The Need for Organisational Resilience - Chapter 2

untenable. In doing this, they kept the Germans engaged in a war of attrition, allowing their own front

to be drawn back but not broken.

On 12 th July, the Germans ran into an armoured counterattack at the city of Prokhorovka, to be

known as arguable the biggest tank battle in military history. It was a tactical victory for the Germans,

but ultimately it dawned on the German High Command OKW (Oberkommando der Wehrmacht) that

gains were far below expectations, and came at a price the German Wehrmacht could not afford.

During the 12 days of Zitadelle , they suffered losses of 9 per cent of operational strength (33,708

casualties, including 6,643 dead). On 15 th July, Operation Zitadelle came to an end with losses of

German men and material that the German army could ill-afford. In WWII, it was the last occasion on

which Germany launched a major offensive in the east.

Operation Zitadelle was the antithesis of an Adaptive Strategy; it contained no element of

surprise. The Red Army had learned, in a near catastrophic manner in 1941/42, how the Germans

operated. The Germans however, could not envisage that applying an Adaptive Strategy might, over

time, cease to be infallibly successful, regardless of how the external environment had changed. Their

insistent belief that they still faced the Red Army of 1941/42 was their downfall.

An Adaptive Strategy needs to remain adaptive by continuously developing dynamic capabilities.

Operation Zitadelle was the opposite, characterised by linear thinking that was entirely

uncharacteristic of the previous German way of thinking. Resources were indeed strengthened and

improved over time (e.g. more advanced equipment and tanks). Nevertheless, the way in which they

were deployed lacked imagination, allowance for contingencies, and thus surprise.

Scenario Planning instead of Forecasting

I seem to be arguing that we should abandon forecasts altogether. That would be foolish.

Without any foresight, an organisation would be virtually blind in engaging with the future,

with no sense of direction and alignment. Nevertheless, in order to adapt to changes in the

environment, many organisations may choose to replace straight forecasting with more

sophisticated “scenario” building, and simple deterministic planning with more complex

“contingency” planning (Mintzberg 1994, 248).

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