The Pre-Phoenix Exercise

What's the first thing you do when bad news lands on your desk? For most of us, it's damage control. Before we've even had time to think straight, when bad news shows up, our instinct is to react to it immediately — even our assessment of the situation can be mired by confusion from lack of all the information. We go into triage, but what if there’s an alternative?

The Pre-Phoenix exercise offers a different first step. Instead of reacting the moment bad news hits, you pause — 15 to 20 minutes, with your team — and ask one question: what's the best thing that could come out of this? Not to ignore the bad news. Not to pretend it isn't bad. Just to look for what might be possible underneath it before your team falls into the abyss of all the “worst case scenarios”. Instead, intentionally look up and contemplate the best thing that could happen for your “ultimate good” before you decide your next move.

If you're not familiar with the phoenix, it's a legendary bird from Egyptian mythology — one that cyclically dies in flames and is reborn from its own ashes. That's where the name of this exercise comes from. You're not waiting until after the fire to see how you escape the flames. You're doing it primitively — searching for how and where the “phoenix” will rise from as you enter the fire.

In 2024, Cracker Barrel changed its logo, removing the old man that had been part of it for years. The backlash was immediate — millions of people were fired up about the change. On the surface, that looks like nothing but bad news. But that's exactly the moment the Pre-Phoenix exercise is built for. P.T. Barnum once said, "There's no such thing as bad publicity," and that's exactly what played out here. Despite the backlash, the logo change generated more attention and conversation than any ad campaign could have bought. That reaction — the noise, the outrage, the attention — was the phoenix rising out of what looked like ashes.

The lesson isn't that bad news is secretly good news in disguise every time. It's that the phoenix doesn't wait until the ashes are swept away to rise — it rises out of them. So the next time bad news hits, resist the urge to panic first. Take the time to ask what is the best possible “good” that could come from it? If you focus on “what could be” you’re more likely not just to endure a bad situation, but come through it better than before.