Competency Trap

A company masters a technique. It works. So the company uses it more, improves it more, knows it better — until the world changes, and the company's great strength is the answer to a question nobody is asking anymore.

The trap is built from success, not failure. Failure forces search; success forbids it. Why explore when the known method pays so well? And so the skill that made you becomes the cage that holds you.

You know the personal version. The wit who jokes in every serious conversation. The hard worker who answers every problem with more hours. The old strength, applied to the new problem, is the most common form of weakness.

The discipline: hold your best skill lightly. Once a year ask — if this strength were taken from me tomorrow, what would I do? The answer is your escape route. Build it before you need it.