Episode #352: Covid-19 Financial Crisis Leadership

The Covid-19 virus is nomadic, persistently wandering around the countries of the world infecting people and proving deadly for those over 70 and or with an existing health condition. Health professionals provide advice on how to limit the spread of the virus and washing your hands, cancelling events, restricting travel, working from home and social distancing have proven to be good advice. For those businesses impacted by these preventative measures however, the restriction of activities to reduce virus contagion means constricting their ability to make revenues and therefore make payroll. For small and medium sized business, it can seem like a race to the bottom, between which one will get you first, the virus contagion or bankruptcy.

As the business leader, you can feel you are staring down the barrel of oblivion. You are worried. Your team are worried. They look to you for a way out of this and for some comfort that you know what you are doing. Do you actually know what you are doing or are you just trashing around desperate and uncertain of survival? The first priority is to face reality and stop kidding yourself. “It will disappear in the summer, because the virus doesn’t spread as fast once we get to 40% humidity” is not a plan. I pray for all of us that idea is true, but what if this virus doesn’t follow the same projections as other similar viruses or it just keeps extending, as it rolls out through different populations?

You are the leader, so you must seek clarity around what you are facing, in order to know what to do. Start by writing down the worst business fear you have. Call it out, don’t try to hide from reality. Having done that, gather the team, share your worst case scenario and work together to take action to minimise the damage. Transparency is critical, regular communication both oral and written must be maintained and keep it real. The team will rally to your call to arms, because they all know TINA - There Is No Alternative. By sharing the scenario that is worrying you the most, you can align the power of the whole group and give them ownership of devising and executing on the right solution.

Be proactive as the leader and you in particular, must be super positive. Things are never 100% negative in business and you have to be the beacon of light on the hill for your team to give them hope. Look at your resources, things like cash on hand, accessing available government grants or soft loans, asking for debt repayment moratoriums from your bank or applying to receive a line of credit, negotiating invoice payments to be extended to sixty, ninety or one hundred and twenty days plus. Smaller companies have almost no margins to help much, because they are grappling with their own death throes. Larger players have better capacity to help and so ask early and often for assistance.

Plan for three phases, not just what is in front of you today. Think about things in terms of the immediate, mid term and post-crisis. Get everyone also living in the future, focused on life after Covid-19 and not just the current confusion of the moment, as key information changes, government policies lurch and markets gyrate.

I remember reading Victor Frankl’s book “Man’s Search For Meaning” where he noted that those who survived the Nazi concentration camps, tended to be those who maintained a future orientation, as they grappled with the day to day atrocities. We have to give our team hope for a brighter future. We assemble our immediate action plan, which moves into the second phase as we execute the plan and then the final phase is where we land after the crisis has passed.

When your revenue stream dries up or is reduced to a dribble, it sounds counter-intuitive to be focused on your customers, when you are unsure you will even be in business in a few weeks to be able to service anyone. This is another aspect of future orientation to keep us all going through the immediate threats to our existence. Talk to your customers to see where you can help them, because if they don’t survive, your survival is guaranteed to be gone. Maybe they can’t pay you or engage you today, but this Covid-19 won’t last forever and how do you want to be thought of when the viral cloud finally dissipates?

Is there an area of your business you can pivot to, in order to keep going? Maybe the income streams aren’t as large, but some income is a lot better than none. In every crisis there is also an opportunity. This is part of the positive messaging the team needs to hear. When the share market peels thirty percent off the value of solid companies, there is a buying opportunity. When people realise they can work from home, there is an opportunity to service that need. When there is too much reliance on China, there is an opportunity to diversify supply chains, tourist and investment inputs, as well as export markets.

Change itself is agnostic, but our reaction to change is the key. Forging a strong, proactive, positive, do or die mentality is a must for the leader in a crisis. Communicating your powerful belief in the future for the company, moulded in the harsh crucible of truth and realism, amplifies the team’s sense of hope. Involve, plan, execute, review, execute, review and keep executing is the way forward. Winston Churchill’s speech to Harrow, his alma mater, in 1941 should be our guiding light and we need to convey this message to our people “never give in, never, never, never, never….”.

Free LIVE On Line Stress Management Sessions

On a separate note, we are running public LIVE On Line Stress Management classes, which will be free to all attendees on April 16th (Japanese) and 17th (English). We are also offering the same thing as an in-house programme, delivered LIVE On Line for our existing clients and for prospective clients. This allows us to help our clients and our community.

The registration process for these free stress management sessions is being offered on our website, so please go to this specific page: http://bit.ly/dale_stress_e