To survive an unprecedented crisis like coronavirus, companies need wartime leaders

1. To survive an unprecedented crisis like coronavirus,
companies need wartime leaders
Aadesh Rajput
Apr 27 · 4 min read
History shows us that sustained long term crises reshape human beliefs and behaviour.
A BCG report cites examples of radical changes that past crises have brought to the
world. The Black Death or plague in the 14th century shaped European history, World
War II had a direct impact of accelerating women’s participation in the workforce and
the 9/11 terrorist attacks reshaped transportation and security policies worldwide.
As the coronavirus pandemic changes things around us today, here is how business
leaders and companies may change-in many cases forever.
DISCOVER THE HIDDEN TRUTH ABOUT THE CORONAVIRUS
Behavioral shifts
It is said that human decision making during a crisis is a ected by factual (statistical)
information, real-time knowledge, and experiences. A large part of decision making is
based on past examples and comparatives. But what happens when there are no
precedents to follow?
Anyone can publish on Medium per our Policies, but we don’t fact-check every story. For
more info about the coronavirus, see cdc.gov.

2. The coronavirus crisis has no parallels in recent history, so leaders say they’re coming
up with varied solutions that they feel work best for them. Some of these are:
Be resilient: “I am convinced that the economic crisis engul ng the world is not
purely virus related. It re ects a lack of resilience in the global economy. The virus has
merely exposed the underlying structural problems that have been around. To survive a
change, I would emphasise on self-reliance, resilience, and real capability building,”
says Sridhar Vembu, founder and CEO of Zoho.
Reset: “While it is hard to anticipate the long-term economic impacts of Covid-19, we
know that the e ects will not be felt equally across industries. Some industries have
been hit hard and some have been posed with various opportunities. For example, while
airlines and hospitality have been hit hardest, telemedicine is now made more
accessible to people. I expect the biggest change to be the normalisation of remote work
for knowledge workers,” believes Sid Sijbrandij, co-founder and CEO of GitLab.
Reskill: “Be very good at what you do, that creates an edge in the market and
enhances the odds of survival. When the job market becomes very di cult, it is useful to
think of it as: “The market values my time at zero, but I know I can do better than zero?”
said Zoho’s Vembu.
DISCOVER THE HIDDEN TRUTH ABOUT THE CORONAVIRUS
Are companies passing the tness test?
Like human beings, companies also need to be in good health to last in the long-run. So,
it’s essential to monitor their health quotient regularly, preempt potential threats, and
prepare for any eventuality.
With a lack of early warning systems against a threat like coronavirus, decision-makers
will need to constantly monitor every situation rather than reacting to emergencies
after they occur.
Peter Abreo, co-founder and CEO of BeSpotted, a skills benchmarking platforms, lists a
mental model for founders to navigate through this situation:
Continued Consciousness: To ensure the business health continuum, leadership
teams will need to build dynamic dashboards to identify and be aware of both
visible and invisible threats.
Continued Conservation: The adage “save for a rainy day and a potential ood,” will
serve as a reminder to review and refresh cash reserves, talent relevancy, sales
pipeline, and other metrics critical for business continuity.
Continued Conversation: Leadership teams should create a regular cadence of
credible and authentic communication channels to ensure stakeholders get a
transparent view into the health of their business.
It’s time to be a real leader
Many experts have warned that unpredictability of this sort is generally accompanied by
the psychological phenomenon of “inattentional blindness.” What that means is, rather
than focusing on tiny details, we tend to concentrate on the things that are most
important.

3. One of the best-known experiments demonstrating inattentional blindness is the “
invisible gorilla test,” an experiment that reveals two things: we are missing a lot of
what goes on around us, and we have no idea that we are missing so much.
“Many leaders I have been speaking to are living in denial. Leaders must expect that
things will change for good. Unfortunately, we wish we had a playbook, but we don’t,”
said Kavi Arasu, learning and change specialist for workplaces and communities. “Going
forward, what I see emerging is network-based models replacing individual hierarchical
models.” As per emerging leadership traits, Arasu lists the following as critical, “leaders
should be willing to nurture and cultivate di erences.”
Martin Reeves, chairman of BCG Henderson Institute, believes that this is the time for
excellence in leadership. “This particular crisis requires very di erent problem-solving
approaches,” he said. “For example, in the rst stage decision making was reactive and
rapid. We then moved onto traditional planning based thinking. Currently, we are in an
ambiguous period, where we may see a resurgence of the disease, we need adaptive
thinking. In the post-coronavirus world, we will need creative thinking. What we need
now are ambidextrous leaders.”
In conclusion, we need agile leaders, inspirational leaders, and systems thinkers who
are highly interconnected. Reeves believes this is the era of wartime leaders who can
take hourly decisions, as we do not have the luxury of time.
DISCOVER THE HIDDEN TRUTH ABOUT THE CORONAVIRUS
Corna
Virus Covid 19 Coronavirus
WRITTEN BY
Aadesh Rajput
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