Things You Can Do to Maximize Your Chance of Surviving this Crisis (2 of 3-Operate in Uncertainties)
As small businesses and non-profit organizations, you are likely in midst of figuring out how to deal with the COVID-19 crisis. The implications of the crisis can mean loss of sales, staff, and potentially business closure.
If you are one of the lucky ones that are still in operation, here are some tips that can help you:
Operate under Uncertainty (2 of 3)
Prepare for a Restart (3 of 3)
OPERATE UNDER UNCERTAINTIES
STIMULATE LATENT DEMAND:
Are there other audiences that you currently do not target or not in your core but can benefit from your services/products?
Or perhaps there are ways to prompt and incentivize purchasing now vs. later from your existing customers? (e.g. stock up your favorite XYZ when supply still lasts…)
FREQUENT and TIMELY COMMUNICATIONS:
To help your staff feel safe and secured, frequent and timely communications is important. Have a cadence established and check in often. This allows your organization to stay connected and be able to act swiftly as when changes arise.
STABLIZE SUPPLY CHAIN:
Understand the risks and delays that may come from your suppliers and manage that accordingly to your risk profile. Company Amay want to stock up finished goods as stock-out can mean the end of the business. Company Bmay be more cash strapped and does not want to sit on inventory; therefore, it may want to manage demand more strategically. Making sure your supply and demand are aligned and matches your risk profile is a good protocol no matter what, and is even more important in this critical time.
EVALUTE, DELAY, and REPURPOSE INVESTMENTS:
Are there big capital expenditures that are in the works now that can be delayed to preserve cash?
Are there sales and marketing dollars allocated for events that can be more strategically used or redirected to stimulate demand via other channels?
What are ways that you can preserve cash today? (this alone can be your competitive advantage once the crisis is over)
STAY RELEVANT:
Without the physical points of contact, companies need to find creative ways to continue build relationship with your current and future customers to stay top of mind. This is a great time to nurture the community. Support your community in ways that are synergistic to your business. Offer ways to share your expertise. Give altruistically in ways that you can. Invent new ways to help the community – e.g. Medtronic, NIKE, HP jumping in to help produce ventilators; local distilleries help produce hand sanitizers, etc.
STAY OPEN AND ADAPTIVE:
Innovations are ripe in times of scarcity. Stay open for opportunities to innovate and experiment. Are you a business that always wanted to tap into digital sales channels? Or perhaps you’ve been wanting to try to provide your in-person service in a way that is scalable? Now is the time to experiment. Having a learning mindset is critical in times like this.
HAVE CONTINGENCY PLANS:
What if your production facility is forced to downsize or even close? What if demand continues to drop? What if people get sick? Having contingency plan that can address probable scenarios can help you in many ways:
It can help your employees feel at ease by being proactive,
You will have a playbook that you can pull from without wasting time,
You will have thought through the implications and are equipped to make swift decisions.
Things are not business as usual, despite our best attempt to hold down to “normalcy.” Risk management can help us think through things and provide temporary sense of control. That said, our environment will continue to shift. Leaders need a combination of foresight and adaptability to navigate in this critical time. We need deep thinking around how to navigate this changing landscape. We equally need to stay open and listen to what is required of us. Only by shifting towards “what is possible” mindset, we can learn, grow and reinvent.
Hsiang-Yi Lin is the managing director of MKMB Consulting, a boutique management and strategy consultancy that helps organizations navigate uncertainties, build strategic capacity, and accelerate organizational transformations. She can be reached at hsiangyi@mkmbgroup.com.
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