How to know when (and when not) to make a change

In 2011, Patagonia faced the same pressure every retailer faces on Black Friday: maximize sales on the year’s biggest shopping day. Instead, they ran a full-page ad in the New York Times with a stark message: “Don’t Buy This Jacket.” The ad detailed the environmental cost of making their bestselling R2 fleece, such as 135 liters of water in the manufacturing process and 20 pounds of carbon dioxide for transporting it to the company’s warehouse.

This wasn’t a clever marketing ploy. The ad directly urged customers to think twice before purchasing, to fix existing gear before replacing it, and to buy and sell second-hand. This was a real commitment to the values that had driven Patagonia since Yvon Chouinard founded the company in 1973: putting environmental protection above profit maximization, even when market logic demanded otherwise. As a result of staying true to their deepest values, Patagonia today has a fiercely loyal customer base and enjoys more than $1 billion in annual revenue.

Patagonia is a striking example of a business that has thrived not by giving in to pressure to change, but rather by doubling down on their core ideas. Another such example is fast-food favorite In-N-Out Burger, which has spent 75 years refusing to franchise, expand quickly, or add more items to its menu. Unlike McDonald’s, which tried to reinvent itself as a purveyor of healthy foods a decade ago, In-N-Out has stuck to making burgers, fries, and milkshakes. The result? Cult-level customer devotion and some of the highest per-store revenues in the fast-food industry.

Patagonia and In-N-Out Burger are not dinosaurs that have failed to adapt. They are billion-dollar businesses with the kind of customer devotion and employee loyalty that money can’t buy. And a large part of the reason for this success is that they have mastered a counterintuitive truth: the more things change, the more you need to stay the same.

The virtue of staying steadfast                                       

In order to thrive in change, we need the ability to resist change. This ability, which I call steadfastness, is essential for two reasons.

First, organizations liberate enormous energy by committing to their identity and purpose in times of change. This commitment gives people a reason to endure change and turmoil. As the German philosopher Nietzsche famously said, those who have a why can bear almost any how. This reason, and the energy and strength it liberates, becomes a crucial resource for organizations that are confronted with change—and in our current era, that is all organizations, all the time.

Second, it gives you a fixed point by which to navigate, which is especially important in times of change. When an organization sticks to its core identity and purpose, it is better placed to understand how to respond to the changes it faces. In-N-Out’s core mission is to make great burgers, and by sticking to it, the company can navigate major changes in the business landscape by asking a simple question: how can this change help us make great burgers?

Steadfastness should not be mistaken for the kind of dangerous rigidity that can run a company into the ground. Kodak didn’t fail because it stayed true to its purpose of helping people capture and share memories—it failed because its leaders became overcommitted to the business model of maximizing profits by selling film. The critical distinction is this: be steadfast about your why (your purpose), but be flexible about your how (your methods). Patagonia’s purpose is protecting nature, not selling as many fleece jackets as possible. In-N-Out’s purpose is making great burgers, not resisting technology. When you are clear about this distinction, steadfastness becomes a source of strength rather than a path to obsolescence.

The dual demand of organizational resilience

Understanding the difference between purpose and methods points to a deeper challenge: organizations must somehow find a way to be both immovable and infinitely adaptable at the same time. They need to be unshakeable about their why while being completely willing to reinvent their how.

This is what makes building resilience so difficult. It requires holding two contrasting capabilities in perfect tension. Most organizations fail at one extreme or the other. Some chase every trend and lose their identity in the process while others cling to outdated methods and mistake their current business model for their reason for being.

But there is a group of people who have mastered implementing both sets of capabilities simultaneously: entrepreneurs. The entrepreneurial journey demands both unwavering commitment to a vision and constant willingness to change tactics. This entrepreneurial mindset—this ability to be both stubborn and adaptable—is not just for startups. It is the key to building resilience in any organization. And it rests on four specific traits that enable leaders to navigate the tension between steadfastness and flexibility.

Four entrepreneurial traits that build resilience

1. Love. Entrepreneurs don’t fall in love with their products—they fall in love with the problem they’re solving and the people they’re serving. This distinction is critical. When you love your product, you resist necessary changes. When you love your purpose, you’ll do whatever it takes to fulfill it. Love for purpose creates both the commitment to persist and the freedom to change. It’s what allows organizations to ask: “Does this method still serve what we love?” rather than protecting methods that have become comfortable but ineffective.

2. Embracing Suffering as Growth. Every entrepreneur knows the particular pain of watching a cherished strategy fail. But they learn to reframe suffering as a source of learning, a font of hard-won data about what doesn’t work. This reframing serves a dual purpose: it makes you quick to abandon failing tactics while simultaneously strengthening your commitment to the purpose that makes the suffering worthwhile.

3. Building Partnerships. Entrepreneurs know that the right partners don’t just share your current strategy—they share your purpose. This distinction is crucial for resilience. Partners who are only aligned on methods will abandon you when those methods fail. Partners who are aligned on purpose will help you find new methods when the old ones stop working. True partners act as both innovation catalysts (pushing you to try new approaches) and guardians of purpose (keeping you honest about your why). They give you permission to change everything except what matters most.

4. The Power of Saying No. The hardest entrepreneurial skill is saying no—both to opportunities that don’t serve your purpose and to methods that no longer work. This dual discipline is what creates resilience. Every time you say no to a profitable distraction, you strengthen your commitment to purpose. Every time you say no to a failing approach, you free resources for innovation. This discipline is what allows organizations to be both focused and agile. It’s the skill that prevents both mission drift and tactical stubbornness.

Building the resilient organization

At the company level, the challenge is to master the tension of being steadfast about purpose while flexible about methods. Here are three ways to build this capability:

1. Define your non-negotiables. Write down your organization’s core purpose—the why that will never change regardless of market pressure—and separate it explicitly from your current methods, products, and business models. Make this distinction visible throughout the organization so everyone understands what must be protected and what can be reimagined.

2. Distinguish purpose from method in every decision. When facing changes or challenges, explicitly ask: “Is this about our why (which we won’t compromise) or our how (which we can reimagine)?” Make this question a standard part of strategic discussions, and promote leaders who consistently make this distinction well.

3. Practice strategic steadfastness. The next time you face pressure to chase a trend or copy a competitor, pause and ask whether it serves your core purpose. If not, say no publicly and explain why. Each time you hold firm on purpose while adapting methods, you build organizational muscle memory for true resilience.

Change is inevitable. The organizations that will thrive aren’t those that resist all change or embrace every trend, but those that know exactly what to preserve and what to transform.

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