Businesses prosper by being resilient: they are experts at adapting to adversity and change both now and in the future. And resilient businesses don’t just muddle through challenges—they emerge stronger than before.

But most respondents to an SAP Insights global survey of 4,239 business leaders don’t consider themselves to be excellent at many (or for 30% of companies, any) of the capabilities needed to be resilient.

Those that do, meanwhile, have a not-so-secret advantage: data access. Respondents who rated their capabilities highly for dealing with current or future challenges also reported having better access to data for decision making. We saw the opposite, too. Businesses that rated their resilience capabilities poorly reported worse data access.

In other words, current resilience, future resilience, and data access appear to go hand in hand, reinforcing each other.

And that overused maxim about people being our most important asset? It turns out to be true when it comes to resilience. Those who said they were excellent at preparing employees for new and different roles appear to be more committed to changing processes—another important aspect of business resilience.

Respondents who aren’t confident about their company’s capabilities in any of the three categories are much less hopeful about their resilience. However, we found that even companies that are struggling can make great strides—and more money—with a few improvements.

Survey findings: How prepared are you for business resilience?

Not ready for today.

Asked to rate their effectiveness in nine areas that are important to current resilience, a disturbingly high number of respondents—30%—didn’t consider themselves very effective (the highest rating) in any of those areas (Figure 1). The remaining 70% don’t have much depth: they gave themselves the top rating in three or fewer of the nine areas. Not one respondent said they were very effective in all nine areas.

Not ready for tomorrow.

Many businesses also struggle with their ability to predict and prepare for problems that might affect them in the future. One-third (32%) of respondents said they are not extremely satisfied (the top rating) with their company’s performance in any of 12 capabilities needed for future resilience (Figure 2). As with current resilience, they lack depth: 65% said they are extremely satisfied with three or fewer areas, and no respondents chose all 12.

Data correlates with resilience.

Survey respondents who say that their data is accessible are more likely to say they are prepared to both deal with problems they face today and plan for the future. Data gives you the ability to make informed decisions. When you have better access to data, you can respond better to disruptions (Figure 3a) and do a better job of anticipating what you need to do. (Figure 3b).

Future resilience makes money.

Businesses that rate themselves highly in future resilience are more likely to predict they will increase revenue by 6% or more. Conversely, companies that are less satisfied with their capabilities are more likely to expect their revenue will stagnate or decline. It really does pay to think ahead!

People strength matters.

Becoming more resilient will require process improvement. And you’re not going to succeed at changing processes unless you train employees to navigate these changes. We found that respondents who said they are very effective at preparing employees to adapt to new or different roles are more ambitious about making the process changes that improve resiliency.

Even better, respondents who combine excellence in employee training with excellence in the ability to manage or prevent labor shortages are working on even more process improvements than respondents whose companies are great at just one of the two people-focused capabilities.

Resilience means letting go.

Innovation makes companies more resilient, but it can be stifled if businesses can’t make way for new products, services, or businesses. Respondents said that a hesitancy to give up the tried and true holds them back more than any other innovation barrier.

How to make your business more resilient

What if you’re struggling to improve capabilities for current and future resilience? By focusing on improving resiliency in just a few areas, you can join the ranks of the most resilient companies.

Getting great at a few capabilities makes the most difference. Respondents who say their companies are highly skilled at any single capability in the categories of current resilience, future resilience, or data access, tend to rate themselves better across all the other capabilities compared to those who say they are not excellent at any. This finding suggests that excellence may be contagious: companies that have invested in one area may have a higher level of commitment to resilience across the board.

Meanwhile, although your business may not be perfect, neither is anyone else’s. The most resilient companies in our survey gave themselves the highest ratings on four current resilience and six future resilience capabilities. Beyond that, having more highly rated capabilities did not significantly improve respondents’ resiliency scores.

Read more in this series