Driving change in a world under #coronavirus quarantine
Get your top staff, that represent 80% of your business’s strategic functions in terms of value creation and revenue and discuss some #covid19 response strategy. Here are the talking points:
- How is #coronavirus affecting your industry in general, and your business in particular? For each issue identified, describe what it is, how it affects your business and the best strategic response. What interventions must you do to win?
- What worries you about each of these changes and what excites you about each of these changes? What are the best strategic and tactical responses in either scenario?
- How will your business or organization be impacted if you do not implement the agreed interventions and changes? How much would such cost the organization in terms of increased costs or lost revenue? What will happen if you embrace change and implement agreed recommendations? What is the worst case and best case?
- Make a list of challenges that require a technical response and those that require an adaptive response. Remember, technical challenges are easy to solve as they have known responses. If the car has a flat tire, find a mechanic who has the technical skills and knows the process of doing it to fix it. However, if it is raining with an unclear road view, you need a great driver who can “adopt” to such a tough driving condition. Not everyone can do it and there is no specific formula or rule. For these reasons, adaptive challenges require brainstorming and creative thinking. Covid19 challenges are adaptive. Since the virus is novel, meaning it has never happened, it calls for serious thinking.
- Leaders must encourage their frontline staff to provide solutions that work since they know what takes place at the front line. When it comes to finding answers to adaptive challenges, do not shut anyone out. Get all the views and internalize them.
- Above all, keep everyone informed of the next steps. Change management hates darkness. The worst you can do is to keep people unaware of what is taking place. It is better to communicate the news – good or bad – so that people are prepared and are aware of the road ahead.
- You must invest in data analysis and business intelligence systems to gain factual insights to inform your decisions. Data-driven decision-making triumphs over hearsay or opinion-driven decisions. In times like these, facts and data are gold that provides the competitive edge to win.
No conditions are permanent. Stay alive. Everything shall resume to normal. Be safe.
Copyright Mustapha B Mugisa, 2020. All rights reserved.
