Coronavirus – Threat - Resources

"If you want to improve, be content to be thought foolish and stupid.”  ~ EPICTETUS

Last Sunday, while staying in my rented villa in Eloy, Arizona, I received three messages by text and email from my three sons.

The messages were all similar.  They warned me to leave Arizona now, or risk the possibility of having to stay there indefinitely.

My message today is to provide resources regarding the pandemic for your business, and to make sure you are aware of the seriousness of this threat. (And just because it’s all over the news, from my experience many are still ignoring the danger. Read my experience traveling from Arizona to Iowa Wednesday and Thursday)   

Arizona to Iowa

On my drive from Arizona to Iowa, I saw firsthand how people are responding to this threat.  I should say how it appears they are NOT responding.

Driving through Phoenix traffic was heavy.  Perhaps not as heavy as it would be on a normal day, but still a lot of people were on the roads.

From there to here, the semi’s and truck traffic was heavy.  That somewhat surprised me.

At gas stations I wore gloves to put gas in my rental vehicle, and then a mask when I went inside.  (You can guess if people looked at me suspiciously.)

It’s impossible to stay 6 feet away from anyone in a rest room I discovered. 

What dismayed me was no one seemed to be aware of social distancing.  Despite my wearing a mask, it didn’t seem to keep too many people away from me, and many times I had to go out of their way to avoid being too close to them.

It seems people are still unaware of the danger of close contact with others.  At least at these gas stations, most people were conducting themselves as business as usual.

What have you discovered?

Reality

The current situation is unprecedented.

What does that mean?

There is no clear pattern or history we can follow to determine how this will affect our businesses, the world, or the planet. 

You can see how it’s affected the stock market.  The markets do not like unpredictability.  Our businesses do not like unpredictability either.

We do everything we can to develop our processes and even our people to respond predictably and consistently.

The best resource I’ve found to give you some hint of what might happen is How Companies Can Respond to the Coronavirus.  It sheds light on what occurred in China with businesses and markets.

BUSINESS RESOURCES

Several of our European coaches got together to develop a ScaleDown Corona Impact Checklist.  It’s similar in theme to our Rockefeller Habits Checklist, focused on making sure your business is adequately prepared for this event.  The checklist includes checklists to prep for:

• Direction from the leadership team
• Make the most of internal collaboration
• Grip on the customer and business
• Grip on the supply chain
• Maintain a grip on cash
• Grip on growth

Whether you and your team have prepared a plan or not, I urge you to download and review it to make sure you’re prepared for all the ways this can impact your business.

Are your employees able to work from home during this?

We have resources to help you, as well as how to conduct effective online meetings.

REMOTE WORKING

• Working from home due to Coronavirus >
• Preparing for Emergency Remote Work >
• Remote Work Advocates Warn Companies About COVID-19 Work-From-Home Strategies >
• Remote Readiness Assessment: Measure your company's readiness to go remote >

VIRTUAL MEETINGS 

• Virtual Meetings Are Here to Stay. Here's How to Make Yours Better >
• Virtual Meetings: 82 (Best) Tools, Ideas and Tips >
• The ultimate guide to remote meetings in 2020 >
• Remote Meetings 101: Everything You Need to Know >
• 9 best practices for engagement in virtual meetings >
• How to take notes in meetings >
• Best Practices for Hosting Remote Meetings >
• 20 Simple Ways to Improve Virtual Meetings >
• How to have a virtual meeting that’s not painful (and actually productive) >
• The Guide To Holding Remote Team Meetings That Aren’t A Total Waste Of Time >

You’ll find these and much more at Scaling Up Coaches COVID-19 resource page 

Good News about Coronavirus?

Finally, if it the midst of all this you need a dose of good news, visit GOOD NEWS ABOUT THE COVID-19

Singularity University has a great deal of information on COVID-19.  They held a 3 day Virtual Summit: The State & Future of Pandemics you can find here.  I thought it was exceptional, even though I was only able to catch most of Monday’s broadcasts.  Over 22,000 participants watched these live.

Growth demands Strategic Discipline.

To build an enduring great organization, requires disciplined people, disciplined thought, disciplined action, to produce superior results, and make a distinctive impact in the world.

Discipline sustains momentum, over a long period of time, laying the foundations for lasting endurance.

A winning habit starts with 3 Strategic Disciplines: Priority, Metrics and Meeting Rhythms.   Forecasting, accountability, individual, and team performance improve dramatically.

Meeting Rhythms achieve a disciplined focus on performance metrics to drive growth.

Let Positioning Systems help your business achieve these outcomes on the Four most Important Decisions your business faces:

Positioning Systems helps mid-sized ($5M - $250M) business Scale-UP. We align your business to focus on Your One Thing!  Contact dwick@positioningsystems.com to Scale Up your business! Take our Four Decisions Needs Assessment to discover how your business measures against other Scaled Up companies. We’ll contact you.

NEXT BLOG – My Experience Working from a Hospital Room