Most business executives have traditionally viewed business models as static constructs that work on a simple input-output method. And yet today, because of a variety of forces, from globalization to the information revolution, companies are being forced to face the fact that nothing is static anymore. All systems, including business models and strategies, are dynamic and ever-evolving.

This new business environment saps momentum and demands strategic resilience — the ability of organizations to dynamically reinvent business models and strategies amid changing circumstances. This means continuously reading the environment and adapting to it.

There are many facts of corporate life that work against resilience, including arrogance, denial, and a stagnant corporate culture, according to an article in the Harvard Business Review. As a result, four main challenges stand in the way of becoming resilient:

First, there is the cognitive challenge. Senior management must remain alert to change in the environment and must constantly analyze how those changes are going to influence the business model.

Second, there is the strategic challenge. Management must see strategy as a continuously evolving set of options that offer reasonable alternatives to the way business is done today.

Third, there is the political challenge. Managers must not let projects continue simply because they’re already under way. They must rapidly reallocate resources to support new projects that offer the best response to the changing environment.

Fourth, there is the ideological challenge. The long-standing mantra of “continuous process improvement” must be questioned when the environment changes. Innovation must replace perpetuation if a company is to be truly resilient.

Changes in the environment can take many shapes. For example, when a labor dispute closed seaports on the West Coast in September 2002, disrupted supply chains inflicted a billion-dollar loss on manufacturing companies every day the disruption continued.

This example highlights two important facts: First, a more resilient industry might have fared better. And second, in today’s networked world, disruptions at one small point in the value chain can have ramifications in many...