I heard it again today – a colleague relayed a recent conversation in which a B2B CMO had said “right now, only the most mission critical needs get a PO.”

This tendency toward inaction in a perceived down market is often explained as “conserving resources.” At its heart, though, it’s a reflection of an internal mindset that holds many businesses back: embracing a status quo bias – the sense that things as they are now, however imperfect, probably are better than available alternatives.

In uncertain times, the status quo can feel secure.

It’s human nature to focus on the solution in place, rather than looking deeper to evaluate the pain it may be causing. After all, the impact of change is an unknown. (Feel free to add in a pinch of sunk cost fallacy for good measure.) My view: when you’ve taken a default position to stick with things as they are, you have no way to know if standing pat is a good decision until you take a careful look at exactly what it is you’re stuck with – and what it can and can’t do for you.

Choosing the status quo isn’t really free.

In marketing, inaction can have a very real cost: if programs aren’t tuned for current conditions, you’re likely to underdeliver on market opportunities you have right now. That’s your tradeoff for embracing the status quo. To better understand this risk, try devoting ten minutes to this simple thought experiment.

A quick exercise to help you understand your exposure to status quo risk.

Start by allowing yourself, just for a few minutes, to embrace this possibility:

However slow the current rate of growth is in your market, it’s still possible to grow market share.

Now, grab a pen or your keyboard and answer these questions:

• Is our brand optimized to attract the new-to-us buyers who are open to acting now?
• Is our thought leadership focused on a future that is now either delayed or unavailable, rather than pivoting to offer useful commercial insight for today’s changing reality?
• Is our messaging tuned to maximize success amid change; for example, business leaders who suddenly want “harnessing AI” and “increasing ROI” to be part of a cohesive narrative?

Your answers to these questions will help you visualize some of the risks of staying “safely” on the sidelines. Now go through your list of answers again, pausing at each to ask yourself:

• If we were to change this one thing, how might it help us generate conversations? Influence opportunities? Close more often or more quickly?

Overcoming status quo bias can feel challenging, even unsafe. That’s the nature of the unknown and the invisible. To clearly see your biases, make your available opportunities visible and the consequences of inaction clear. Then decide if you can afford not to rethink your strategy.