he was also aware that admitting the mistake could bring a halt to the exercise—and potential punishment. As long as the tool was unaccounted for, each successful takeoff and landing would be a near miss, a lucky outcome. He reported the mistake, the exercise was stopped, and all aircraft aloft were redirected to bases on land, at a significant cost. Rather than being punished for his error, the seaman was commended by his commanding officer in a formal ceremony for his bravery in reporting it. Leaders in any organization should publicly reward staff for uncovering near misses—including their own. Two forces conspire to make learning from near misses difficult: Cognitive biases make them hard to see, and, even when they are visible, leaders tend not to grasp their significance. Thus, organizations often fail to expose and correct latent errors even when the cost of doing so is small—and so they miss opportunities for organizational improvement before disaster strikes. This tendency is itself a type of organizational failure—a failure to learn from “cheap” data. Surfacing near misses and correcting root causes is one the soundest investments an organization can make.","isAccessibleForFree":false,"publisher":{"name":"Harvard Business Review","url":"https://hbr.org/"}}</script><link rel="stylesheet" href="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/chunks/19qqo6ngleb1v.css" data-n-g=""/><link rel="stylesheet" href="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/chunks/0t42t02nxur6y.css" data-n-g=""/><link rel="stylesheet" href="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/chunks/30rzrq256r8kv.css" data-n-g=""/><link rel="stylesheet" href="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/chunks/1oeo7k2bmf4s7.css" data-n-g=""/><link rel="stylesheet" href="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/chunks/02t5_17983coq.css" data-n-g=""/><link rel="stylesheet" href="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/chunks/3p9_u7ke-1ng6.css" data-n-p=""/><link rel="stylesheet" href="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/chunks/2r_l8ljy5d6gg.css" data-n-p=""/><noscript data-n-css=""></noscript><script src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/chunks/05xkj5gqwah4t.js" defer=""></script><script src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/chunks/3f5acd4y-sgig.js" defer=""></script><script src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/chunks/0elbzq6ce-723.js" defer=""></script><script src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/chunks/42-p_x1wwwscc.js" defer=""></script><script src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/chunks/1q626g0-wrs8t.js" defer=""></script><script src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/chunks/turbopack-3xforwk7bhdhp.js" defer=""></script><script src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/chunks/2dfdliq269wsx.js" defer=""></script><script src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/chunks/25osxoplwi8k4.js" defer=""></script><script src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/chunks/turbopack-0k7bjxvmnas22.js" defer=""></script><script src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/Gg7YHWGdcqxsJffs2T7OU/_buildManifest.js" defer=""></script><script src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/Gg7YHWGdcqxsJffs2T7OU/_ssgManifest.js" defer=""></script><script src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/Gg7YHWGdcqxsJffs2T7OU/_clientMiddlewareManifest.js" defer=""></script></head><body><link rel="preload" as="image" href="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/media/Twitter.2ht2cms5y_jst.svg"/><link rel="preload" as="image" href="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/media/Facebook.0fa87g7qokkir.svg"/><link rel="preload" as="image" href="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/media/LinkedIn.1rxjnbz72rdut.svg"/><link rel="preload" as="image" href="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/media/Save.0u3z0-ektfs6x.svg"/><link rel="preload" as="image" href="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/media/Print.36pu1c-y-hkee.svg"/><link rel="preload" as="image" href="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/media/close.18diym-sk5pqf.svg"/><div id="__next"><a href="#main" class="SkipLink-module-scss-module__Z8h4HG__skip-link">SKIP TO CONTENT</a><div class="Standard-module-scss-module__yt85fq__top-container"><div class="Standard-module-scss-module__yt85fq__primary-ad-container"><div class="PrimaryAd-module-scss-module__ZvHXSq__ad-container" data-testid="ad-container"><div data-testid="ad" id="primary-ad-slot" class=""></div></div></div><div class="Standard-module-scss-module__yt85fq__header-container"><div class="Header-module_resize__--1Z3"></div><header class="Header-module_header__qxHtx"><div class="Header-module_main-content__pEOjn"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Header-module_logo-link__XfxPZ" href="/"><svg class="Header-module_big-logo__0VZGX" x="0" y="0" viewBox="0 0 130 148" aria-labelledby="logo_R_abhm6_" role="img"><title id="logo_R_abhm6_">Harvard Business Review Logo</title><path d="M21.3729 54.332V50.78C21.3729 49.2013 20.5031 47.9022 19.0534 47.3102L18.8546 47.228L19.0534 47.154C20.4037 46.6689 21.2072 45.3862 21.2072 43.7171V40.6667C21.2072 37.3531 19.3434 35.6758 15.6736 35.6758H9.05469V59.3229H15.8392C19.509 59.3229 21.3729 57.6456 21.3729 54.332ZM13.9671 39.7869H15.1682C15.8807 39.7869 16.2866 40.2884 16.2866 41.16V43.75C16.2866 44.6216 15.8807 45.1231 15.1682 45.1231H13.9671V39.7869ZM13.9671 55.2036V49.1684H15.1351C15.9884 49.1684 16.4191 49.6618 16.4191 50.6402V53.8222C16.4191 54.7102 16.0132 55.1953 15.2676 55.1953H13.9671V55.2036Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M34.8668 35.6758H29.8882V54.036C29.8882 54.9487 29.4823 55.4749 28.7698 55.4749C28.0574 55.4749 27.6184 54.9322 27.6184 54.036V35.6758H22.6729V54.1676C22.6729 57.4647 25.0669 59.5942 28.7698 59.5942C32.4728 59.5942 34.8668 57.4647 34.8668 54.1676V35.6758Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M41.908 59.5859C45.6109 59.5859 48.005 57.4563 48.005 54.1592V51.0759C48.005 49.0779 47.392 47.9267 45.7352 46.8332L41.8252 44.0787C41.2287 43.6347 41.0216 43.199 41.0216 42.385V40.9625C41.0216 39.7703 41.6098 39.5236 42.1068 39.5236C42.7861 39.5236 43.1589 40.0334 43.1589 40.9625V43.7827H47.9719V40.831C47.9719 37.4352 45.7766 35.4043 42.1068 35.4043C38.437 35.4043 36.043 37.5339 36.043 40.831V43.3881C36.043 45.3861 36.656 46.5372 38.3128 47.6307L42.2228 50.4181C42.753 50.8127 43.0263 51.1827 43.0263 52.1119V54.0359C43.0263 54.965 42.6536 55.4747 41.9743 55.4747C41.4772 55.4747 40.8891 55.2281 40.8891 54.0359V50.7881H36.043V54.1674C36.043 57.5632 38.2382 59.5941 41.908 59.5941V59.5859Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M54.334 35.6758H49.3223V59.3229H54.334V35.6758Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M64.3746 59.3229H68.7568V35.6758H64.2752V41.8589L64.3497 47.0142H63.9024L61.2681 35.6758H56.2811V59.3229H60.7628V51.446L60.6965 46.488H61.1355L64.3746 59.3229Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M80.1721 40.05V35.6758H70.7118V59.3229H80.1721V54.9404H75.591V49.3082H79.6005V44.9258H75.591V40.05H80.1721Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M92.9786 51.0846C92.9786 49.0866 92.3656 47.9355 90.7088 46.842L86.7988 44.0875C86.2024 43.6435 85.9952 43.2078 85.9952 42.3938V40.9713C85.9952 39.7791 86.5834 39.5324 87.0805 39.5324C87.7597 39.5324 88.1325 40.0422 88.1325 40.9713V43.7915H92.9455V40.8398C92.9455 37.444 90.7502 35.4131 87.0805 35.4131C83.4107 35.4131 81.0166 37.5426 81.0166 40.8398V43.3969C81.0166 45.3949 81.6296 46.546 83.2864 47.6395L87.1964 50.4269C87.7266 50.8215 88 51.1915 88 52.1206V54.0446C88 54.9738 87.6272 55.4835 86.9479 55.4835C86.4509 55.4835 85.8627 55.2369 85.8627 54.0446V50.7969H81.0166V54.1762C81.0166 57.572 83.2118 59.6029 86.8816 59.6029C90.5514 59.6029 92.9786 57.4733 92.9786 54.1762V51.0846Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M106.076 51.0846C106.076 49.0866 105.463 47.9355 103.806 46.842L99.8965 44.0875C99.3 43.6435 99.0929 43.2078 99.0929 42.3938V40.9713C99.0929 39.7791 99.6811 39.5324 100.178 39.5324C100.857 39.5324 101.23 40.0422 101.23 40.9713V43.7915H106.043V40.8398C106.043 37.444 103.848 35.4131 100.178 35.4131C96.5083 35.4131 94.1143 37.5426 94.1143 40.8398V43.3969C94.1143 45.3949 94.7273 46.546 96.3841 47.6395L100.294 50.4269C100.824 50.8215 101.098 51.1915 101.098 52.1206V54.0446C101.098 54.9738 100.725 55.4835 100.046 55.4835C99.5485 55.4835 98.9604 55.2369 98.9604 54.0446V50.7969H94.1143V54.1762C94.1143 57.572 96.3095 59.6029 99.9793 59.6029C103.649 59.6029 106.076 57.4733 106.076 54.1762V51.0846Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M21.696 32.6417V8.98633H16.7091V18.2446H14.0748V8.98633H9.05469V32.6417H14.0748V22.6188H16.7091V32.6417H21.696Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M30.8663 27.8651L31.3634 32.6422H36.2095L32.987 8.99512H25.7137L22.5244 32.6422H27.2048L27.6687 27.8651H30.8663ZM28.3977 19.8813L28.8782 15.3345H29.6238L30.1456 19.8813L30.6344 23.9513H27.909L28.3977 19.8813Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M49.7285 32.6418C49.4386 31.7785 49.3972 30.5945 49.3972 29.542V24.4032C49.3972 22.6847 48.6599 21.4514 47.3096 20.9334L47.1025 20.8512L47.3096 20.7772C48.6599 20.292 49.4635 19.0094 49.4635 17.3403V13.9938C49.4635 10.6803 47.5996 9.00293 43.9298 9.00293H37.1121V32.65H42.0576V23.03H43.1925C43.7641 23.03 44.4434 23.2849 44.4434 24.5018V29.7065C44.4434 30.652 44.4848 31.8278 44.783 32.6418H49.7285ZM43.3665 18.812H42.0659V13.2127H43.3665C44.0706 13.2127 44.4848 13.7307 44.4848 14.5858V17.4389C44.4848 18.3105 44.0789 18.812 43.3665 18.812Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M58.5261 8.9873L57.4989 19.7913L57.0598 25.0782H56.538L56.0989 19.7913L55.0303 8.9873H49.9688L53.5143 32.6426H59.8101L63.3971 8.9873H58.5261Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M84.5049 32.6428H89.4422C89.1522 31.7795 89.1108 30.5955 89.1108 29.543V24.4041C89.1108 22.6857 88.3735 21.4524 87.0232 20.9343L86.8244 20.8521L87.0315 20.7781C88.3818 20.293 89.1854 19.0104 89.1854 17.3412V13.9948C89.1854 10.6812 87.3215 9.00391 83.6517 9.00391H76.834V32.651H81.7795V23.031H82.9144C83.486 23.031 84.1653 23.2859 84.1653 24.5028V29.7075C84.1653 30.653 84.2067 31.8288 84.5049 32.6428ZM83.0801 18.813H81.7795V13.2137H83.0801C83.7842 13.2137 84.1984 13.7317 84.1984 14.5868V17.4399C84.1984 18.3115 83.7925 18.813 83.0801 18.813Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M103.276 14.414C103.276 11.0675 100.973 8.9873 97.2784 8.9873H90.9246V32.6344H97.2784C100.981 32.6344 103.276 30.5542 103.276 27.2077V14.4057V14.414ZM98.2973 27.0515C98.2973 27.9149 97.8831 28.4246 97.179 28.4246H95.8784V13.2053H97.179C97.8831 13.2053 98.2973 13.7233 98.2973 14.5784V27.0515Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M70.6041 27.8651L71.1094 32.6422H75.9555L72.7331 8.99511H65.4598L62.2704 32.6422H66.9509L67.4148 27.8651H70.6041ZM68.1355 19.8813L68.616 15.3344H69.3615L69.8834 19.8813L70.3721 23.9513H67.6467L68.1355 19.8813Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M16.7336 86.0129H21.6708C21.3809 85.1496 21.3394 83.9656 21.3394 82.9131V77.7742C21.3394 76.0558 20.6022 74.8225 19.2519 74.3045L19.0531 74.2222L19.2602 74.1482C20.6105 73.6631 21.414 72.3805 21.414 70.7114V67.3649C21.414 64.0514 19.5501 62.374 15.8803 62.374H9.06264V86.0211H14.0082V76.4011H15.1431C15.7146 76.4011 16.3939 76.656 16.3939 77.8729V83.0776C16.3939 84.0231 16.4354 85.1989 16.7336 86.0129ZM15.3087 72.1831H14.0082V66.5838H15.3087C16.0129 66.5838 16.4271 67.1018 16.4271 67.9569V70.81C16.4271 71.6816 16.0212 72.1831 15.3087 72.1831Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M32.5472 66.7399V62.3574H23.0869V86.0128H32.5472V81.6303H27.9662V75.9899H31.9756V71.6156H27.9662V66.7399H32.5472Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M52.3956 62.3574H47.3838V86.0045H52.3956V62.3574Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M63.7367 66.7398V62.3573H54.2764V86.0127H63.7367V81.6302H59.1557V75.9898H63.1651V71.6156H59.1557V66.7398H63.7367Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M78.9626 62.3573L77.9851 76.0227H77.2395L77.2313 75.9487L76.3035 62.3573H72.2609L71.3911 76.0227H70.6372L70.2562 71.1058L69.6266 62.3573H64.4491L67.1497 86.0127H72.8408L73.7768 73.3093H74.4478L75.3508 86.0127H81.0419L83.7424 62.3573H78.9626Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M41.7842 62.3573L40.757 73.1613L40.3097 78.4482H39.7961L39.3488 73.1613L38.2884 62.3573H33.2186L36.7724 86.0127H43.0682L46.6469 62.3573H41.7842Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M64.9959 148L64.0929 147.556C39.1499 135.387 22.9548 124.509 13.1218 113.319C4.05085 103 0 92.1464 0 78.1276V0H130V78.1276C130 92.1464 125.957 103 116.878 113.319C107.045 124.509 90.8418 135.387 65.9071 147.556L65.0042 148H64.9959ZM4.10884 4.07822V78.1276C4.10884 91.0858 7.8449 101.117 16.2117 110.638C25.5643 121.27 41.0801 131.712 64.9959 143.453C88.9116 131.712 104.436 121.27 113.78 110.638C122.155 101.117 125.883 91.094 125.883 78.1276V4.07822H4.10055H4.10884Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path></svg><svg class="Header-module_compact-logo__1sOi0" x="0" y="0" viewBox="0 0 47 54" aria-labelledby="logo_R_ibhm6_" role="img"><title id="logo_R_ibhm6_">Harvard Business Review Logo</title><path d="M29.5562 15.7316V22.5566H25.9894V5.68164H30.8008C33.4388 5.68164 34.7206 6.90039 34.7206 9.28164V11.6629C34.7206 12.7879 34.2005 13.7816 33.1787 14.1566C34.2562 14.5879 34.6649 15.5629 34.6649 16.6691V20.3066C34.6649 21.2066 34.7206 21.9941 34.925 22.5566H31.3582C31.1538 22.0129 31.0981 21.2441 31.0981 20.4191V16.7254C31.0981 16.0879 30.838 15.7316 30.2807 15.7316H29.5376H29.5562ZM30.4107 8.77539H29.5562V12.6379H30.4107C30.8752 12.6379 31.1352 12.3004 31.1352 11.7191V9.69414C31.1352 9.13164 30.8752 8.77539 30.4107 8.77539Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M20.6949 5.66211C23.3328 5.66211 24.6146 6.88086 24.6146 9.26211V11.4184C24.6146 12.5434 24.0945 13.5371 23.0727 13.9121C24.1502 14.3621 24.7261 15.3184 24.7261 16.4246V18.9371C24.7261 21.3184 23.4443 22.5371 20.8063 22.5371H16.0134V5.66211H20.6949ZM20.3605 8.69961H19.5802V12.3746H20.3605C20.8249 12.3746 21.085 12.0371 21.085 11.4559V9.61836C21.085 9.03711 20.8249 8.69961 20.3605 8.69961ZM20.3419 15.3559H19.5802V19.5184H20.4348C20.9178 19.5184 21.1779 19.1809 21.1779 18.5996V16.3496C21.1779 15.7121 20.9178 15.3559 20.3419 15.3559Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M14.5272 5.66211V22.5371H10.9419V15.4309H9.21418V22.5371H5.61023V5.66211H9.21418V12.2246H10.9419V5.66211H14.5272Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M23.5 54L22.9427 53.7188C14.0628 49.3125 8.30395 45.375 4.77431 41.2875C1.48617 37.4813 0 33.4688 0 28.2938V0H47V28.2938C47 33.4688 45.5324 37.4813 42.2257 41.2875C38.696 45.3563 32.9372 49.3125 24.0573 53.7188L23.5 54ZM2.56364 2.5875V28.2938C2.56364 36.075 6.00039 42.3375 23.5 51.1125C40.981 42.3375 44.4364 36.0938 44.4364 28.2938V2.5875H2.56364Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path></svg></a><div class="Header-module_content__DV-in"><div class="Header-module_upper-section__Ugvec"><button type="button" aria-label="Toggle the main menu" class="Button-module_btn__daEdK Header-module_hamburger__RBx4F Button-module_text__dcWb-"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" viewBox="0 0 24 24" role="img" class="SVGIcon-module_icon__jWzmK Header-module_hamburger-icon__wrwur" aria-hidden="true"><path d="M24 3.5H0v1.1h3.37V21h17.25V4.6H24zm-4.47 16.4H4.47v-15h15.06z"></path><path d="M7.5 8.07h9v1.1h-9zM7.5 15.57h9v1.1h-9zM7.5 11.82h9v1.1h-9z"></path></svg></button><div class="Header-module_consumer-content-container__45xTU" data-testid="header-content-wrapper"><div class="StandardHeadline-module-scss-module__Gxatoa__content-container" data-testid="standard-headline-container"><span class="StandardHeadline-module-scss-module__Gxatoa__headline-topic"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem StandardHeadline-module-scss-module__Gxatoa__headline-topic-anchor" href="/topic/subject/strategic-planning">Strategic planning</a></span><span class="StandardHeadline-module-scss-module__Gxatoa__headline-separator">|</span><span class="StandardHeadline-module-scss-module__Gxatoa__headline-title">How to Avoid Catastrophe</span></div></div><div class="Header-module_subscribe-sign-in__hGJny"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Header-module_subscribe-button__mGvj9" href="/subscriptions?ab=topbar-subtout&tpcc=houseads.site.topbar-subtout" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Subscribe</a><button type="button" class="Button-module_btn__daEdK Header-module_sign-in__voGP5 Button-module_text__dcWb-" id="sign-in-button-header">Sign In</button></div><button type="button" aria-label="Search hbr.org" class="Button-module_btn__daEdK Header-module_search__LDIn2 Button-module_text__dcWb-"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" viewBox="0 0 24 24" role="img" class="SVGIcon-module_icon__jWzmK Header-module_search-icon__jP3LV" aria-hidden="true"><path d="M24.06 23.22l-6.38-6.38a10.11 10.11 0 10-.85.85l6.37 6.37zM1.2 10.13A8.93 8.93 0 1110.13 19a8.94 8.94 0 01-8.93-8.87z"></path></svg></button></div><nav class="Header-module_navbar__oNJdL" aria-label="Quick Menu"><ul class="NavBar-module_list__kScWs"><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem NavBar-module_link__WIUMx" href="/the-latest">Latest</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem NavBar-module_link__WIUMx" href="/magazine">Magazine</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem NavBar-module_link__WIUMx" href="/topics">Topics</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem NavBar-module_link__WIUMx" href="/podcasts">Podcasts</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem NavBar-module_link__WIUMx" href="/store">Store</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem NavBar-module_link__WIUMx" href="/reading-lists">Reading Lists</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem NavBar-module_link__WIUMx" href="/data-visuals">Data & Visuals</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem NavBar-module_link__WIUMx" href="/case-selections">Case Selections</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem NavBar-module_link__WIUMx" href="/executive">HBR Executive</a></li></ul></nav></div></div><div class="MegaMenu-module_overlay__Ol58y"></div><nav class="MegaMenu-module_mega-menu__Eu7KC MegaMenu-module_menu-close__KCgUx" aria-label="Main Menu"><button type="button" aria-label="Close the main menu" class="Button-module_btn__daEdK MegaMenu-module_btn-close__dZ-lc Button-module_text__dcWb-"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" viewBox="0 0 24 24" role="img" class="SVGIcon-module_icon__jWzmK SVGIcon-module_x__czr2H" aria-hidden="true"><line x1="5" y1="5" x2="19" y2="19"></line><line x1="19" y1="5" x2="5" y2="19"></line></svg></button><div class="MegaMenu-module_content-container__2BfcA"><div><form class="SearchForm-module_search-form__vTTDN MegaMenu-module_search__R2Jdp" role="search" autoComplete="off" action="/search"><button type="submit" aria-label="Search hbr.org" class="Button-module_btn__daEdK SearchForm-module_btn-search__ik9Kt Button-module_text__dcWb-"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" viewBox="0 0 24 24" role="img" class="SVGIcon-module_icon__jWzmK SearchForm-module_btn-search-icon__oMQa3" aria-hidden="true"><path d="M24.06 23.22l-6.38-6.38a10.11 10.11 0 10-.85.85l6.37 6.37zM1.2 10.13A8.93 8.93 0 1110.13 19a8.94 8.94 0 01-8.93-8.87z"></path></svg></button><div class="SearchForm-module_input-container__raxqf"><div class="TextInput-module_container__ZQmdd"><label class="SearchForm-module_search-field-label__xqtLB TextInput-module_label__zSFLb" for="text-input_R_15krhm6_">Search hbr.org</label><div class="TextInput-module_input-container__jJXwT"><input class="SearchForm-module_search-field__e6XeP TextInput-module_input__bLrqx" type="search" id="text-input_R_15krhm6_" aria-invalid="false" placeholder="Search hbr.org" name="term" value=""/></div></div></div><button type="button" aria-label="Clear search" class="Button-module_btn__daEdK SearchForm-module_btn-clear-search__eX40c SearchForm-module_hide__G7yU3 Button-module_text__dcWb-"><svg xmlns="http://www.w3.org/2000/svg" viewBox="0 0 20 20" role="img" class="SVGIcon-module_icon__jWzmK SearchForm-module_btn-clear-icon__KlA5r" aria-hidden="true"><path fill-rule="evenodd" clip-rule="evenodd" d="M0 9.99928C0 4.47766 4.47699 0 10.0007 0C15.5238 0 20 4.47773 20 9.99928C20 15.523 15.5238 20 10.0007 20C4.47696 20 0 15.523 0 9.99928ZM10.0007 0.970895C5.01315 0.970895 0.970895 5.01392 0.970895 9.99928C0.970895 14.9868 5.01318 19.0291 10.0007 19.0291C14.9875 19.0291 19.0291 14.9869 19.0291 9.99928C19.0291 5.01385 14.9875 0.970895 10.0007 0.970895ZM10.0001 9.1652L12.6738 6.49147L13.3603 7.178L10.6868 9.85155L13.3617 12.5251L12.6754 13.2118L10.0003 10.5381L7.32562 13.2127L6.63909 12.5262L9.31357 9.85172L6.63913 7.17864L7.32548 6.49194L10.0001 9.1652Z" class="SVGIcon-module_fill-charcoal__7CDAl"></path></svg></button></form></div><ul class="MegaMenu-module_short-links-list__KmWZt"><div class="MegaMenu-module_subscribe-container__gga0J"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_subscribe-button__EjJ2M" href="/subscriptions?ab=leftnav-subtout&tpcc=houseads.site.leftnav-subtout" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Subscribe</a></div><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/the-latest">Latest</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/podcasts">Podcasts</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/magazine">The Magazine</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/store">Store</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/webinars">Webinars</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/email-newsletters">Newsletters</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/topics">All Topics</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/reading-lists">Reading Lists</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/data-visuals">Data & Visuals</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/case-selections">Case Selections</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/executive">HBR Executive</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/my-library">My Library</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/my-library/settings">Account Settings</a></li><li><button type="button" class="Button-module_btn__daEdK MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH Button-module_text__dcWb-" data-qa="mega-menu-sign-in-button">Sign In</button></li></ul><div class="MegaMenu-module_long-lists-container__tF8hq" data-testid="long-lists-container"><div class="MegaMenu-module_long-list-container__bZFox MegaMenu-module_long-list-container-1__h7B1p"><h2 class="MegaMenu-module_list-title__Vixb6">Explore HBR</h2><ul class="MegaMenu-module_list__-9bHO"><li class="MegaMenu-module_long-links-list-item__P4oKo"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/the-latest">Latest</a></li><li class="MegaMenu-module_long-links-list-item__P4oKo"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/magazine">The Magazine</a></li><li class="MegaMenu-module_long-links-list-item__P4oKo"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/podcasts">Podcasts</a></li><li class="MegaMenu-module_long-links-list-item__P4oKo"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/store">Store</a></li><li class="MegaMenu-module_long-links-list-item__P4oKo"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/webinars">Webinars</a></li><li class="MegaMenu-module_long-links-list-item__P4oKo"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/email-newsletters">Newsletters</a></li></ul></div><div class="MegaMenu-module_long-list-container__bZFox MegaMenu-module_long-list-container-2__f04eC"><h2 class="MegaMenu-module_list-title__Vixb6">Popular Topics</h2><ul class="MegaMenu-module_list__-9bHO"><li class="MegaMenu-module_long-links-list-item__P4oKo"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/topic/managing-yourself">Managing Yourself</a></li><li class="MegaMenu-module_long-links-list-item__P4oKo"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/topic/leadership">Leadership</a></li><li class="MegaMenu-module_long-links-list-item__P4oKo"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/topic/strategy">Strategy</a></li><li class="MegaMenu-module_long-links-list-item__P4oKo"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/topic/managing-people">Managing Teams</a></li><li class="MegaMenu-module_long-links-list-item__P4oKo"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/topic/gender">Gender</a></li><li class="MegaMenu-module_long-links-list-item__P4oKo"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/topic/innovation">Innovation</a></li><li class="MegaMenu-module_long-links-list-item__P4oKo"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/topic/work-life-balance">Work-life Balance</a></li><li class="MegaMenu-module_long-links-list-item__P4oKo"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/topics">All Topics</a></li></ul></div><div class="MegaMenu-module_long-list-container__bZFox MegaMenu-module_long-list-container-3__RLdNV"><h2 class="MegaMenu-module_list-title__Vixb6">For Subscribers</h2><ul class="MegaMenu-module_list__-9bHO"><li class="MegaMenu-module_long-links-list-item__P4oKo"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/reading-lists">Reading Lists</a></li><li class="MegaMenu-module_long-links-list-item__P4oKo"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/data-visuals">Data & Visuals</a></li><li class="MegaMenu-module_long-links-list-item__P4oKo"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/case-selections">Case Selections</a></li><li class="MegaMenu-module_long-links-list-item__P4oKo"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/executive">HBR Executive</a></li><li class="MegaMenu-module_long-links-list-item__P4oKo"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-red__R2K01" href="/subscriptions?ab=leftnav-subtout&tpcc=houseads.site.leftnav-subtout" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Subscribe</a></li></ul></div><div class="MegaMenu-module_long-list-container__bZFox MegaMenu-module_long-list-container-4__CNRqg"><h2 class="MegaMenu-module_list-title__Vixb6">My Account</h2><ul class="MegaMenu-module_list__-9bHO"><li class="MegaMenu-module_long-links-list-item__P4oKo"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/my-library">My Library</a></li><li class="MegaMenu-module_long-links-list-item__P4oKo"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/my-library/topics">Topic Feeds</a></li><li class="MegaMenu-module_long-links-list-item__P4oKo"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/my-library/orders">Orders</a></li><li class="MegaMenu-module_long-links-list-item__P4oKo"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/my-library/settings">Account Settings</a></li><li class="MegaMenu-module_long-links-list-item__P4oKo"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e " href="/my-library/preferences">Email Preferences</a></li><li class="MegaMenu-module_long-links-list-item__P4oKo"><button type="button" class="Button-module_btn__daEdK MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH Button-module_text__dcWb-" data-qa="mega-menu-sign-in-button">Sign In</button></li></ul></div><ul class="MegaMenu-module_social-media-list__HvTFL"><li class="MegaMenu-module_social-media-list-item__kYnRr"><a aria-label="HBR on Twitter" class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e" href="//twitter.com/HarvardBiz" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><span class="FontIcon-module_icon__sgsQL FontIcon-module_twitter__bQXzy" role="presentation"></span></a></li><li class="MegaMenu-module_social-media-list-item__kYnRr"><a aria-label="HBR on Facebook" class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e" href="//www.facebook.com/HBR" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><span class="FontIcon-module_icon__sgsQL FontIcon-module_facebook__S9ltf" role="presentation"></span></a></li><li class="MegaMenu-module_social-media-list-item__kYnRr"><a aria-label="HBR on LinkedIn" class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e" href="//www.linkedin.com/company/harvard-business-review?trk=biz-companies-cym" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><span class="FontIcon-module_icon__sgsQL FontIcon-module_linkedin__pU2s2" role="presentation"></span></a></li><li class="MegaMenu-module_social-media-list-item__kYnRr"><a aria-label="HBR on Instagram" class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MegaMenu-module_link__y5yqH MegaMenu-module_link-default__a864e" href="//www.instagram.com/harvard_business_review/?hl=en" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><span class="FontIcon-module_icon__sgsQL FontIcon-module_instagram__fAjdS" role="presentation"></span></a></li></ul></div></div></nav></header></div></div><article class="ArticleWrapper-module-scss-module__B-Qtaa__wrapper" id="main"><svg class="PrintLogo-module-scss-module__OyLHaa__print-logo" x="0" y="0" viewBox="0 0 130 148" aria-labelledby="logo_R_am6_" role="img"><title id="logo_R_am6_">Harvard Business Review Logo</title><path d="M21.3729 54.332V50.78C21.3729 49.2013 20.5031 47.9022 19.0534 47.3102L18.8546 47.228L19.0534 47.154C20.4037 46.6689 21.2072 45.3862 21.2072 43.7171V40.6667C21.2072 37.3531 19.3434 35.6758 15.6736 35.6758H9.05469V59.3229H15.8392C19.509 59.3229 21.3729 57.6456 21.3729 54.332ZM13.9671 39.7869H15.1682C15.8807 39.7869 16.2866 40.2884 16.2866 41.16V43.75C16.2866 44.6216 15.8807 45.1231 15.1682 45.1231H13.9671V39.7869ZM13.9671 55.2036V49.1684H15.1351C15.9884 49.1684 16.4191 49.6618 16.4191 50.6402V53.8222C16.4191 54.7102 16.0132 55.1953 15.2676 55.1953H13.9671V55.2036Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M34.8668 35.6758H29.8882V54.036C29.8882 54.9487 29.4823 55.4749 28.7698 55.4749C28.0574 55.4749 27.6184 54.9322 27.6184 54.036V35.6758H22.6729V54.1676C22.6729 57.4647 25.0669 59.5942 28.7698 59.5942C32.4728 59.5942 34.8668 57.4647 34.8668 54.1676V35.6758Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M41.908 59.5859C45.6109 59.5859 48.005 57.4563 48.005 54.1592V51.0759C48.005 49.0779 47.392 47.9267 45.7352 46.8332L41.8252 44.0787C41.2287 43.6347 41.0216 43.199 41.0216 42.385V40.9625C41.0216 39.7703 41.6098 39.5236 42.1068 39.5236C42.7861 39.5236 43.1589 40.0334 43.1589 40.9625V43.7827H47.9719V40.831C47.9719 37.4352 45.7766 35.4043 42.1068 35.4043C38.437 35.4043 36.043 37.5339 36.043 40.831V43.3881C36.043 45.3861 36.656 46.5372 38.3128 47.6307L42.2228 50.4181C42.753 50.8127 43.0263 51.1827 43.0263 52.1119V54.0359C43.0263 54.965 42.6536 55.4747 41.9743 55.4747C41.4772 55.4747 40.8891 55.2281 40.8891 54.0359V50.7881H36.043V54.1674C36.043 57.5632 38.2382 59.5941 41.908 59.5941V59.5859Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M54.334 35.6758H49.3223V59.3229H54.334V35.6758Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M64.3746 59.3229H68.7568V35.6758H64.2752V41.8589L64.3497 47.0142H63.9024L61.2681 35.6758H56.2811V59.3229H60.7628V51.446L60.6965 46.488H61.1355L64.3746 59.3229Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M80.1721 40.05V35.6758H70.7118V59.3229H80.1721V54.9404H75.591V49.3082H79.6005V44.9258H75.591V40.05H80.1721Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M92.9786 51.0846C92.9786 49.0866 92.3656 47.9355 90.7088 46.842L86.7988 44.0875C86.2024 43.6435 85.9952 43.2078 85.9952 42.3938V40.9713C85.9952 39.7791 86.5834 39.5324 87.0805 39.5324C87.7597 39.5324 88.1325 40.0422 88.1325 40.9713V43.7915H92.9455V40.8398C92.9455 37.444 90.7502 35.4131 87.0805 35.4131C83.4107 35.4131 81.0166 37.5426 81.0166 40.8398V43.3969C81.0166 45.3949 81.6296 46.546 83.2864 47.6395L87.1964 50.4269C87.7266 50.8215 88 51.1915 88 52.1206V54.0446C88 54.9738 87.6272 55.4835 86.9479 55.4835C86.4509 55.4835 85.8627 55.2369 85.8627 54.0446V50.7969H81.0166V54.1762C81.0166 57.572 83.2118 59.6029 86.8816 59.6029C90.5514 59.6029 92.9786 57.4733 92.9786 54.1762V51.0846Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M106.076 51.0846C106.076 49.0866 105.463 47.9355 103.806 46.842L99.8965 44.0875C99.3 43.6435 99.0929 43.2078 99.0929 42.3938V40.9713C99.0929 39.7791 99.6811 39.5324 100.178 39.5324C100.857 39.5324 101.23 40.0422 101.23 40.9713V43.7915H106.043V40.8398C106.043 37.444 103.848 35.4131 100.178 35.4131C96.5083 35.4131 94.1143 37.5426 94.1143 40.8398V43.3969C94.1143 45.3949 94.7273 46.546 96.3841 47.6395L100.294 50.4269C100.824 50.8215 101.098 51.1915 101.098 52.1206V54.0446C101.098 54.9738 100.725 55.4835 100.046 55.4835C99.5485 55.4835 98.9604 55.2369 98.9604 54.0446V50.7969H94.1143V54.1762C94.1143 57.572 96.3095 59.6029 99.9793 59.6029C103.649 59.6029 106.076 57.4733 106.076 54.1762V51.0846Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M21.696 32.6417V8.98633H16.7091V18.2446H14.0748V8.98633H9.05469V32.6417H14.0748V22.6188H16.7091V32.6417H21.696Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M30.8663 27.8651L31.3634 32.6422H36.2095L32.987 8.99512H25.7137L22.5244 32.6422H27.2048L27.6687 27.8651H30.8663ZM28.3977 19.8813L28.8782 15.3345H29.6238L30.1456 19.8813L30.6344 23.9513H27.909L28.3977 19.8813Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M49.7285 32.6418C49.4386 31.7785 49.3972 30.5945 49.3972 29.542V24.4032C49.3972 22.6847 48.6599 21.4514 47.3096 20.9334L47.1025 20.8512L47.3096 20.7772C48.6599 20.292 49.4635 19.0094 49.4635 17.3403V13.9938C49.4635 10.6803 47.5996 9.00293 43.9298 9.00293H37.1121V32.65H42.0576V23.03H43.1925C43.7641 23.03 44.4434 23.2849 44.4434 24.5018V29.7065C44.4434 30.652 44.4848 31.8278 44.783 32.6418H49.7285ZM43.3665 18.812H42.0659V13.2127H43.3665C44.0706 13.2127 44.4848 13.7307 44.4848 14.5858V17.4389C44.4848 18.3105 44.0789 18.812 43.3665 18.812Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M58.5261 8.9873L57.4989 19.7913L57.0598 25.0782H56.538L56.0989 19.7913L55.0303 8.9873H49.9688L53.5143 32.6426H59.8101L63.3971 8.9873H58.5261Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M84.5049 32.6428H89.4422C89.1522 31.7795 89.1108 30.5955 89.1108 29.543V24.4041C89.1108 22.6857 88.3735 21.4524 87.0232 20.9343L86.8244 20.8521L87.0315 20.7781C88.3818 20.293 89.1854 19.0104 89.1854 17.3412V13.9948C89.1854 10.6812 87.3215 9.00391 83.6517 9.00391H76.834V32.651H81.7795V23.031H82.9144C83.486 23.031 84.1653 23.2859 84.1653 24.5028V29.7075C84.1653 30.653 84.2067 31.8288 84.5049 32.6428ZM83.0801 18.813H81.7795V13.2137H83.0801C83.7842 13.2137 84.1984 13.7317 84.1984 14.5868V17.4399C84.1984 18.3115 83.7925 18.813 83.0801 18.813Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M103.276 14.414C103.276 11.0675 100.973 8.9873 97.2784 8.9873H90.9246V32.6344H97.2784C100.981 32.6344 103.276 30.5542 103.276 27.2077V14.4057V14.414ZM98.2973 27.0515C98.2973 27.9149 97.8831 28.4246 97.179 28.4246H95.8784V13.2053H97.179C97.8831 13.2053 98.2973 13.7233 98.2973 14.5784V27.0515Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M70.6041 27.8651L71.1094 32.6422H75.9555L72.7331 8.99511H65.4598L62.2704 32.6422H66.9509L67.4148 27.8651H70.6041ZM68.1355 19.8813L68.616 15.3344H69.3615L69.8834 19.8813L70.3721 23.9513H67.6467L68.1355 19.8813Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M16.7336 86.0129H21.6708C21.3809 85.1496 21.3394 83.9656 21.3394 82.9131V77.7742C21.3394 76.0558 20.6022 74.8225 19.2519 74.3045L19.0531 74.2222L19.2602 74.1482C20.6105 73.6631 21.414 72.3805 21.414 70.7114V67.3649C21.414 64.0514 19.5501 62.374 15.8803 62.374H9.06264V86.0211H14.0082V76.4011H15.1431C15.7146 76.4011 16.3939 76.656 16.3939 77.8729V83.0776C16.3939 84.0231 16.4354 85.1989 16.7336 86.0129ZM15.3087 72.1831H14.0082V66.5838H15.3087C16.0129 66.5838 16.4271 67.1018 16.4271 67.9569V70.81C16.4271 71.6816 16.0212 72.1831 15.3087 72.1831Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M32.5472 66.7399V62.3574H23.0869V86.0128H32.5472V81.6303H27.9662V75.9899H31.9756V71.6156H27.9662V66.7399H32.5472Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M52.3956 62.3574H47.3838V86.0045H52.3956V62.3574Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M63.7367 66.7398V62.3573H54.2764V86.0127H63.7367V81.6302H59.1557V75.9898H63.1651V71.6156H59.1557V66.7398H63.7367Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M78.9626 62.3573L77.9851 76.0227H77.2395L77.2313 75.9487L76.3035 62.3573H72.2609L71.3911 76.0227H70.6372L70.2562 71.1058L69.6266 62.3573H64.4491L67.1497 86.0127H72.8408L73.7768 73.3093H74.4478L75.3508 86.0127H81.0419L83.7424 62.3573H78.9626Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M41.7842 62.3573L40.757 73.1613L40.3097 78.4482H39.7961L39.3488 73.1613L38.2884 62.3573H33.2186L36.7724 86.0127H43.0682L46.6469 62.3573H41.7842Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M64.9959 148L64.0929 147.556C39.1499 135.387 22.9548 124.509 13.1218 113.319C4.05085 103 0 92.1464 0 78.1276V0H130V78.1276C130 92.1464 125.957 103 116.878 113.319C107.045 124.509 90.8418 135.387 65.9071 147.556L65.0042 148H64.9959ZM4.10884 4.07822V78.1276C4.10884 91.0858 7.8449 101.117 16.2117 110.638C25.5643 121.27 41.0801 131.712 64.9959 143.453C88.9116 131.712 104.436 121.27 113.78 110.638C122.155 101.117 125.883 91.094 125.883 78.1276V4.07822H4.10055H4.10884Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path></svg><div class="Standard-module-scss-module__yt85fq__container"><div class="Standard-module-scss-module__yt85fq__article-header"><div class="MainTopicLink-module-scss-module__38uyaW__container MainTopicLink-module-scss-module__38uyaW__standard"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem MainTopicLink-module-scss-module__38uyaW__topic" href="/topic/subject/strategic-planning">Strategic planning</a></div><div class="Title-module-scss-module__RU2Y5q__headline-container Title-module-scss-module__RU2Y5q__standard"><h1 class="Title-module-scss-module__RU2Y5q__title Title-module-scss-module__RU2Y5q__standard">How to Avoid Catastrophe</h1></div><div class="DekBylineContainer-module-scss-module__4nZYCa__dek-byline-container DekBylineContainer-module-scss-module__4nZYCa__standard"><p class="DekBylineContainer-module-scss-module__4nZYCa__dek-byline-content DekBylineContainer-module-scss-module__4nZYCa__standard"><span class="Byline-module-scss-module__bswM1G__byline"> <!-- -->by<!-- --> <a href="/search?term=Catherine H. Tinsley" class="Byline-module-scss-module__bswM1G__author">Catherine H. Tinsley</a>, <a href="/search?term=Robin L. Dillon" class="Byline-module-scss-module__bswM1G__author">Robin L. Dillon</a> <!-- -->and<!-- --> <a href="/search?term=Peter M. Madsen" class="Byline-module-scss-module__bswM1G__author">Peter M. Madsen</a></span></p></div><div class="PublicationDate-module-scss-module__4JetCq__standard PublicationDate-module-scss-module__4JetCq__magazine-date-container"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem PublicationDate-module-scss-module__4JetCq__magazine-date" href="/archive-toc/BR1104">From the Magazine (April 2011)</a></div></div><div class="Standard-module-scss-module__yt85fq__hero-image"></div><div class="Standard-module-scss-module__yt85fq__top-utils"><ul class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__container-top PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__standard"><li class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__list-item"><a aria-label="Post on Twitter" class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__item-button" href="https://twitter.com/intent/tweet?&original_referer=&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw&related=twitterapi%2Ctwitter&tw_p=tweetbutton&url=" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-analytics="share-on-x"><img src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/media/Twitter.2ht2cms5y_jst.svg" aria-hidden="true" alt="" width="24" height="24"/><span class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__utility-name PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__standard">Post</span></a></li><li class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__list-item"><button aria-label="Post on Facebook" class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__item-button" type="button" data-analytics="share-on-facebook"><img src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/media/Facebook.0fa87g7qokkir.svg" aria-hidden="true" alt="" width="24" height="24"/><span class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__utility-name PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__standard">Post</span></button></li><li class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__list-item"><button aria-label="Share on LinkedIn" class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__item-button" type="button" data-analytics="share-on-linkedin"><img src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/media/LinkedIn.1rxjnbz72rdut.svg" aria-hidden="true" alt="" width="24" height="24"/><span class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__utility-name PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__standard">Share</span></button></li><li class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__list-item"><button class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__item-button" type="button" data-analytics="open-save-flyout"><img src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/media/Save.0u3z0-ektfs6x.svg" aria-hidden="true" alt="" width="24" height="24"/><span class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__utility-name PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__standard">Save</span></button></li><li class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__list-item PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__standard"><button class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__item-button" type="button" data-analytics="print-article"><img src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/media/Print.36pu1c-y-hkee.svg" aria-hidden="true" alt="" width="24" height="24"/><span class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__utility-name PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__standard">Print</span></button></li></ul><dialog class="PDFSubscriberBenefit-module-scss-module___brXfa__container" aria-labelledby="pdf-benefit-title"><button type="button" class="PDFSubscriberBenefit-module-scss-module___brXfa__close" aria-label="Close PDF subscriber benefit dialog"><img src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/media/close.18diym-sk5pqf.svg" alt="" aria-hidden="true" role="presentation"/></button><div class="PDFSubscriberBenefit-module-scss-module___brXfa__pdf-benefit" id="pdf-benefit"></div></dialog></div><div class="Standard-module-scss-module__yt85fq__summary"><section class="Summary-module-scss-module__oECGIa__container Summary-module-scss-module__oECGIa__standard Summary-module-scss-module__oECGIa__final-layout"><h2 class="Summary-module-scss-module__oECGIa__summary-header">Summary<!-- -->. </h2><span class="Summary-module-scss-module__oECGIa__summary-text"><span><span class="Summary-module-scss-module__oECGIa__summary-text"><span class="reprint">Reprint: R1104G</span></span>
|
||
<span class="Summary-module-scss-module__oECGIa__summary-text">Most business failures—such as engineering disasters, product malfunctions, and PR crises—are foreshadowed by near misses, close</span></span></span><span><span aria-hidden="true">...</span><button type="button" class="Summary-module-scss-module__oECGIa__button" data-analytics="expand-exec-summary-link" aria-label="more summary information">more</button></span></section><div class="TranslateMessage-module-scss-module__jgwrha__translate-message"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem TranslateMessage-module-scss-module__jgwrha__link TranslateMessage-module-scss-module__jgwrha__translate" href="/2011/04/how-to-avoid-catastrophe?language=es" data-analytics="lang-es">Leer en español</a><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem TranslateMessage-module-scss-module__jgwrha__link TranslateMessage-module-scss-module__jgwrha__translate" href="/2011/04/how-to-avoid-catastrophe?language=pt" data-analytics="lang-pt">Ler em português</a></div></div><div class="Standard-module-scss-module__yt85fq__left-rail"><ul class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__container-left PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__standard"><li class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__list-item PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__vertical"><a aria-label="Post on Twitter" class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__item-button" href="https://twitter.com/intent/tweet?&original_referer=&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw&related=twitterapi%2Ctwitter&tw_p=tweetbutton&url=" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-analytics="share-on-x"><img src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/media/Twitter.2ht2cms5y_jst.svg" aria-hidden="true" alt="" width="24" height="24"/><span class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__utility-name PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__standard">Post</span></a></li><li class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__list-item PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__vertical"><button aria-label="Post on Facebook" class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__item-button" type="button" data-analytics="share-on-facebook"><img src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/media/Facebook.0fa87g7qokkir.svg" aria-hidden="true" alt="" width="24" height="24"/><span class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__utility-name PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__standard">Post</span></button></li><li class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__list-item PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__vertical"><button aria-label="Share on LinkedIn" class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__item-button" type="button" data-analytics="share-on-linkedin"><img src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/media/LinkedIn.1rxjnbz72rdut.svg" aria-hidden="true" alt="" width="24" height="24"/><span class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__utility-name PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__standard">Share</span></button></li><li class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__list-item PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__vertical"><button class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__item-button" type="button" data-analytics="open-save-flyout"><img src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/media/Save.0u3z0-ektfs6x.svg" aria-hidden="true" alt="" width="24" height="24"/><span class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__utility-name PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__standard">Save</span></button></li><li class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__list-item PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__vertical PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__standard"><button class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__item-button" type="button" data-analytics="print-article"><img src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/media/Print.36pu1c-y-hkee.svg" aria-hidden="true" alt="" width="24" height="24"/><span class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__utility-name PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__standard">Print</span></button></li></ul><dialog class="PDFSubscriberBenefit-module-scss-module___brXfa__container" aria-labelledby="pdf-benefit-title"><button type="button" class="PDFSubscriberBenefit-module-scss-module___brXfa__close" aria-label="Close PDF subscriber benefit dialog"><img src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/media/close.18diym-sk5pqf.svg" alt="" aria-hidden="true" role="presentation"/></button><div class="PDFSubscriberBenefit-module-scss-module___brXfa__pdf-benefit" id="pdf-benefit"></div></dialog></div><div class="Standard-module-scss-module__yt85fq__content"><p class="Paragraph-module-scss-module__UwInRW__text" data-first-paragraph="true">Most people think of “near misses” as harrowing close calls that could have been a lot worse—when a firefighter escapes a burning building moments before it collapses, or when a tornado miraculously veers away from a town in its path. Events like these are rare narrow escapes that leave us shaken and looking for lessons.</p></div><div class="Standard-module-scss-module__yt85fq__right-rail"><div class="Standard-module-scss-module__yt85fq__right-rail-content"><div class="Standard-module-scss-module__yt85fq__right-rail-middle-container"></div></div></div><div class="Standard-module-scss-module__yt85fq__author"><div class="PublicationDate-module-scss-module__4JetCq__bottom-magazine-date-container"><span class="PublicationDate-module-scss-module__4JetCq__bottom-magazine-date">A version of this article appeared in the <a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem PublicationDate-module-scss-module__4JetCq__bottom-magazine-date-anchor" href="/archive-toc/BR1104">April 2011</a> issue of <em>Harvard Business Review.</em></span></div><div data-analytics="end-of-article" data-testid="container"></div><aside class="AuthorBioList-module-scss-module__R_7B0q__container"><div class="AuthorBio-module-scss-module__XkRYkq__author-info-item"><div class="AuthorBio-module-scss-module__XkRYkq__author-bio-container"><a class="AuthorBio-module-scss-module__XkRYkq__author-name" href="/search?term=Catherine%20H.%20Tinsley&amp;search_type=search-all">Catherine H. Tinsley<!-- --> </a><span class="AuthorBio-module-scss-module__XkRYkq__biography"><a target="_blank" rel="noreferrer noopener" href="https://gufaculty360.georgetown.edu/s/contact/00336000014RaQLAA0/catherine-tinsley" class="ContentLink-module-scss-module__qKDjGa__anchor Hyperlink SCXW79254829 BCX0"><span class="TextRun Underlined SCXW79254829 BCX0" lang="EN-US" xml:lang="EN-US" data-contrast="none"><span class="NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0" data-ccp-charstyle="Hyperlink"></span></span></a><span class="TextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0" lang="EN-US" xml:lang="EN-US" data-contrast="auto"><span class="NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0"> is the </span><span class="NormalTextRun SpellingErrorV2Themed SCXW79254829 BCX0">Raffini</span> <span class="NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0">Term</span><span class="NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0"> Professor</span><span class="NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0"> and Chair of the Management Area </span><span class="NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0">at Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business</span><span class="NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0">.</span> <span class="NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0">Tinsley is an expert on gender intelligent leadership, </span><span class="NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0">decision making under risk and uncertainty, </span><span class="NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0">negotiations, and </span><span class="NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0">conflict resolution</span><span class="NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0">. </span><span class="NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0"> S</span><span class="NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0">he participated in The World Economic Forum’s annual meeting in Davos, </span><span class="NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0">Switzerland </span><span class="NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0">and </span><span class="NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0">partnered with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to study a decade of gender in the C-suite</span><span class="NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0">.</span><span class="NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0"> Her work on decision making has been sponsored by NASA, NSF, and DHS.</span></span><span class="EOP SCXW79254829 BCX0" data-ccp-props="{"201341983":0,"335559739":0,"335559740":240}"> </span></span></div></div><div class="AuthorBio-module-scss-module__XkRYkq__author-info-item"><div class="AuthorBio-module-scss-module__XkRYkq__author-bio-container"><a class="AuthorBio-module-scss-module__XkRYkq__author-name" href="/search?term=Robin%20L.%20Dillon&amp;search_type=search-all">Robin L. Dillon<!-- --> </a><span class="AuthorBio-module-scss-module__XkRYkq__biography"><span class="bodybold"></span> (<a xmlns="" href="mailto:rld9@georgetown.edu" class="ContentLink-module-scss-module__qKDjGa__anchor">rld9@georgetown.edu</a>) is an associate professor at Georgetown’s McDonough School of Business.</span></div></div><div class="AuthorBio-module-scss-module__XkRYkq__author-info-item"><div class="AuthorBio-module-scss-module__XkRYkq__author-bio-container"><a class="AuthorBio-module-scss-module__XkRYkq__author-name" href="/search?term=Peter%20M.%20Madsen&amp;search_type=search-all">Peter M. Madsen<!-- --> </a><span class="AuthorBio-module-scss-module__XkRYkq__biography"><span class="bodybold"></span> (<a xmlns="" href="mailto:petermadsen@byu.edu" class="ContentLink-module-scss-module__qKDjGa__anchor">petermadsen@byu.edu</a>) is an assistant professor at Brigham Young University’s Marriott School of Management, in Provo, Utah.</span></div></div></aside></div><div class="Standard-module-scss-module__yt85fq__bottom-utils"><ul class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__container-bottom PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__standard"><li class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__list-item"><a aria-label="Post on Twitter" class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__item-button" href="https://twitter.com/intent/tweet?&original_referer=&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw&related=twitterapi%2Ctwitter&tw_p=tweetbutton&url=" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-analytics="share-on-x"><img src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/media/Twitter.2ht2cms5y_jst.svg" aria-hidden="true" alt="" width="24" height="24"/><span class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__utility-name PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__standard">Post</span></a></li><li class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__list-item"><button aria-label="Post on Facebook" class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__item-button" type="button" data-analytics="share-on-facebook"><img src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/media/Facebook.0fa87g7qokkir.svg" aria-hidden="true" alt="" width="24" height="24"/><span class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__utility-name PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__standard">Post</span></button></li><li class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__list-item"><button aria-label="Share on LinkedIn" class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__item-button" type="button" data-analytics="share-on-linkedin"><img src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/media/LinkedIn.1rxjnbz72rdut.svg" aria-hidden="true" alt="" width="24" height="24"/><span class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__utility-name PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__standard">Share</span></button></li><li class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__list-item"><button class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__item-button" type="button" data-analytics="open-save-flyout"><img src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/media/Save.0u3z0-ektfs6x.svg" aria-hidden="true" alt="" width="24" height="24"/><span class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__utility-name PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__standard">Save</span></button></li><li class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__list-item PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__hidden-horizontal-utility PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__standard"><button class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__item-button" type="button" data-analytics="print-article"><img src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/media/Print.36pu1c-y-hkee.svg" aria-hidden="true" alt="" width="24" height="24"/><span class="PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__utility-name PageUtils-module-scss-module__vt80CW__standard">Print</span></button></li></ul><dialog class="PDFSubscriberBenefit-module-scss-module___brXfa__container" aria-labelledby="pdf-benefit-title"><button type="button" class="PDFSubscriberBenefit-module-scss-module___brXfa__close" aria-label="Close PDF subscriber benefit dialog"><img src="/assets-mfe-articles/_next/static/media/close.18diym-sk5pqf.svg" alt="" aria-hidden="true" role="presentation"/></button><div class="PDFSubscriberBenefit-module-scss-module___brXfa__pdf-benefit" id="pdf-benefit"></div></dialog></div><div class="Standard-module-scss-module__yt85fq__bottom-related-topics"><div class="RelatedTopics-module-scss-module__GV7pmq__container RelatedTopics-module-scss-module__GV7pmq__standard"><span class="RelatedTopics-module-scss-module__GV7pmq__related-topics RelatedTopics-module-scss-module__GV7pmq__standard">Read more on<!-- --> <a href="/topic/subject/strategic-planning?ab=articlepage-topic" class="RelatedTopics-module-scss-module__GV7pmq__topic-link"><strong>Strategic planning</strong></a> or related topics <a href="/topic/subject/organizational-culture?ab=articlepage-topic" class="RelatedTopics-module-scss-module__GV7pmq__topic-link"><strong>Organizational culture</strong></a>, <a href="/topic/subject/crisis-management?ab=articlepage-topic" class="RelatedTopics-module-scss-module__GV7pmq__topic-link"><strong>Crisis management</strong></a>, <a href="/topic/subject/psychology?ab=articlepage-topic" class="RelatedTopics-module-scss-module__GV7pmq__topic-link"><strong>Psychology</strong></a>, <a href="/topic/subject/strategy?ab=articlepage-topic" class="RelatedTopics-module-scss-module__GV7pmq__topic-link"><strong>Strategy</strong></a> and <a href="/topic/industry/space-vehicles?ab=articlepage-topic" class="RelatedTopics-module-scss-module__GV7pmq__topic-link"><strong>Space vehicles</strong></a></span></div></div><div class="Standard-module-scss-module__yt85fq__recommended"><div class="content-rec-wrapper RecommendedForYou-module-scss-module__0WtSxq__container RecommendedForYou-module-scss-module__0WtSxq__standard" data-testid="recommended-for-you-container"><div data-analytics="placement-recommended-for-you" data-testid="container"></div></div></div></div></article><div id="paywall-creative-container" class="PianoPaywall-module-scss-module__f6hLha__paywall PianoPaywall-module-scss-module__f6hLha__hidden" data-testid="piano"></div><section class="LimitCounter-module-scss-module__fnAtMa__container"><div class="persistent-banner deactivated LimitCounter-module-scss-module__fnAtMa__not-visible" aria-label="Article count" aria-live="polite" aria-hidden="true" role="dialog"></div></section><section class="PartnerCenter-module_container__w6Ige"><h2 class="PartnerCenter-module_partner-center-title__EMvh6 Heading-module_level-2__cI8dj">Partner Center</h2><div class="PartnerCenter-module_ad-container__B1ZB2"><div data-testid="ad" id="library-partnercenter-ad-first" class="PartnerCenter-module_ad-slot__mVfwV"></div><div data-testid="ad" id="library-partnercenter-ad-second" class="PartnerCenter-module_ad-slot__mVfwV"></div><div data-testid="ad" id="library-partnercenter-ad-third" class="PartnerCenter-module_ad-slot__mVfwV"></div><div data-testid="ad" id="library-partnercenter-ad-fourth" class="PartnerCenter-module_ad-slot__mVfwV"></div></div></section><footer class="Footer-module_footer__smP7p"><div class="Footer-module_container__1wqNg"><div class="Footer-module_top-content__WOP4t"><div class="Footer-module_subscribe-link-container__Wgulz"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS Footer-module_subscribe-link__lW6yW" href="/subscriptions?ab=footer-subtout&tpcc=houseads.site.footer-subtout">Start my subscription!</a></div></div><nav class="Footer-module_nav__Omdgl" aria-label="Comprehensive Menu"><details class="Footer-module_accordion__8VmFB Accordion-module_container__6rGl0" data-testid="container"><summary class="Accordion-module_title__-9-np" aria-expanded="false" aria-controls="accordion-panel-Explore-HBR">Explore HBR<span class="FontIcon-module_icon__sgsQL Accordion-module_title-icon__lc6tR FontIcon-module_caret-right__vpaQH" role="presentation"></span></summary><div id="accordion-panel-Explore-HBR"><ul class="Footer-module_nav-list__apyBT"><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/the-latest">The Latest</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/topics">All Topics</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/magazine">Magazine Archive</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/reading-lists">Reading Lists</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/case-selections">Case Selections</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/executive">HBR Executive</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/podcasts">Podcasts</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/webinars">Webinars</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/data-visuals">Data & Visuals</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/my-library">My Library</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/email-newsletters">Newsletters</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/hbrpress">HBR Press</a></li></ul></div></details><details class="Footer-module_accordion__8VmFB Accordion-module_container__6rGl0" data-testid="container"><summary class="Accordion-module_title__-9-np" aria-expanded="false" aria-controls="accordion-panel-HBR-Store">HBR Store<span class="FontIcon-module_icon__sgsQL Accordion-module_title-icon__lc6tR FontIcon-module_caret-right__vpaQH" role="presentation"></span></summary><div id="accordion-panel-HBR-Store"><ul class="Footer-module_nav-list__apyBT"><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/store/articles">Article Reprints</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/store/books">Books</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/store/case-studies">Cases</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/store/collections">Collections</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/store/magazine-issues">Magazine Issues</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/store/landing/guides">HBR Guide Series</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/store/landing/20-minute-managers">HBR 20-Minute Managers</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/store/landing/emotional-intelligence-series">HBR Emotional Intelligence Series</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/store/landing/mustreads">HBR Must Reads</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/store/tools">Tools</a></li></ul></div></details><details class="Footer-module_accordion__8VmFB Accordion-module_container__6rGl0" data-testid="container"><summary class="Accordion-module_title__-9-np" aria-expanded="false" aria-controls="accordion-panel-About-HBR">About HBR<span class="FontIcon-module_icon__sgsQL Accordion-module_title-icon__lc6tR FontIcon-module_caret-right__vpaQH" role="presentation"></span></summary><div id="accordion-panel-About-HBR"><ul class="Footer-module_nav-list__apyBT"><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/contact-us">Contact Us</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/hbr-advertising-sales">Advertise with Us</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/booksellers-retailers">Information for Booksellers/Retailers</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/about-hbr">Masthead</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/global-editions">Global Editions</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/media-inquiries">Media Inquiries</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/guidelines-for-authors-web">Guidelines for Authors</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/hbr-analytic-services">HBR Analytic Services</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/permissions">Copyright Permissions</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="https://www.harvardbusiness.org/accessibility-at-harvard-business-publishing">Accessibility</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="https://www.harvardbusiness.org/harvard-business-publishing-digital-accessibility-policy">Digital Accessibility</a></li></ul></div></details><details class="Footer-module_accordion__8VmFB Accordion-module_container__6rGl0" data-testid="container"><summary class="Accordion-module_title__-9-np" aria-expanded="false" aria-controls="accordion-panel-Manage-My-Account">Manage My Account<span class="FontIcon-module_icon__sgsQL Accordion-module_title-icon__lc6tR FontIcon-module_caret-right__vpaQH" role="presentation"></span></summary><div id="accordion-panel-Manage-My-Account"><ul class="Footer-module_nav-list__apyBT"><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><button type="button" class="Button-module_btn__daEdK Footer-module_link__v0KZS Button-module_text__dcWb-">My Library</button></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><button type="button" class="Button-module_btn__daEdK Footer-module_link__v0KZS Button-module_text__dcWb-">Topic Feeds</button></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><button type="button" class="Button-module_btn__daEdK Footer-module_link__v0KZS Button-module_text__dcWb-">Orders</button></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><button type="button" class="Button-module_btn__daEdK Footer-module_link__v0KZS Button-module_text__dcWb-">Account Settings</button></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><button type="button" class="Button-module_btn__daEdK Footer-module_link__v0KZS Button-module_text__dcWb-">Email Preferences</button></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="https://hbphelp.zendesk.com/hc/en-us">Help Center</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/subscriber-help#contact-customer-service">Contact Customer Service</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/subscription-terms">Subscription Terms</a></li></ul></div></details><div class="Footer-module_nav-list-wrapper__QlFFQ"><h3 class="Footer-module_nav-list-title__hi4pZ">Explore HBR</h3><ul class="Footer-module_nav-list__apyBT"><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/the-latest">The Latest</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/topics">All Topics</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/magazine">Magazine Archive</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/reading-lists">Reading Lists</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/case-selections">Case Selections</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/executive">HBR Executive</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/podcasts">Podcasts</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/webinars">Webinars</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/data-visuals">Data & Visuals</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/my-library">My Library</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/email-newsletters">Newsletters</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/hbrpress">HBR Press</a></li></ul></div><div class="Footer-module_nav-list-wrapper__QlFFQ"><h3 class="Footer-module_nav-list-title__hi4pZ">HBR Store</h3><ul class="Footer-module_nav-list__apyBT"><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/store/articles">Article Reprints</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/store/books">Books</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/store/case-studies">Cases</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/store/collections">Collections</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/store/magazine-issues">Magazine Issues</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/store/landing/guides">HBR Guide Series</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/store/landing/20-minute-managers">HBR 20-Minute Managers</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/store/landing/emotional-intelligence-series">HBR Emotional Intelligence Series</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/store/landing/mustreads">HBR Must Reads</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/store/tools">Tools</a></li></ul></div><div class="Footer-module_nav-list-wrapper__QlFFQ"><h3 class="Footer-module_nav-list-title__hi4pZ">About HBR</h3><ul class="Footer-module_nav-list__apyBT"><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/contact-us">Contact Us</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/hbr-advertising-sales">Advertise with Us</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/booksellers-retailers">Information for Booksellers/Retailers</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/about-hbr">Masthead</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/global-editions">Global Editions</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/media-inquiries">Media Inquiries</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/guidelines-for-authors-web">Guidelines for Authors</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/hbr-analytic-services">HBR Analytic Services</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/permissions">Copyright Permissions</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="https://www.harvardbusiness.org/accessibility-at-harvard-business-publishing">Accessibility</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="https://www.harvardbusiness.org/harvard-business-publishing-digital-accessibility-policy">Digital Accessibility</a></li></ul></div><div class="Footer-module_nav-list-wrapper__QlFFQ"><h3 class="Footer-module_nav-list-title__hi4pZ">Manage My Account</h3><ul class="Footer-module_nav-list__apyBT"><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><button type="button" class="Button-module_btn__daEdK Footer-module_link__v0KZS Button-module_text__dcWb-">My Library</button></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><button type="button" class="Button-module_btn__daEdK Footer-module_link__v0KZS Button-module_text__dcWb-">Topic Feeds</button></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><button type="button" class="Button-module_btn__daEdK Footer-module_link__v0KZS Button-module_text__dcWb-">Orders</button></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><button type="button" class="Button-module_btn__daEdK Footer-module_link__v0KZS Button-module_text__dcWb-">Account Settings</button></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><button type="button" class="Button-module_btn__daEdK Footer-module_link__v0KZS Button-module_text__dcWb-">Email Preferences</button></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="https://hbphelp.zendesk.com/hc/en-us">Help Center</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/subscriber-help#contact-customer-service">Contact Customer Service</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="/subscription-terms">Subscription Terms</a></li></ul></div><div class="Footer-module_nav-list-wrapper__QlFFQ Footer-module_follow-list__qgAgd"><h3 class="Footer-module_nav-list-title__hi4pZ">Follow HBR</h3><ul class="Footer-module_nav-list__apyBT"><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><span class="FontIcon-module_icon__sgsQL Footer-module_link-icon__-UY-q FontIcon-module_facebook__S9ltf" role="presentation"></span><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="https://www.facebook.com/HBR">Facebook</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><span class="FontIcon-module_icon__sgsQL Footer-module_link-icon__-UY-q FontIcon-module_twitter__bQXzy" role="presentation"></span><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="https://twitter.com/HarvardBiz">X Corp.</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><span class="FontIcon-module_icon__sgsQL Footer-module_link-icon__-UY-q FontIcon-module_linkedin__pU2s2" role="presentation"></span><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="https://www.linkedin.com/company/harvard-business-review?trk=biz-companies-cym">LinkedIn</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><span class="FontIcon-module_icon__sgsQL Footer-module_link-icon__-UY-q FontIcon-module_instagram__fAjdS" role="presentation"></span><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="https://www.instagram.com/harvard_business_review/?hl=en">Instagram</a></li><li class="Footer-module_nav-list-item__WBl0o"><span class="FontIcon-module_icon__sgsQL Footer-module_link-icon__-UY-q FontIcon-module_rss__CQubR" role="presentation"></span><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem Footer-module_link__v0KZS" href="https://feeds.harvardbusiness.org/harvardbusiness/">Your Newsreader</a></li></ul></div></nav><div class="FinePrint-module_container__DHZfu" data-testid="container"><div class="FinePrint-module_logo-container__Fy1ZM"><svg class="FinePrint-module_logo__J-mNb" x="0" y="0" viewBox="0 0 130 148" aria-labelledby="logo_R_3rq6_" role="img"><title id="logo_R_3rq6_">Harvard Business Review Logo</title><path d="M21.3729 54.332V50.78C21.3729 49.2013 20.5031 47.9022 19.0534 47.3102L18.8546 47.228L19.0534 47.154C20.4037 46.6689 21.2072 45.3862 21.2072 43.7171V40.6667C21.2072 37.3531 19.3434 35.6758 15.6736 35.6758H9.05469V59.3229H15.8392C19.509 59.3229 21.3729 57.6456 21.3729 54.332ZM13.9671 39.7869H15.1682C15.8807 39.7869 16.2866 40.2884 16.2866 41.16V43.75C16.2866 44.6216 15.8807 45.1231 15.1682 45.1231H13.9671V39.7869ZM13.9671 55.2036V49.1684H15.1351C15.9884 49.1684 16.4191 49.6618 16.4191 50.6402V53.8222C16.4191 54.7102 16.0132 55.1953 15.2676 55.1953H13.9671V55.2036Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M34.8668 35.6758H29.8882V54.036C29.8882 54.9487 29.4823 55.4749 28.7698 55.4749C28.0574 55.4749 27.6184 54.9322 27.6184 54.036V35.6758H22.6729V54.1676C22.6729 57.4647 25.0669 59.5942 28.7698 59.5942C32.4728 59.5942 34.8668 57.4647 34.8668 54.1676V35.6758Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M41.908 59.5859C45.6109 59.5859 48.005 57.4563 48.005 54.1592V51.0759C48.005 49.0779 47.392 47.9267 45.7352 46.8332L41.8252 44.0787C41.2287 43.6347 41.0216 43.199 41.0216 42.385V40.9625C41.0216 39.7703 41.6098 39.5236 42.1068 39.5236C42.7861 39.5236 43.1589 40.0334 43.1589 40.9625V43.7827H47.9719V40.831C47.9719 37.4352 45.7766 35.4043 42.1068 35.4043C38.437 35.4043 36.043 37.5339 36.043 40.831V43.3881C36.043 45.3861 36.656 46.5372 38.3128 47.6307L42.2228 50.4181C42.753 50.8127 43.0263 51.1827 43.0263 52.1119V54.0359C43.0263 54.965 42.6536 55.4747 41.9743 55.4747C41.4772 55.4747 40.8891 55.2281 40.8891 54.0359V50.7881H36.043V54.1674C36.043 57.5632 38.2382 59.5941 41.908 59.5941V59.5859Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M54.334 35.6758H49.3223V59.3229H54.334V35.6758Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M64.3746 59.3229H68.7568V35.6758H64.2752V41.8589L64.3497 47.0142H63.9024L61.2681 35.6758H56.2811V59.3229H60.7628V51.446L60.6965 46.488H61.1355L64.3746 59.3229Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M80.1721 40.05V35.6758H70.7118V59.3229H80.1721V54.9404H75.591V49.3082H79.6005V44.9258H75.591V40.05H80.1721Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M92.9786 51.0846C92.9786 49.0866 92.3656 47.9355 90.7088 46.842L86.7988 44.0875C86.2024 43.6435 85.9952 43.2078 85.9952 42.3938V40.9713C85.9952 39.7791 86.5834 39.5324 87.0805 39.5324C87.7597 39.5324 88.1325 40.0422 88.1325 40.9713V43.7915H92.9455V40.8398C92.9455 37.444 90.7502 35.4131 87.0805 35.4131C83.4107 35.4131 81.0166 37.5426 81.0166 40.8398V43.3969C81.0166 45.3949 81.6296 46.546 83.2864 47.6395L87.1964 50.4269C87.7266 50.8215 88 51.1915 88 52.1206V54.0446C88 54.9738 87.6272 55.4835 86.9479 55.4835C86.4509 55.4835 85.8627 55.2369 85.8627 54.0446V50.7969H81.0166V54.1762C81.0166 57.572 83.2118 59.6029 86.8816 59.6029C90.5514 59.6029 92.9786 57.4733 92.9786 54.1762V51.0846Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M106.076 51.0846C106.076 49.0866 105.463 47.9355 103.806 46.842L99.8965 44.0875C99.3 43.6435 99.0929 43.2078 99.0929 42.3938V40.9713C99.0929 39.7791 99.6811 39.5324 100.178 39.5324C100.857 39.5324 101.23 40.0422 101.23 40.9713V43.7915H106.043V40.8398C106.043 37.444 103.848 35.4131 100.178 35.4131C96.5083 35.4131 94.1143 37.5426 94.1143 40.8398V43.3969C94.1143 45.3949 94.7273 46.546 96.3841 47.6395L100.294 50.4269C100.824 50.8215 101.098 51.1915 101.098 52.1206V54.0446C101.098 54.9738 100.725 55.4835 100.046 55.4835C99.5485 55.4835 98.9604 55.2369 98.9604 54.0446V50.7969H94.1143V54.1762C94.1143 57.572 96.3095 59.6029 99.9793 59.6029C103.649 59.6029 106.076 57.4733 106.076 54.1762V51.0846Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M21.696 32.6417V8.98633H16.7091V18.2446H14.0748V8.98633H9.05469V32.6417H14.0748V22.6188H16.7091V32.6417H21.696Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M30.8663 27.8651L31.3634 32.6422H36.2095L32.987 8.99512H25.7137L22.5244 32.6422H27.2048L27.6687 27.8651H30.8663ZM28.3977 19.8813L28.8782 15.3345H29.6238L30.1456 19.8813L30.6344 23.9513H27.909L28.3977 19.8813Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M49.7285 32.6418C49.4386 31.7785 49.3972 30.5945 49.3972 29.542V24.4032C49.3972 22.6847 48.6599 21.4514 47.3096 20.9334L47.1025 20.8512L47.3096 20.7772C48.6599 20.292 49.4635 19.0094 49.4635 17.3403V13.9938C49.4635 10.6803 47.5996 9.00293 43.9298 9.00293H37.1121V32.65H42.0576V23.03H43.1925C43.7641 23.03 44.4434 23.2849 44.4434 24.5018V29.7065C44.4434 30.652 44.4848 31.8278 44.783 32.6418H49.7285ZM43.3665 18.812H42.0659V13.2127H43.3665C44.0706 13.2127 44.4848 13.7307 44.4848 14.5858V17.4389C44.4848 18.3105 44.0789 18.812 43.3665 18.812Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M58.5261 8.9873L57.4989 19.7913L57.0598 25.0782H56.538L56.0989 19.7913L55.0303 8.9873H49.9688L53.5143 32.6426H59.8101L63.3971 8.9873H58.5261Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M84.5049 32.6428H89.4422C89.1522 31.7795 89.1108 30.5955 89.1108 29.543V24.4041C89.1108 22.6857 88.3735 21.4524 87.0232 20.9343L86.8244 20.8521L87.0315 20.7781C88.3818 20.293 89.1854 19.0104 89.1854 17.3412V13.9948C89.1854 10.6812 87.3215 9.00391 83.6517 9.00391H76.834V32.651H81.7795V23.031H82.9144C83.486 23.031 84.1653 23.2859 84.1653 24.5028V29.7075C84.1653 30.653 84.2067 31.8288 84.5049 32.6428ZM83.0801 18.813H81.7795V13.2137H83.0801C83.7842 13.2137 84.1984 13.7317 84.1984 14.5868V17.4399C84.1984 18.3115 83.7925 18.813 83.0801 18.813Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M103.276 14.414C103.276 11.0675 100.973 8.9873 97.2784 8.9873H90.9246V32.6344H97.2784C100.981 32.6344 103.276 30.5542 103.276 27.2077V14.4057V14.414ZM98.2973 27.0515C98.2973 27.9149 97.8831 28.4246 97.179 28.4246H95.8784V13.2053H97.179C97.8831 13.2053 98.2973 13.7233 98.2973 14.5784V27.0515Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M70.6041 27.8651L71.1094 32.6422H75.9555L72.7331 8.99511H65.4598L62.2704 32.6422H66.9509L67.4148 27.8651H70.6041ZM68.1355 19.8813L68.616 15.3344H69.3615L69.8834 19.8813L70.3721 23.9513H67.6467L68.1355 19.8813Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M16.7336 86.0129H21.6708C21.3809 85.1496 21.3394 83.9656 21.3394 82.9131V77.7742C21.3394 76.0558 20.6022 74.8225 19.2519 74.3045L19.0531 74.2222L19.2602 74.1482C20.6105 73.6631 21.414 72.3805 21.414 70.7114V67.3649C21.414 64.0514 19.5501 62.374 15.8803 62.374H9.06264V86.0211H14.0082V76.4011H15.1431C15.7146 76.4011 16.3939 76.656 16.3939 77.8729V83.0776C16.3939 84.0231 16.4354 85.1989 16.7336 86.0129ZM15.3087 72.1831H14.0082V66.5838H15.3087C16.0129 66.5838 16.4271 67.1018 16.4271 67.9569V70.81C16.4271 71.6816 16.0212 72.1831 15.3087 72.1831Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M32.5472 66.7399V62.3574H23.0869V86.0128H32.5472V81.6303H27.9662V75.9899H31.9756V71.6156H27.9662V66.7399H32.5472Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M52.3956 62.3574H47.3838V86.0045H52.3956V62.3574Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M63.7367 66.7398V62.3573H54.2764V86.0127H63.7367V81.6302H59.1557V75.9898H63.1651V71.6156H59.1557V66.7398H63.7367Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M78.9626 62.3573L77.9851 76.0227H77.2395L77.2313 75.9487L76.3035 62.3573H72.2609L71.3911 76.0227H70.6372L70.2562 71.1058L69.6266 62.3573H64.4491L67.1497 86.0127H72.8408L73.7768 73.3093H74.4478L75.3508 86.0127H81.0419L83.7424 62.3573H78.9626Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M41.7842 62.3573L40.757 73.1613L40.3097 78.4482H39.7961L39.3488 73.1613L38.2884 62.3573H33.2186L36.7724 86.0127H43.0682L46.6469 62.3573H41.7842Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path><path d="M64.9959 148L64.0929 147.556C39.1499 135.387 22.9548 124.509 13.1218 113.319C4.05085 103 0 92.1464 0 78.1276V0H130V78.1276C130 92.1464 125.957 103 116.878 113.319C107.045 124.509 90.8418 135.387 65.9071 147.556L65.0042 148H64.9959ZM4.10884 4.07822V78.1276C4.10884 91.0858 7.8449 101.117 16.2117 110.638C25.5643 121.27 41.0801 131.712 64.9959 143.453C88.9116 131.712 104.436 121.27 113.78 110.638C122.155 101.117 125.883 91.094 125.883 78.1276V4.07822H4.10055H4.10884Z" class="Logo-module_charcoal-hbr__BNFAK"></path></svg></div><div class="FinePrint-module_links-container__LObO-"><ul class="FinePrint-module_inline-nav-list__P7Mqc"><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem FinePrint-module_link__7R6Yu" href="/corporate/about">About Us</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem FinePrint-module_link__7R6Yu" href="/corporate/careers">Careers</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem FinePrint-module_link__7R6Yu" href="/privacy-policy">Privacy Policy</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem FinePrint-module_link__7R6Yu" href="/corporate/cookie-policy">Cookie Policy</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem FinePrint-module_link__7R6Yu" href="/permissions">Copyright Information</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem FinePrint-module_link__7R6Yu" href="https://trademark.harvard.edu/pages/trademark-notice">Trademark Policy</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem FinePrint-module_link__7R6Yu" href="/terms-of-use">Terms of Use</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem FinePrint-module_link__7R6Yu" href="/subscription-terms">Subscription Terms</a></li></ul><div class="FinePrint-module_business-links__VyCoy"><p class="FinePrint-module_business-links-title__ZiorU">Harvard Business Publishing:</p><ul class="FinePrint-module_inline-nav-list__P7Mqc FinePrint-module_nav-list-title__xHwwl"><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem FinePrint-module_link__7R6Yu" href="https://hbsp.harvard.edu/">Higher Education</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem FinePrint-module_link__7R6Yu" href="https://www.harvardbusiness.org/">Corporate Learning</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem FinePrint-module_link__7R6Yu" href="https://hbr.org/">Harvard Business Review</a></li><li><a class="Anchor-module_anchor__uhpem FinePrint-module_link__7R6Yu" href="https://www.hbs.edu/">Harvard Business School</a></li></ul></div><p class="FinePrint-module_copyright__-7Kyx">Copyright ©<!-- -->2026<!-- --> Harvard Business School Publishing. All rights reserved. Harvard Business Publishing is an affiliate of Harvard Business School.</p></div></div></div></footer></div><script id="__NEXT_DATA__" type="application/json">{"props":{"pageProps":{"profile":{"accountLocked":false,"careerLevel":"","companyName":"","companySize":"","customAttributes":[],"displayName":"Guest User","emailAddress":"anonymousUser","firstName":"Guest","folders":[],"guid":"482c9d54943c9a0766089d57ab45302f","hbrIndustry":"","hbrJobTitle":"","industry":"","isGdprDeleted":false,"jobFunction":"","jobTitle":"","lastName":"User","lastVisitDate":"2026-09-12T00:05:40.245+00:00","leader-profile":{"completed-quizzes":0,"page-visits":0},"linkedAccounts":[],"loggedIn":false,"marketingCampaigns":[],"newsletters":[],"pianoRegistered":false,"quota":{"count":1,"limit":2,"remaining":1,"ascend":false},"state":"Anonymous","status":"Anonymous","subscriptions":[],"tiers":[],"topics":[],"username":"ANONYMOUSUSER"},"article":{"title":"How to Avoid Catastrophe","type":"standard","tag":"hbr.org,1922-01-01:201104.47716-R1104G","dek":"Failures happen. But if you pay attention to near misses, you can predict and prevent crises.","summary":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cspan class=\"reprint\"\u003eReprint: R1104G\u003c/span\u003e\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eMost business failures\u0026#8212;such as engineering disasters, product malfunctions, and PR crises\u0026#8212;are foreshadowed by near misses, close calls that, had luck not intervened, would have had far worse consequences. The space shuttle \u003cem\u003eColumbia\u003c/em\u003e\u0026#8217;s fatal reentry, BP\u0026#8217;s Gulf oil rig disaster, Toyota\u0026#8217;s stuck accelerators, even the iPhone 4\u0026#8217;s antenna failures\u0026#8212;all were preceded by near-miss events that should have tipped off managers to impending crises. The problem is that near misses are often overlooked\u0026#8212;or, perversely, viewed as a sign that systems are resilient and working well. That\u0026#8217;s because managers are blinded by cognitive biases, argue Georgetown professors Tinsley and Dillon, and Brigham Young University\u0026#8217;s Madsen.\u003c/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSeven strategies can help managers recognize and learn from near misses: They should be on increased alert when time or cost pressures are high; watch for deviations in operations from the norm and uncover their root causes; make decision makers accountable for near misses; envision worst-case scenarios; be on the lookout for near-misses masquerading as successes; and reward individuals for exposing near misses.\u003c/p\u003e","topics":["Strategic planning","Organizational culture","Crisis management","Psychology","Strategy","Space vehicles"],"primaryTopic":"Strategic planning","content":"\u003carticle-ideainbrief class=\"article-ideainbrief\"\u003e\n \u003ch4 class=\"ideainbrief-title\"\u003eThe Idea in Brief\u003c/h4\u003e\n \u003cdiv class=\"ideainbrief-contents\"\u003e\n \u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eMost business failures,\u003c/strong\u003e such as engineering disasters, product malfunctions, and PR crises, \u003cstrong\u003eare preceded by near misses\u003c/strong\u003e—close calls that, had it not been for chance, would have been worse.\u003c/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003eManagers often misinterpret these warning signs because they are blinded by cognitive biases. They take the near misses as indications that systems are working well—or they don’t notice them at all.\u003c/p\u003e\n \u003cp\u003eSeven strategies can help managers recognize and learn from near misses. Managers should: (1) be on alert when time or cost pressures are high; (2) watch for deviations from the norm; (3) uncover the deviations’ root causes; (4) hold themselves accountable for near misses; (5) envision worst-case scenarios; (6) look for near misses masquerading as successes; and (7) reward individuals for exposing near misses.\u003c/p\u003e\n \u003c/div\u003e\n\u003c/article-ideainbrief\u003e\u003cp\u003eMost people think of “near misses” as harrowing close calls that could have been a lot worse—when a firefighter escapes a burning building moments before it collapses, or when a tornado miraculously veers away from a town in its path. Events like these are rare narrow escapes that leave us shaken and looking for lessons.\u003c/p\u003e","authors":[{"name":"Catherine H. Tinsley","bio":"\u003ca class=\"Hyperlink SCXW79254829 BCX0\" href=\"https://gufaculty360.georgetown.edu/s/contact/00336000014RaQLAA0/catherine-tinsley\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"TextRun Underlined SCXW79254829 BCX0\" lang=\"EN-US\" xml:lang=\"EN-US\" data-contrast=\"none\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0\" data-ccp-charstyle=\"Hyperlink\"\u003eCatherine H. Tinsley\u003c/span\u003e\u003c/span\u003e\u003c/a\u003e\u003cspan class=\"TextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0\" lang=\"EN-US\" xml:lang=\"EN-US\" data-contrast=\"auto\"\u003e\u003cspan class=\"NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0\"\u003e is the \u003c/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"NormalTextRun SpellingErrorV2Themed SCXW79254829 BCX0\"\u003eRaffini\u003c/span\u003e \u003cspan class=\"NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0\"\u003eTerm\u003c/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0\"\u003e Professor\u003c/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0\"\u003e and Chair of the Management Area \u003c/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0\"\u003eat Georgetown University\u0026#8217;s McDonough School of Business\u0026#8203;\u003c/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0\"\u003e.\u003c/span\u003e \u003cspan class=\"NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0\"\u003eTinsley is an expert on gender intelligent leadership, \u003c/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0\"\u003edecision making under risk and uncertainty, \u003c/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0\"\u003enegotiations, and \u003c/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0\"\u003econflict resolution\u003c/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0\"\u003e. \u003c/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0\"\u003e\u0026#160;S\u003c/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0\"\u003ehe participated in The World Economic Forum\u0026#8217;s annual meeting in Davos, \u003c/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0\"\u003eSwitzerland \u003c/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0\"\u003eand \u003c/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0\"\u003epartnered with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to study a decade of gender in the C-suite\u003c/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0\"\u003e.\u003c/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"NormalTextRun SCXW79254829 BCX0\"\u003e Her work on decision making has been sponsored by NASA, NSF, and DHS.\u003c/span\u003e\u003c/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"EOP SCXW79254829 BCX0\" data-ccp-props=\"{\u0026#34;201341983\u0026#34;:0,\u0026#34;335559739\u0026#34;:0,\u0026#34;335559740\u0026#34;:240}\"\u003e\u0026#160;\u003c/span\u003e"},{"name":"Robin L. Dillon","bio":"\u003cspan class=\"bodybold\"\u003eRobin L. Dillon\u003c/span\u003e (\u003ca xmlns=\"\" href=\"mailto:rld9@georgetown.edu\"\u003erld9@georgetown.edu\u003c/a\u003e) is an associate professor at Georgetown\u0026#8217;s McDonough School of Business."},{"name":"Peter M. Madsen","bio":"\u003cspan class=\"bodybold\"\u003ePeter M. Madsen\u003c/span\u003e (\u003ca xmlns=\"\" href=\"mailto:petermadsen@byu.edu\"\u003epetermadsen@byu.edu\u003c/a\u003e) is an assistant professor at Brigham Young University\u0026#8217;s Marriott School of Management, in Provo, Utah."}],"published":"2011-04-01T04:00:00.000+00:00","issue":{"coverDate":"April 2011","issueId":"BR1104","reprintId":"R1104G"},"hasAudio":false,"hasDropCap":true,"paywallEligible":true,"hbrExecutive":false,"giftedArticle":false,"contentKey":"SGsYU9CjSJBtoj33PjPRzs1VoC0g1UVidgfr7Q2PdW5Y6FY5iaMbyDnFuu7PPqaQBmHk83UdMPNDALQQQmECSM93uQiCcsq4sVqXLy1ZUXKkn/z27SSZ1WnEIUyfnqM/","metaTags":{"page-id":"300","page-category-id":"391783","article-content-type":"Magazine Article","issue-id":"BR1104"},"stylesOverride":["has-dropcap"],"editorTags":[{"tagValue":"Import Notice"},{"tagValue":"Missing Image"}],"configurations":{"configExemptFromPaywall":false,"configNoIntromercial":false,"configSubscriberOnly":false},"pianoConfigurations":{"pianoContentType":"standard"},"userProfile":{"accountLocked":false,"careerLevel":"","companyName":"","companySize":"","customAttributes":[],"displayName":"Guest User","emailAddress":"anonymousUser","firstName":"Guest","folders":[],"guid":"482c9d54943c9a0766089d57ab45302f","hbrIndustry":"","hbrJobTitle":"","industry":"","isGdprDeleted":false,"jobFunction":"","jobTitle":"","lastName":"User","lastVisitDate":"2026-09-12T00:05:40.245+00:00","leader-profile":{"completed-quizzes":0,"page-visits":0},"linkedAccounts":[],"loggedIn":false,"marketingCampaigns":[],"newsletters":[],"pianoRegistered":false,"quota":{"count":1,"limit":2,"remaining":1,"ascend":false},"state":"Anonymous","status":"Anonymous","subscriptions":[],"tiers":[],"topics":[],"username":"ANONYMOUSUSER"},"articleBody":"The Idea in Brief Most business failures, such as engineering disasters, product malfunctions, and PR crises, are preceded by near misses—close calls that, had it not been for chance, would have been worse. Managers often misinterpret these warning signs because they are blinded by cognitive biases. They take the near misses as indications that systems are working well—or they don’t notice them at all. Seven strategies can help managers recognize and learn from near misses. Managers should: (1) be on alert when time or cost pressures are high; (2) watch for deviations from the norm; (3) uncover the deviations’ root causes; (4) hold themselves accountable for near misses; (5) envision worst-case scenarios; (6) look for near misses masquerading as successes; and (7) reward individuals for exposing near misses. Most people think of “near misses” as harrowing close calls that could have been a lot worse—when a firefighter escapes a burning building moments before it collapses, or when a tornado miraculously veers away from a town in its path. Events like these are rare narrow escapes that leave us shaken and looking for lessons. But there’s another class of near misses, ones that are much more common and pernicious. These are the often unremarked small failures that permeate day-to-day business but cause no immediate harm. People are hardwired to misinterpret or ignore the warnings embedded in these failures, and so they often go unexamined or, perversely, are seen as signs that systems are resilient and things are going well. Yet these seemingly innocuous events are often harbingers; if conditions shift slightly, or if luck does not intervene, a crisis erupts. Consider the BP Gulf oil rig disaster. As a case study in the anatomy of near misses and the consequences of misreading them, it’s close to perfect. In April 2010, a gas blowout occurred during the cementing of the Deepwater Horizon well. The blowout ignited, killing 11 people, sinking the rig, and triggering a massive underwater spill that would take months to contain. Numerous poor decisions and dangerous conditions contributed to the disaster: Drillers had used too few centralizers to position the pipe, the lubricating “drilling mud” was removed too early, managers had misinterpreted vital test results that would have confirmed that hydrocarbons were seeping from the well. In addition, BP relied on an older version of a complex fail-safe device called a blowout preventer that had a notoriously spotty track record. Why did Transocean (the rig’s owner), BP executives, rig managers, and the drilling crew overlook the warning signs, even though the well had been plagued by technical problems all along (crew members called it “the well from hell”)? We believe that the stakeholders were lulled into complacency by a catalog of previous near misses in the industry—successful outcomes in which luck played a key role in averting disaster. Increasing numbers of ultradeep wells were being drilled, but significant oil spills or fatalities were extremely rare. And many Gulf of Mexico wells had suffered minor blowouts during cementing (dozens of them in the past two decades); however, in each case chance factors—favorable wind direction, no one welding near the leak at the time, for instance—helped prevent an explosion. Each near miss, rather than raise alarms and prompt investigations, was taken as an indication that existing methods and safety procedures worked. For the past seven years, we have studied near misses in dozens of companies across industries from telecommunications to automobiles, at NASA, and in lab simulations. Our research reveals a pattern: Multiple near misses preceded (and foreshadowed) every disaster and business crisis we studied, and most of the misses were ignored or misread. Our work also shows that cognitive biases conspire to blind managers to the near misses. Two in particular cloud our judgment. The first is “normalization of deviance,” the tendency over time to accept anomalies—particularly risky ones—as normal. Think of the growing comfort a worker might feel with using a ladder with a broken rung; the more times he climbs the dangerous ladder without incident, the safer he feels it is. For an organization, such normalization can be catastrophic. Columbia University sociologist Diane Vaughan coined the phrase in her book The Challenger Launch Decision to describe the organizational behaviors that allowed a glaring mechanical anomaly on the space shuttle to gradually be viewed as a normal flight risk—dooming its crew. The second cognitive error is the so-called outcome bias. When people observe successful outcomes, they tend to focus on the results more than on the (often unseen) complex processes that led to them. Recognizing and learning from near misses isn’t simply a matter of paying attention; it actually runs contrary to human nature. In this article, we examine near misses and reveal how companies can detect and learn from them. By seeing them for what they are—instructive failures—managers can apply their lessons to improve operations and, potentially, ward off catastrophe. Roots of Crises Consider this revealing experiment: We asked business students, NASA personnel, and space-industry contractors to evaluate a fictional project manager, Chris, who was supervising the launch of an unmanned spacecraft and had made a series of decisions, including skipping the investigation of a potential design flaw and forgoing a peer review, because of time pressure. Each participant was given one of three scenarios: The spacecraft launched without issue and was able to transmit data (success outcome); shortly after launch, the spacecraft had a problem caused by the design flaw, but because of the way the sun happened to be aligned with the vehicle it was still able to transmit data (near-miss outcome); or the craft had a problem caused by the flaw and, because of the sun’s chance alignment, it failed to transmit data and was lost (failure outcome). How did Chris fare? Participants were just as likely to praise his decision making, leadership abilities, and the overall mission in the success case as in the near-miss case—though the latter plainly succeeded only because of blind luck. When people observe a successful outcome, their natural tendency is to assume that the process that led to it was fundamentally sound, even when it demonstrably wasn’t; hence the common phrase “you can’t argue with success.” In fact, you can—and should. Organizational disasters, studies show, rarely have a single cause. Rather, they are initiated by the unexpected interaction of multiple small, often seemingly unimportant, human errors, technological failures, or bad business decisions. These latent errors combine with enabling conditions to produce a significant failure. A latent error on an oil rig might be a cementing procedure that allows gas to escape; enabling conditions might be a windless day and a welder working near the leak. Together, the latent error and enabling conditions ignite a deadly firestorm. Near misses arise from the same preconditions, but in the absence of enabling conditions, they produce only small failures and thus go undetected or are ignored. Latent errors often exist for long periods of time before they combine with enabling conditions to produce a significant failure. Whether an enabling condition transforms a near miss into a crisis generally depends on chance; thus, it makes little sense to try to predict or control enabling conditions. Instead, companies should focus on identifying and fixing latent errors before circumstances allow them to create a crisis. Little Near Misses and Small-Scale Failures We’ve used dramatic cases such as oil spills and shuttle disasters to illustrate how near misses can foreshadow huge calamities. But near misses are relevant to managers at all levels in their day-to-day work, as they can also presage lesser but still consequential problems. Research on workplace safety, for example, estimates that for every 1,000 near misses, one accident results in a serious injury or fatality, at least 10 smaller accidents cause minor injuries, and 30 cause property damage but no injury. Identifying near misses and addressing the latent errors that give rise to them can head off the even the more mundane problems that distract organizations and sap their resources. Imagine an associate who misses deadlines and is chronically late for client meetings but is otherwise a high performer. Each tardy project and late arrival is a near miss; but by addressing the symptoms of the problem—covering for the employee in a variety of ways—his manager is able to prevent clients from defecting. By doing this, however, she permits a small but significant erosion of client satisfaction, team cohesiveness, and organizational performance. And eventually, a client may jump ship—an outcome that could have been avoided by attending to the near misses. Your organization needn’t face a threat as serious as an oil spill to benefit from exposing near misses of all types and addressing their root causes. Oil rig explosions offer a dramatic case in point, but latent errors and enabling conditions in business often combine to produce less spectacular but still costly crises—corporate failures that attention to latent errors could have prevented. Let’s look at three. Bad Apple. Take Apple’s experience following its launch of the iPhone 4, in June 2010. Almost immediately, customers began complaining about dropped calls and poor signal strength. Apple’s initial response was to blame users for holding the phone the wrong way, thus covering the external antenna, and to advise them to “avoid gripping [the phone] in the lower left corner.” When questioned about the problem by a user on a web forum, CEO Steve Jobs fired back an e-mail describing the dropped calls as a “non issue.” Many customers found Apple’s posture arrogant and insulting and made their displeasure known through social and mainstream media. Several filed class action lawsuits, including a suit that alleged “fraud by concealment, negligence, intentional misrepresentation and defective design.” The reputation crisis reached a crescendo in mid-July, when Consumer Reports declined to recommend the iPhone 4 (it had recommended all previous versions). Ultimately Apple backpedaled, acknowledging software errors and offering owners software updates and iPhone cases to address the antenna problem. The latent errors underlying the crisis had long been present. As Jobs demonstrated during a press conference, virtually all smartphones experience a drop in signal strength when users touch the external antenna. This flaw had existed in earlier Phones, as well as in competitors’ phones, for years. The phones’ signal strength problem was also well known. Other latent errors emerged as the crisis gained momentum, notably an evasive PR strategy that invited a backlash. Consumers’ enduring the iPhone’s problems for years without comment was a sign not of a solid strategy but of an ongoing near miss. That consumers had endured the performance issues for years without significant comment was not a sign of a successful strategy but of an ongoing near miss. When coupled with the right enabling conditions—Consumer Reports’ withering and widely quoted review and the expanding reach of social media—a crisis erupted. If Apple had recognized consumers’ forbearance as an ongoing near miss and proactively fixed the phones’ technical problems, it could have avoided the crisis. It didn’t, we suspect, because of normalization bias, which made the antenna glitch seem increasingly acceptable; and because of outcome bias, which led managers to conclude that the lack of outcry about the phones’ shortcomings reflected their own good strategy—rather than good luck. Speed Warning. On August 28, 2009, California Highway Patrol officer Mark Saylor and three family members died in a fiery crash after the gas pedal of the Lexus sedan they were driving in stuck, accelerating the car to more than 120 miles per hour. A 911 call from the speeding car captured the horrifying moments before the crash and was replayed widely in the news and social media. Up to this point, Toyota, which makes Lexus, had downplayed the more than 2,000 complaints of unintended acceleration among its cars it had received since 2001. The Saylor tragedy forced the company to seriously investigate the problem. Ultimately, Toyota recalled more than 6 million vehicles in late 2009 and early 2010 and temporarily halted production and sales of eight models, sustaining an estimated $2 billion loss in North American sales alone and immeasurable harm to its reputation. Complaints about vehicle acceleration and speed control are common for all automakers, and in most cases, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, the problems are caused by driver error, not a vehicle defect. However, beginning in 2001, about the time that Toyota introduced a new accelerator design, complaints of acceleration problems in Toyotas increased sharply, whereas such complaints remained relatively constant for other automakers (see the exhibit “Toyota Pedal Problems”). Toyota could have averted the crisis if it had noted this deviation and acknowledged the thousands of complaints for what they were—near misses. Here, too, normalization of deviance and outcome bias, along with other factors, conspired to obscure the grave implications of the near misses. Only when an enabling condition occurred—the Saylor family tragedy and the ensuing media storm—did the latent error trigger a crisis. Misreading the Evidence Errors in process or product design are often ignored, even when the warning signs clearly call for action. The more times small failures occur without disaster, the more complacent managers become. Jet Black and Blue. Since it began operating, in 2000, JetBlue Airways has taken an aggressive approach to bad weather, canceling proportionately fewer flights than other airlines and directing its pilots to pull away from gates as soon as possible in severe weather so as to be near the front of the line when runways were cleared for takeoff—even if that meant loaded planes would sit for some time on the tarmac. For several years, this policy seemed to work. On-tarmac delays were not arduously long, and customers were by and large accepting of them. Nonetheless, it was a risky strategy, exposing the airline to the danger of stranding passengers for extended periods if conditions abruptly worsened. The wake-up call came on February 14, 2007. A massive ice storm at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport caused widespread disruption—but no carrier was harder hit than JetBlue, whose assertive pilots now found themselves stuck on the tarmac (literally, in some cases, because of frozen wheels) and with no open gates to return to. Distressed passengers on several planes were trapped for up to 11 hours in overheated, foul-smelling cabins with little food or water. The media served up angry first-person accounts of the ordeal, and a chastened David Neeleman, JetBlue’s CEO, acknowledged on CNBC, “We did a horrible job, actually, of getting our customers off those airplanes.” The airline reported canceling more than 250 of its 505 flights that day—a much higher proportion than any other airline. It lost millions of dollars and squandered priceless consumer loyalty. For JetBlue, each of the thousands of flights that took off before the competition during previous weather delays was a near miss. As the airline continued to get away with the risky strategy, managers who had expressed concern early on about the way the airline handled flight delays became complacent, even as long delays mounted. Indeed, the proportion of JetBlue weather-based delays of two hours or more roughly tripled between 2003 and 2007, whereas such delays remained fairly steady at other major U.S. airlines (see the exhibit “JetBlue Tarmac Trouble”). Rather than perceiving that a dramatic increase in delays represented a dramatic increase in risk, JetBlue managers saw only successfully launched flights. It took an enabling condition—the ferocious ice storm—to turn the latent error into a crisis. Recognizing and Preventing Near Misses Our research suggests seven strategies that can help organizations recognize near misses and root out the latent errors behind them. We have developed many of these strategies in collaboration with NASA—an organization that was initially slow to recognize the relevance of near misses but is now developing enterprisewide programs to identify, learn from, and prevent them. 1. Heed High Pressure. The greater the pressure to meet performance goals such as tight schedules, cost, or production targets, the more likely managers are to discount near-miss signals or misread them as signs of sound decision making. BP’s managers knew the company was incurring overrun costs of $1 million a day in rig lease and contractor fees, which surely contributed to their failure to recognize warning signs. The high-pressure effect also contributed to the Columbia space shuttle disaster, in which insulation foam falling from the external fuel tank damaged the shuttle’s wing during liftoff, causing the shuttle to break apart as it reentered the atmosphere. Managers had been aware of the foam issue since the start of the shuttle program and were concerned about it early on, but as dozens of flights proceeded without serious mishap, they began to classify foam strikes as maintenance issues—rather than as near misses. This classic case of normalization of deviance was exacerbated by the enormous political pressure the agency was under at the time to complete the International Space Station’s main core. Delays on the shuttle, managers knew, would slow down the space station project. Despite renewed concern about foam strikes caused by a particularly dramatic recent near miss, and with an investigation under way, the Columbia took off. According to the Columbia Accident Investigation Board, “The pressure of maintaining the flight schedule created a management atmosphere that increasingly accepted less-than-specification performance of various components and systems.” When people make decisions under pressure, psychological research shows, they tend to rely on heuristics, or rules of thumb, and thus are more easily influenced by biases. In high-pressure work environments, managers should expect people to be more easily swayed by outcome bias, more likely to normalize deviance, and more apt to believe that their decisions are sound. Organizations should encourage, or even require, employees to examine their decisions during pressure-filled periods and ask, “If I had more time and resources, would I make the same decision?” 2. Learn from Deviations. As the Toyota and JetBlue crises suggest, managers’ response when some aspect of operations skews from the norm is often to recalibrate what they consider acceptable risk. Our research shows that in such cases, decision makers may clearly understand the statistical risk represented by the deviation, but grow increasingly less concerned about it. We’ve seen this effect clearly in a laboratory setting. Turning again to the space program for insight, we asked study participants to assume operational control of a Mars rover in a simulated mission. Each morning they received a weather report and had to decide whether or not to drive onward. On the second day, they learned that there was a 95% chance of a severe sandstorm, which had a 40% chance of causing catastrophic wheel failure. Half the participants were told that the rover had successfully driven through sandstorms in the past (that is, it had emerged unscathed in several prior near misses); the other half had no information about the rover’s luck in past storms. When the time came to choose whether or not to risk the drive, three quarters of the near-miss group opted to continue driving; only 13% of the other group did. Both groups knew, and indeed stated that they knew, that the risk of failure was 40%—but the near-miss group was much more comfortable with that level of risk. Managers should seek out operational deviations from the norm and examine whether their reasons for tolerating the associated risk have merit. Questions to ask might be: Have we always been comfortable with this level of risk? Has our policy toward this risk changed over time? 3. Uncover Root Causes. When managers identify deviations, their reflex is often to correct the symptom rather than its cause. Such was Apple’s response when it at first suggested that customers address the antenna problem by changing the way they held the iPhone. NASA learned this lesson the hard way as well, during its 1998 Mars Climate Orbiter mission. As the spacecraft headed toward Mars it drifted slightly off course four times; each time, managers made small trajectory adjustments, but they didn’t investigate the cause of the drifting. As the $200 million spacecraft approached Mars, instead of entering into orbit, it disintegrated in the atmosphere. Only then did NASA uncover the latent error—programmers had used English rather than metric units in their software coding. The course corrections addressed the symptom of the problem but not the underlying cause. Their apparent success lulled decision makers into thinking that the issue had been adequately resolved. The health care industry has made great strides in learning from near misses and offers a model for others. Providers are increasingly encouraged to report mistakes and near misses so that the lessons can be teased out and applied. An article in Today’s Hospitalist, for example, describes a near miss at Delnor-Community Hospital, in Geneva, Illinois. Two patients sharing a hospital room had similar last names and were prescribed drugs with similar-sounding names—Cytotec and Cytoxan. Confused by the similarities, a nurse nearly administered one of the drugs to the wrong patient. Luckily, she caught her mistake in time and filed a report detailing the close call. The hospital immediately separated the patients and created a policy to prevent patients with similar names from sharing rooms in the future. 4. Demand Accountability. Even when people are aware of near misses, they tend to downgrade their importance. One way to limit this potentially dangerous effect is to require managers to justify their assessments of near misses. Remember Chris, the fictional manager in our study who neglected some due diligence in his supervision of a space mission? Participants gave him equally good marks for the success scenario and the near-miss scenario. Chris’s raters didn’t seem to see that the near miss was in fact a near disaster. In a continuation of that study, we told a separate group of managers and contractors that they would have to justify their assessment of Chris to upper management. Knowing they’d have to explain their rating to the bosses, those evaluating the near-miss scenario judged Chris’s performance just as harshly as did those who had learned the mission had failed—recognizing, it seems, that rather than managing well, he’d simply dodged a bullet. 5. Consider Worst-Case Scenarios. Unless expressly advised to do so, people tend not to think through the possible negative consequences of near misses. Apple managers, for example, were aware of the iPhone’s antenna problems but probably hadn’t imagined how bad a consumer backlash could get. If they had considered a worst-case scenario, they might have headed off the crisis, our research suggests. In one study, we told participants to suppose that an impending hurricane had a 30% chance of hitting their house and asked them if they would evacuate. Just as in our Mars rover study, people who were told that they’d escaped disaster in previous near misses were more likely to take a chance (in this case, opting to stay home). However, when we told participants to suppose that, although their house had survived previous hurricanes, a neighbor’s house had been hit by a tree during one, they saw things differently; this group was far more likely to evacuate. Examining events closely helps people distinguish between near misses and successes, and they’ll often adjust their decision making accordingly. Managers in Walmart’s business-continuity office clearly understand this. For several years prior to Hurricane Katrina, the office had carefully evaluated previous hurricane near misses of its stores and infrastructure and, based on them, planned for a direct hit to a metro area where it had a large presence. In the days before Katrina made landfall in Louisiana, the company expanded the staff of its emergency command center from the usual six to 10 people to more than 50, and stockpiled food, water, and emergency supplies in its local warehouses. Having learned from prior near misses, Walmart famously outperformed local and federal officials in responding to the disaster. Said Jefferson Parish sheriff Harry Lee, “If the American government had responded like Walmart has responded, we wouldn’t be in this crisis.” 6. Evaluate Projects at Every Stage. When things go badly, managers commonly conduct postmortems to determine causes and prevent recurrences. When they go well, however, few do formal reviews of the success to capture its lessons. Because near misses can look like successes, they often escape scrutiny. This article also appears in: HBR’s 10 Must Reads on Making Smart Decisions The chief knowledge officer at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Edward Rogers, instituted a “pause and learn” process in which teams discuss at each project milestone what they have learned. They not only cover mishaps but also expressly examine perceived successes and the design decisions considered along the way. By critically examining projects while they’re under way, teams avoid outcome bias and are more likely to see near misses for what they are. These sessions are followed by knowledge-sharing workshops involving a broader group of teams. Other NASA centers, including the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which manages NASA’s Mars program, are beginning similar experiments. According to Rogers, most projects that have used the pause-and-learn process have uncovered near misses—typically, design flaws that had gone undetected. “Almost every mishap at NASA can be traced to some series of small signals that went unnoticed at the critical moment,” he says. 7. Reward Owning Up. Seeing and attending to near misses requires organizational alertness, but no amount of attention will avert failure if people aren’t motivated to expose near misses—or, worse, are discouraged from doing so. In many organizations, employees have reason to keep quiet about failures, and in that type of environment they’re likely to keep suspicions about near misses to themselves. Political scientists Martin Landau and Donald Chisholm described one such case that, though it took place on the deck of a warship, is relevant to any organization. An enlisted seaman on an aircraft carrier discovered during a combat exercise that he’d lost a tool on the deck. He knew that an errant tool could cause a catastrophe if it were sucked into a jet engine, and he was also aware that admitting the mistake could bring a halt to the exercise—and potential punishment. As long as the tool was unaccounted for, each successful takeoff and landing would be a near miss, a lucky outcome. He reported the mistake, the exercise was stopped, and all aircraft aloft were redirected to bases on land, at a significant cost. Rather than being punished for his error, the seaman was commended by his commanding officer in a formal ceremony for his bravery in reporting it. Leaders in any organization should publicly reward staff for uncovering near misses—including their own. Two forces conspire to make learning from near misses difficult: Cognitive biases make them hard to see, and, even when they are visible, leaders tend not to grasp their significance. Thus, organizations often fail to expose and correct latent errors even when the cost of doing so is small—and so they miss opportunities for organizational improvement before disaster strikes. This tendency is itself a type of organizational failure—a failure to learn from “cheap” data. Surfacing near misses and correcting root causes is one the soundest investments an organization can make."},"initialDataLayer":{"page":{"pageInfo":{"date":"09-11-2026","time":"08:05 PM","deviceType":"Desktop","pageURL":"https://hbr.org/2011/04/how-to-avoid-catastrophe","referringURL":"","language":"en","contentType":"Magazine Article","pageName":"How to Avoid Catastrophe","pageType":"Article","pageCategoryID":"391783","pageCategoryName":"Strategic planning","pageDescription":"Reprint: R1104G Most business failures—such as engineering disasters, product malfunctions, and PR crises—are foreshadowed by near misses, close calls that, had luck not intervened, would have had far worse consequences. The space shuttle Columbia ’s fatal reentry, BP’s Gulf oil rig disaster, Toyota’s stuck accelerators, even the iPhone 4’s antenna failures—all were preceded by near-miss events that should have tipped off managers to impending crises. The problem is that near misses are often overlooked—or, perversely, viewed as a sign that systems are resilient and working well. That’s because managers are blinded by cognitive biases, argue Georgetown professors Tinsley and Dillon, and Brigham Young University’s Madsen. Seven strategies can help managers recognize and learn from near misses: They should be on increased alert when time or cost pressures are high; watch for deviations in operations from the norm and uncover their root causes; make decision makers accountable for near misses; envision worst-case scenarios; be on the lookout for near-misses masquerading as successes; and reward individuals for exposing near misses."},"attributes":{"articleEditorialDistinction":null,"articleContentType":"Magazine Article","articleType":"Magazine Article","articleAuthor":[{"authorName":"Catherine H. Tinsley"},{"authorName":"Robin L. Dillon"},{"authorName":"Peter M. Madsen"}],"articleID":"tag:hbr.org,1922-01-01:201104.47716-R1104G","articleTitle":"How to Avoid Catastrophe","articlePrimaryTopic":"Strategic planning","articlePublishDate":"2011-04-01","articlePostingDate":"2011-04-01","primaryAuthor":"Catherine H. Tinsley","articleSubTopics":[{"subTopicName":"Strategic planning"},{"subTopicName":"Organizational culture"},{"subTopicName":"Crisis management"},{"subTopicName":"Psychology"},{"subTopicName":"Strategy"},{"subTopicName":"Space vehicles"}],"articlePrimaryEditor":"","articleTags":"Magazine Article","configSubscriberOnly":false,"configNoIntromercial":false,"configExemptFromPaywall":false,"editorTags":[{"tagValue":"Import Notice"},{"tagValue":"Missing Image"}],"articleFindingMethod":"External","giftedArticle":false,"noaPlayerDisplayed":"False","configHBRExecExclusive":"False","hbrExecType":""}},"users":[{"profile":{"dateLastVisit":"2026-09-12","daysSinceLastVisit":"Less than one day","guid":"482C9D54943C9A0766089D57AB45302F","userState":"Guest","quota":{"limit":2,"remaining":1},"feeds":[],"marketingCampaigns":[],"newsletters":[]}}],"pageInstanceID":"How to Avoid Catastropheproduction"},"apiOrigin":"https://platform.hbr.org","storeDomain":"https://store.hbr.org","pageURL":"https://hbr.org/2011/04/how-to-avoid-catastrophe","pianoParams":{"setDebug":"false","setAid":"mbs77qtzUz","setEndpoint":"https://buy.tinypass.com/api/v3","setUseTinypassAccounts":false,"setUsePianoIdUserProvider":false,"setCxenseSiteId":"1141964769885092441"},"pianoOrigin":"https://buy.tinypass.com","splunkEnv":"production","featureFlags":{"hbr-executive-offer":true,"hbrmodrn-3211-split-async-adobe-load":true,"piano-subscription-offer":true,"webinar-tout-enabled":false}},"__N_SSP":true},"page":"/[year]/[month]/[slug]","query":{"year":"2011","month":"04","slug":"how-to-avoid-catastrophe"},"buildId":"Gg7YHWGdcqxsJffs2T7OU","assetPrefix":"/assets-mfe-articles","isFallback":false,"isExperimentalCompile":false,"gssp":true,"scriptLoader":[]}</script></body></html> |