Arguably, the shareholders don't want the management to try to harden the company. If the shareholders wanted to invest in a new approach, they could do that on their own. Rather, the shareholders expect the company to squeeze what they can out of what they are, even if that means winding down the firm.
Companies and management would rather a slow controlled descent into the ground than unexpected success. They balance their risk at the portfolio level not at the company level.
During good times focus on your core and then peter out. Just follow a nice parabolic arc.
A lot of success is just timing and attempting to fight all threats look foolish. A remember, for every up and comer that “we all saw coming” there were lots that didn’t make it. If you waste time fighting those you wasted money.
Right. It's not actually in anyone's interest most of the time to deliberately destroy the company in the short term to have a glimmer of hope of maybe successfully reinventing it in the longer term. Shareholders always have the option of moving on and employees/management can probably collect paychecks for more time while they possibly look elsewhere. Corporate legal continuity is probably overrated.
