We’re facing some of the biggest challenges in business and leadership for a very long time. The Covid 19 crisis is putting pressure on leaders across the spectrum, and no doubt you’re feeling that pressure too. Deciding what to do, and how to think things through effectively to make those decisions, has never been more important.
We’ve heard a lot since the pandemic started about the word recognition, it appears to be somewhat of a buzzword now, like ‘unprecedented’ or ‘pivot’. But I’m much more interested in how it’s manifesting itself on the ground so to speak – in ‘the doing’ part, not ‘the knowing’..
The UK has now been in lockdown for six weeks. That’s six weeks of only leaving the house for up to an hour a day, six weeks of supermarket fights for toilet rolls and flour, 42 days of journalists asking questions to cabinet ministers, and over 1,000 hours spent in close proximity to our nearest and dearest.
There are decades when nothing happens, and there are weeks when decades happen
As we continue coping with the COVID crisis and all it entails, on both a personal level and a business one, it may sometimes feel that this thing is too vast to get one’s head around.
As a manager, wouldn’t it be wonderful if you could just say, “this week we’re going to do X,” and it just happened? No fuss, no bother.
How’s 2020 shaping up for you? Do you know which direction you want to take the business this year? Are you making progress? Are you sure? But arguably more importantly, have you made sure your staff are part of what you’re trying to achieve?
It’s not uncommon these days for leaders to realise they need to be working ‘on’ the business more – which means less rolling up your sleeves and getting lost in the operational noise and more bigger picture thinking.
I find that being flexible with business plans is essential, designing in the opportunity to adjust and recalibrate. Too many times businesses put together a detailed plan with a lot of interrelated actions, which, once one or two have gone pear shaped, all others seem to follow.