For many years, Cirque du Soleil has been a model of how to rethink a business and an inspiration for the authors of the best seller “Blue Ocean Strategy.” Founded in 1984 in Canada, the company changed the way to understand cirque entertainment around the globe, delivering a new value proposition to the market.

However, its unbeatable strategy couldn’t fight the COVID-19 pandemic and the company went for bankruptcy protection in June of this year.

Nonetheless, it wouldn’t be fair to blame the strategy. There have been companies such as Amazon, Netflix, and Zoom, among others, that have been highly benefited from the pandemic. So, were they just lucky? Were they in the right industry at the right time?

Not necessarily. For example, Cirque du Soleil and Netflix are both in the same industry: entertainment. However, the former went bankrupt while the latter added 10 million customers in the second quarter of the year. So, what made the difference?

The answer: channels. The COVID-19 pandemic was selective with channels. What played a crucial role was the business model that every organization had. This is the rationale for how an organization organizes its resources and activities to deliver the promised value proposition to the market. For example, while the cab industry still remains arguing for legal and political issues, digital platforms such as Uber and Lift are trying to keep up with the exponential curve of technology, thinking about how to integrate driverless cars. The cab industry never understood that channels make the difference in the market and they won’t get it despite the tremendous blow received by the pandemic.

Forces of the external environment can impact the organization in tremendous ways, negatively or positively. They can present golden opportunities or harmful threats. An organization itself has no power to alter the external context in order to prevent its impact. The only thing a company can do is to anticipate, prepare, and adjust to the changing environment in order to remain competitive in the market. So, the question now is how are companies rethinking their business model?

Some organizations are just optimistic. They are waiting for the pandemic to pass and activities return to normal. For these companies, the news is that optimism is not a strategy. At least not in this century. Today, the strategy involves critical thinking, innovation, and action. The organizations that will survive the pandemic will be the ones that can rapidly learn from the situation, innovate, adapt, and move on.

The COVID-19 pandemic brought uncertainty and emotional load into the decision-making process. The pandemic pushes the learning horizon away from the CEOs’ sight. It is not about getting the right prediction about what the future could be, but rather working out different scenarios that might take place in the upcoming future in order to adapt to the company’s strategy. Strategic thinking comes before the strategy.

Ms. Eduardo J. Ergueta