Incrementalism is often dismissed as not scalable enough to translate into population-level outcomes. But a series of incremental changes, conducted by various stakeholders in concert, can translate into new norms, higher standards, and more resilient cities.
Incrementalism is often dismissed as not scalable enough to translate into population-level outcomes. But a series of incremental changes, conducted by various stakeholders in concert, can translate into new norms, higher standards, and more resilient cities.
The concept of adaptive capacity reveals that a household's ability to respond matters as much as its exposure.
Incrementalism is often dismissed as not scalable enough to translate into population-level outcomes. But a series of incremental changes, conducted by various stakeholders in concert, can translate into new norms, higher standards, and more resilient cities.
Most organizations working on climate resilience have a good idea of what needs to happen. The harder question is how.
Last year, The Resiliency Company created a playbook for commercial real estate. From Vulnerability to Value, A Risk Mitigation Playbook to Drive Resilient Development is designed to show how the ecosystem of stakeholders in the sector—such as lenders, investors, developers, owners, designers, contractors, and insurers—can work in coordination to reduce weather-related risk and unlock new value.
We took an early draft to an event at Climate Week NY in 2025 to get feedback from industry leaders. Everyone was in alignment with the premise and utility of the playbook and acknowledged that the industry already has the knowledge, technology, and standards for risk reduction.
However, when we broke out into groups to explore how to actually operationalize the playbook in the context of the various stakeholder silos, the realities and obstacles to change became very real. People who were bought in on the concepts wrestled with the implementation and justification of how to directly attribute ROI.
It makes sense. We've built our current operating and investing models on assumptions and dynamics that, for many years, we haven't had to revisit. America's infrastructure was built during a period of relative climate stability—when weather could be treated as a constant. That's no longer true.
In the executive summary of the Risk Mitigation Playbook, we wrote, "The time for incremental change has passed. Success demands decisive, collaborative action across the entire CRE ecosystem." Those words were intended to spark action—more rallying cry than nuanced analysis. As time has passed, I've come to question them.
Yes, we're seeing a meteoric increase in the number of billion-dollar disasters in the United States. Yes, investing and building with resilience is a strategic imperative. But what we need more is the broad adoption of incremental change. Incrementalism is often dismissed as not scalable enough to translate into population-level outcomes. But a series of incremental changes, conducted by various stakeholders in concert, can translate into new norms, higher standards, and more resilient cities.
In commercial real estate, the people with the most influence over a project's risk profile are rarely the ones who ultimately bear that risk. Developers make the decisions that determine how much a building can withstand, and then hand it off. Lenders underwrite the asset and then exit. Contractors build to spec and move to the next project.
The risk ultimately lands with owners, insurers, and communities. Incremental steps matter because they can shift behavior for each stakeholder, without waiting for the whole system to realign.
A few examples for incremental improvements from the playbook:
None of these changes requires coordination across the value chain to take effect. Each action works on its own, and when enough actors make enough small moves, the cumulative effect can become a new standard of practice.
Pre-development is where leverage is highest. This is why Shalini Vajjhala and Caroline George of PRE Collective argue that "in many ways, the business case for resilience looks more like preventative healthcare or early childhood education than traditional capital planning or infrastructure finance. Early action creates the greatest value." Incremental change isn't flashy. It flies below the radar. But it's also where we need to start.
Read the full article here.
Read more about insurance on The Epicenter here.
Read more about resilient public infrastructure and government solutions on The Epicenter here.
Read more about resilient real estate on The Epicenter here.
Read more about private investment on The Epicenter here.
A post by Insurance for Good analyzed the recent growth of the FAIR Plan in California.
Have thoughts to share or want to add your voice to the conversation? Reach out!
The Epicenter helps decision makers understand climate risks and discover viable resilience solutions. The Epicenter is an affiliated publication of The Resiliency Company, a 501(c)3 nonprofit dedicated to inspiring and empowering humanity to adapt to the accelerating challenges of the next 100+ years.
Incrementalism is often dismissed as not scalable enough to translate into population-level outcomes. But a series of incremental changes, conducted by various stakeholders in concert, can translate into new norms, higher standards, and more resilient cities.
The concept of adaptive capacity reveals that a household's ability to respond matters as much as its exposure.
As climate-driven hazards accelerate, a dangerous structural misalignment has emerged: What building codes deem legally permissible to construct is increasingly at odds with what catastrophic risk models deem financially viable to insure.
As long as building codes lag behind climate realities, private insurance markets will continue to dictate local safety standards by default. Resiliency Codes offer a clear, actionable strategy to change this dynamic.
