It’s been just over a year since the WHO declared a pandemic and in the last 12 months Covid has brought with it a terrible toll on life, mental health issues, economic recession and a whole load of uncertainty for everyone. Will there be another wave? Another lockdown? Will we ever go back to the office? 2 days a week or 3 or maybe never? Will our customer base come back? Have people’s habits and behaviour changed forever? And the answer to all these questions is the same.
No one knows.
A lot of people are making guesses, but that’s all they are. Guesses.
And that’s a problem when you need to make a plan.
It’s uncertainty that will prove to be the hardest hurdle for a lot of organisations as they start to gear up for some kind of recovery in the next 12 months.
Whereas you’d normally plan per quarter or financial year, make your forecasts and submit your budgets; when the next god knows how long feels completely unplannable, how do you plan? How do you forecast?
Firstly, give yourself a break. Everyone is going to get it wrong. Everyone.
Now we’ve got that out of the way, what can we do?
We can learn from those who fared better through the pandemic.
Covid has put businesses everywhere through the wringer. And for many it was a wake-up call of the rudest kind.
But some (28% according to a recent McKinsey survey) didn’t just survive but flourished. Increased their competitive edge.
These ‘anti-fragile’ organisations (a term coined by writer Nassim Taleb to describe ‘entities’ that get stronger when you put them under stress) all shared the winning combination of bulletproof brand + iterative innovation to help them thrive during turbulent times.
One of the great opportunities these strange days have afforded us all is to take a long hard look at what the future organization could look like. The role it could play in our customer’s lives, in the lives of our people and in society in general. To really define those things that we believe are important. The things we want our customers to believe about us. The things that make us special. Our brand.
But having the best, most engagingly defined brand doesn’t mean a thing if you don’t keep the lights on. We know from historical data of recessions that when it comes to delivering their brands, to making a noise; most pull back, many stop and some just disappear altogether.
But when we eventually pop out the other side, and we will; those that keep a high share of voice will be able to come out with a much higher chance of rapid recovery and then growth.
As things begin to pick up, the boldest and fastest movers will be able to pull away further. Being able to rapidly adapt your strategies to meet the challenges and opportunities that Covid present is going to be critical.
One of the upsides of lockdown is that levels of innovation in most organizations went through the roof. Because they had to in order to survive. And lots of organizations responded at warp speed.
Anything that could go online did. Shifts in services and products to digital that would normally have taken 5 years happened in 5 months.
WFH meant people had to get used to working smarter, faster.
So, take advantage of that momentum and use it to set you up for the future. Use your quick thinkers to do some quick thinking.
Invest in some small budget innovation.
Firstly, make sure you’re up to speed with how customer behaviour and needs have changed are continuing to change.
Then start with the things that we do know.
Spin as many scenarios as you can where your business can take advantage of any or all of them.
Then run as many low-cost experiments as you can to see which ones could work. Don’t rule anything out, opportunities are going to come in all sorts of shapes and sizes.
From improving your costs to maxing out the customer experience. New products or business models, launching new subsidiaries or entering new markets.
Work through your scenarios with your finance and strategy people. Make them as viable and as near ready to go as you can without actually committing to rolling them out.
With a whole portfolio of ‘ready to wear’ moves, whenever you get the chance to scale one of them up, you’ll be ready. Happy days.
One final thought. And this one’s a biggy. All this speed is extremely exciting, especially if the clouds begin to part for you.
But what is of extreme importance is finding a way to operate at high speed that doesn’t burn your people out.
‘This speed is unsustainable.’
— Leena Nair, chief human resources officer at Unilever.
All the time that you’re future focussed on the business, never take your eyes off the mental health of your people. Because without your people and their earth-shattering talent, there is no future.
Next time, we’ll be looking closely at strategies to help your organization recover at super speed without burning out your talent along the way.
For more information about how we could help you recover, adapt and grow in a post-covid world see our Post Covid Business Growth Programme