Disturbance vs. Disruption: Spike or Shift?

In turbulent times, leaders need a clean way to think about disruption vs disturbance: is the latest headline a temporary spike or a permanent shift?

It would be difficult today to find someone (with access to the news) who would disagree that we are in fact, living through turbulent times.  Tariffs, war with Iran, a tsunami of AI – all of these and more seem to keep knocking things off balance.

As we have discussed elsewhere, part of the uncertainty of it all stems from the fact that it is not simply that many events are occurring, it is that in many cases, it is our assumptions that are being stressed and fractured.

Very basic expectations for how the world works – and thus, what to expect for tomorrow – are being broken and reset.  The future, along with uncertainty, is expanding.

At the same time, not everything is breaking.  Not every assumption about the world is being rewritten.  And therein lies the challenge for leaders today (one of many, to be sure): how to know what among all the breathless headlines and volatile movements in the operating environment are “merely” temporary spikes and which are permanent shifts.

A Disruption vs. Disturbance?

One way to deal with this is what we do here within VFS: distinguish between disturbances and disruptions.

A disturbance is something that causes a spike in the system.  That spike might be large, but it is temporary, the system will pull things back in (relatively) short order.  We see these all the time: a terrorist incident; bad news that temporarily upsets stock markets; a new retail product that juices sales for time.

A disruption is something that causes a permanent change in the system.  A realignment of capabilities, relationships, or beliefs at a more fundamental level.  These we see less often, though it seems like these are occurring more frequently than in past eras: 9/11; COVID-19; the public release of ChatGPT.

Disturbances you ride out or steer around.  Disruptions require strategic change from your organization.

To be clear, neither disturbances nor true disruptions emerge out of nowhere.  They typically are the result of long building pressures or developments, and sometimes are emergent phenomena; but they always have preceding causes and conditions (this is where practices like emerging issues analysis, scenario forecasting, and risk assessment can play important roles).

Taking Action

For our present moment in history, it can be helpful to use these formal distinctions within your team to both talk about surprising or upsetting developments as well as to determine courses of action. To create a joint perspective on how (and why) the team is dealing with things a certain way.

Given the long list of headlines presently confronting all of us, there is likely no shortage of issues that your team is very concerned about right now.  One thing you can do today is to schedule time this week to assemble your team for a quick 20-minute discussion and decide: is this most recent top-of-mind issue a temporary spike, or a permanent shift?  Or in our language, is it a disturbance or a true disruption?

If your team is wrestling with such a discussion and could use some help – and especially if you are looking at multiple issues expanding the uncertainty you are under – then contact us today to help facilitate your team’s conversation.