Guide for executives in managing in the COVID 19 crisis environment

1. April 2020
Peter Dale
peter.dale@comarpowco.co.uk
CoVid 19 Crisis Management and Beyond

2. Introduction
Common Issues in managing a crisis and how to deal with them
 Managing crises are not an everyday issue. In most circumstances executives are managing to a familiar environment. Crisis's
when they do emerge are left field, overwhelming and life changing.
 Factors critical to success are a bias to action, ruthless prioritisation; allowing time for clear thinking, direction setting, as well as
building the right teams to deliver success. Backed by an ability to retain strategic patience and sequence actions
 During a crisis there is a propensity for management structures to escalate upward, effectively seeking to pass the problem to a
firms leadership. This can, if allowed, be overwhelming, overstretching the leadership team and leading to decision stasis, or a
focus on issues easiest to deal with, but probably low impact. The second issue is that some executives can confuse early order
stabilisation actions with remediation and do not address on a timely basis longer term necessary actions – ceding advantage to
agile competitors
 This paper addresses these issues as follows:
1. A template crisis roadmap to give executives an idea of what issues management must deal with and when. This is backed up
some more granular detail. These can be adjusted to reflect individual firm/divisional requirements
2. An executive action list. To prevent overload executives should focus only on key issues and delegate the rest to their teams
to deal with and bring back for solution ratification. This frees up time for executives to get ahead and develop clear direction,
launch anticipatory activity and also provide leadership support to their entity
3. Finally a suggestion for a team structure, to give clear ideas of accountability, and focus on activity, namely executive direction
setting, delivery, and assurance and monitoring. Good teams massively increase productivity, issue management bandwidth
and ultimately successful delivery. They can also be flexed as circumstances warrant.

3. Managing the Covid 19 crisis in a page
3
Time scale
Urgency
1. Executive Action
 Understand risks and opportunities
 Develop, oversee & action priorities
 Team organisation
2. Resilience Building
 Reinforce balance sheet, preserve cash,
cost management, govt incentives
 Ops, IT security, configuration &
resourcing
 Client and staff engagement
3. Executive Action II
 Start to develop longer term planning to
manage longer gestating risks and
opportunities
 Initial client communications launch
 Initial supply chain sweep
6. Resilience Development
 IT resilience, security and suitability
 Secure supply chains & build resilience
 Build delivery/change capability
 Build & design resourcing model
 Cost & B/S optimisation
 Corporate actions
7. Operational model design & execution
planning
4. Strategic planning & Leadership
5. Client and Staff communications
8. Management and delivery of change
 Clear articulation of what will be improved
- set goals and aims
 Develop leadership buy in & tone from the top
 Presentation of a compelling business case to
all stakeholders
 Clear planning & resource infrastructure
including data mgt to support change in place
 Develop strong communication capabilities
and practice
 Active monitoring, measurement and
management of resistance, dependencies,
risks and budgets
 Celebration of success
 Undertake appropriate reviews revision and
continuous improvement
Develop the
Business
Secure the
business
Immediate
actions
Now to four weeks 12 weeks outwardTwo to 18 weeks
High Level Crisis Road Map

4. More detailed activities I
Action Arena 1
Executive
Action
 Develop Executive Task lists
 Determine immediate actions
 Actions to be delegated/watchlist
 Opportunity and Risks assessment
 Team organisation into i) executive, ii)
oversight and iii) delivery
 Execute
 Risk analysis (as per above)
 Assessment of financial position – balance
sheet and cost
 Working capital management
 Tax optimisation, Govt support & tax credits
 Operational assessment & cost improvement
 IT configuration & cyber security provision
 Corporate finance actions
 Early order opportunity assessment
 Early order client and staff engagement
Action Arena 2
Resilience
Building
Action Arena 3
Executive
Action II
 Development of initial “new world order”
assessment
 Develop 1st phase planning initiatives
 Development and launch of initial client and
staff communications strategy
 Initial supply chain sweep
 Integrated communication by leadership
 Development of strategic plan
- Identification and evaluation of options
- Development of guiding principles
- Long terms goals and smart objectives
- Strategic and initiative prioritisation
- Establish roadmap, communication plan
and monitoring infrastructure
Action Arena 4
Strategic
Planning and
Leadership
 Develop communication approach
 Build necessary transparency, including
scenario based communications
 Prepare & implement customer journey
comms plan –consideration and customer
protection equals brand build
 Develop customer and staff outreach
programmes – new initiatives, ecosystem
construct free brand building offerings – Joe
Wicks, and Century examples
 Ensure actionable feedback capture
Action Arena 5
Client & Staff
Communications
4
Likely Activity List

5. More detailed activities II
Action Arena 6
Resilience
Development
 Assess IT infrastructure for weaknesses
vulnerabilities and gaps
 Identify and effect critical and quick win
repairs, including cyber security
 Build inventory of sub optimal IT solutions
and potential replacements and incorporate
into new operating model work
 Assess supply chain for vulnerabilities
 Determine impact on operations
 Develop supply chain actions to mitigate
vulnerabilities, including diversification and
scale purchase
 Optimise logistics, ports, routing, pre-
booking capacity
 Enhance supply & demand management
capabilities
 Develop change management capabilities,
e.g. project design, governance, source of
truth capabilities, programme management,
project assurance
 Determine likely resource requirements
 Develop resourcing model to deploy perm
and liquid labour in optimal configuration
 Secure liquid labour pools
 Continue sweep of operations to identify
inefficiencies and source of cost reduction
 Continue process of reinforcing balance
sheet, including disposals and dividends
 Where B/S permits, instigate/identify
corporate actions to build capability – M&A
Action Arena 6
(cont)
Resilience
Development
 Alignment to strategy to develop integrated
design principles reflecting factors essential
to success
 Processes and activities: the work that
needs to be done
 Organization and people: people doing the
work and how they are organized
 Locations, buildings and assets: where work
is done and equipment in those places
needed to support the work
 Information: IT applications and databases
needed to support the work
Action Arena 7
Operational
Model Design
and Execution
Planning
5
Likely Activity List

6. More detailed activities III
 Mobilising of execution planning and
management resource
 Development of governance and
accountability framework
 Appointment of SRO
 Delivery framework design
- Create a delivery framework to tie delivery
to strategy. Line of sight from the Board
(decision making) to the engine room
(delivery) enables:
- i) Better decision-making; ii) improved
programme support iii) Integrate Board
and delivery team relationship
 Success criteria
- Gives clarity on requirements, guiding
effective prioritisation, and accountability
 Risk ID – up to 90% of projects fail
 Up front risk ID allows the board & engine
room to significantly reduce delivery risk
 Delivery methodology
- Assessment & agreement on best delivery
methodology assists good implementation
 Road map delivery
Action Arena 7
(cont)
Operational
Model Design
and Execution
Planning
Action Arena 8
Management
and delivery of
change
 Clear articulation of what will be improved
- Identify the focus and clarify goals
- ID the individuals that will facilitate the
process and lead the endeavour.
 Develop leadership buy in and tone from top
 Presentation of a compelling business case
to all stakeholders
 Clear planning infrastructure including data
mgt to support change in place
 Change resource identified and deployed
 Agents of change identified and supported
 Develop strong communication capabilities
and practice
- Recognition that this is the golden thread
that helps deliver success
 Active monitoring, measurement and
management of resistance, dependencies,
risks and budgets
- Construct digital single source of truth data
infrastructure
 Celebration of success
 Undertake appropriate reviews revision and
continuous improvement
6
Likely Activity List

7. Executive task list – 1st defence against issue overload, decision and action
stasis
Introduction
 Chief of Staff tool
for senior
banking
executives set up
during the
banking crisis for
a winning bank
Key success
factors
 Maintenance of
only 6 issues in
priority 1 items
 Weekly review of
all items
7
Executive Task list template

8. Team structuring – design and use to build executive bandwidth and
effectiveness
Executive Team
Strategy, overall direction setting, final decision makers and
leadership and accountability
Executive Board Members
Oversight Team
Provision of advice, guidance and programme mgt skills.
Delivery of oversight and assurance
Non Execs, Risk, Compliance, Finance, Divisional Heads, PMs,
External Advisory
Advisory
Policies, guidance, and
assurance.
Programme management
Design, oversight,
reporting, monitoring, issue
resolution.
Finance HR
Communications
Int & External
IT
Supply Chain
Vendor Mgt
Business Unit Teams and delivery support resource
Delivery Team
Undertakes delivery and action items mandated by the Board
Strategy
Operations
8
Template Team design

9. 9
Contact details for further information
Peter Dale
Mobile: +44 (0)7811 206807
Email:
peter.dale@comarpowco.co.uk