Change When You Are Strong!

By Prof. Enrique N. Soriano

Business as usual has become one of the greatest strategic risks.

There is a Japanese philosophy that captures one of the most enduring lessons in business: “Kiki no toki ni kaeru no dewa nai. Tsuyoi toki ni kaeru.” Do not change when you are in crisis. Change when you are strong. The strongest organizations never wait until survival is threatened before they transform. They reinvent themselves while they still possess the resources, the confidence, and the freedom to shape their own future. Once decline begins, transformation becomes far more expensive, emotionally difficult, and often too late.

Ironically, the greatest threat to a business is not always recession, disruption, or competition. Sometimes it is success itself. After nearly four decades—half as a corporate executive and half advising boards, founders, and business families across Asia—I have become less worried about companies fighting for survival than those celebrating record profits, expanding aggressively, and declaring their best year ever. Success creates confidence, but unchecked success creates complacency, and that distinction often determines whether a company survives another generation.

This year alone has delivered one global shock after another. Geopolitical conflicts have intensified, supply chains remain fragile, energy prices continue to fluctuate, technology is redefining entire industries, and customer expectations are evolving faster than most organizations can respond. The next disruption is no longer a question of if but when.

Yet this is precisely when many next-generation leaders become comfortable. They inherit healthy businesses, growing balance sheets, respected brands, and loyal customers. The temptation is understandable: protect what already works. But stewardship is not preservation; stewardship is responsible reinvention. The responsibility of the next generation is not simply to maintain the success created by the founders but to ensure the enterprise remains relevant long after today’s success has faded. Every generation inherits a different market, different customers, different technologies, and different competitors. Yesterday’s winning formula inevitably becomes tomorrow’s constraint.

Whenever I meet thriving family businesses, I deliberately ask uncomfortable questions. Has the business model evolved as quickly as the market? Has governance matured alongside growth? Is leadership institutionalized, or does everything still depend on one individual? Is the next generation truly prepared to lead, or merely waiting to inherit authority? If the founder disappeared tomorrow, would the business become stronger—or simply more vulnerable? The response is often predictable: “Why worry when business has never been better?” My answer is equally predictable. Because success often hides tomorrow’s problems.

Experience has taught me that organizational decline rarely begins in the income statement. It begins inside boardrooms where difficult conversations are postponed, succession is delayed, governance remains underdeveloped, innovation slows, and yesterday’s victories quietly become today’s assumptions. By the time declining revenues reveal the truth, the underlying weaknesses have often existed for years, waiting only for the next disruption to expose them.

History repeatedly reminds us of this reality. Esprit grew from a Hong Kong fashion label into one of Asia’s most recognized global brands. Robinsons Singapore served generations of loyal customers and became one of the region’s most respected retail institutions. Both enjoyed iconic brands, talented people, and decades of commercial success. Yet neither declined overnight. Both were gradually overtaken by changing consumer behavior, digital disruption, and business models that evolved faster than they did. Their greatest competitors were not merely external. They were yesterday’s successes.

For founders, the lesson is clear: never allow prosperity to delay transformation. For the next generation, however, the lesson is even more profound. You were never chosen simply to inherit the business; you were entrusted to reinvent it. Legacy is not measured by how faithfully you preserve yesterday’s success, but by whether the enterprise emerges stronger for the generation that follows.

Prof. Enrique M. Soriano is Executive Director of W+B Advisory Group. He is a volunteer Mentor of the Singapore Institute of Directors’ (SID) Board Readiness Programme, a former World Bank/IFC Governance Consultant, and advises boards and multi-generational family enterprises across Asia on governance, strategy, succession and long-term stewardship.