Your transformation project got the green light 18 months ago. The business case was solid, the requirements were documented, and implementation was progressing smoothly. Then your CEO announced their departure.

Sound familiar? You're not alone. Between 2013 and 2022, the median tenure of CEOs at S&P 500 companies dropped by 20% to just 4.8 years.

When Leadership Changes, Everything Changes

Here's what happens when new leadership takes the helm midway through your transformation:

Strategic Priorities Shift

• Previous focus on operational efficiency becomes growth acceleration
• Customer experience initiatives get deprioritised for cost reduction
• Digital transformation goals pivot from innovation to risk management

Budget Allocations Change

• Projects approved under the previous regime face scrutiny
• "Quick wins" become more important than long-term capability building
• Technology investments get evaluated against different success criteria

Cultural Expectations Evolve

• New leadership brings different management styles and preferences
• Reporting requirements and communication cadences change
• Success metrics get redefined mid-implementation

The Software Mismatch Problem

Your software implementation, however, remains frozen in time. It was designed to solve problems as they existed under previous leadership, built around processes and priorities that may no longer be relevant.

Example: A financial services company implemented a comprehensive risk management platform designed around their previous CEO's conservative growth strategy. When new leadership arrived with an aggressive expansion mandate, the platform's sophisticated compliance workflows became barriers to rapid decision-making rather than enablers of growth

The software wasn't "wrong", it was perfectly aligned with the business needs that existed when it was designed. But businesses aren't static, yet most traditional software platforms are.

The Adaptive Alternative

What if your software could automatically adjust to new leadership priorities? What if it could detect shifts in usage patterns and realign capabilities accordingly?

Consider this scenario:

• Your platform detects changes in usage patterns and decision-making workflows
• It identifies that previous risk-focused processes are being bypassed for speed
• It suggests new capabilities that align with emerging growth-focused strategies
• If accepted, it automatically adjusts the user interface, processes and reporting

This isn't about changing your entire platform, it's about software that evolves its capabilities based on real organisational behavior..

In our next series, we'll explore how Adaptive Maturity principles provide a practical framework for building software implementations that thrive on change rather than being victims of it.