ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the concept of “antifragile” as introduced by Nassim Nicholas Taleb. The chapter focuses on two main points taken from Taleb’s book, Antifragile. The first is that the specifics of the future, and significantly disruptive events in particular, are entirely unpredictable. Despite the fact that the past seems orderly and summarily comprehensible in retrospect, the future is complex, verging on the chaotic, and the most influential events in life are thoroughly unpredictable in their detail. The second main point is that organizations must become antifragile, at least in part, to embrace and adapt to significantly disruptive events. Organizations, people, processes, systems, and the like operate on a spectrum ranging from the fragile, to the robust, and through to the antifragile. The chapter emphasizes and explains the difference between fragile, robust, and antifragile organizations. The chapter concludes by combining Cynefin and antifragile concepts to show that resilient organizations are those that have cultivated antifragile capabilities that allow them to successfully navigate complex and chaotic situations.
