The crisis of COVID-19 has had many businesses struggling to adapt to the changing environment. V-Soft COO, Keith Giffney, shares his advice one how to lead a business during this time and key business components to consider for success.
A positive, winning culture will not only help make this time easier to get through, but it will also make your organization healthier and stronger post-COVID-19. Culture is not just the physical environment, it's what you do every day. At V-Soft, we focus on three key areas to make sure our culture and people are successful.
The leadership in an organization is also important to get through today's events. Fostering a culture of inclusion is the most effective way to lead all the time, not just in a crisis. Communication is also critical during this time.
"If you want to go somewhere fast, go alone.
If you want to go somewhere far, go together."
Protecting and attracting top talent is critical. While V-Soft, along with many companies, was not safe from having to make some critical workplace cuts, it was ultimately a good practice to identify redundancies and inefficient roles. To understand which roles to cut, the leadership team focused on culture, dedication, work ethic and productivity. It's important to understand your companies core values and who is enabling those values in your organization.
Once the cuts or furloughs are made, go above and beyond to recognize your existing employees. This can relieve the anxiety they have about job uncertainty, which ultimately effects productivity. Employees need to know they are an important part of the company's overall success and want to feel appreciated.
This is also a great time to educate and improve employees' skills with training. By allowing staff to invest time to improve their skill-set or even gain new skills, it'll serve as a huge asset to your company down the line.
It may be first extinct to make cuts in the sales and marketing department during tough times, but it's important to consider your long-term strategy. Studies show that companies that keep their sales force and marketing team in tact, fair better during downturns and are able to ramp up more quickly when the economy becomes favorable.
During times of crisis, your sales department should focus on serving customers and listen to what their needs are. Identify the solutions you provide that can have an immediate, positive impact to customers. Be flexible with pricing. It's also a good idea to position your solutions in front of verticals that have not been effected by the downturn.
Your marketing team should be more focused on working directly with sales to equip them with the assets to succeed. As solutions and messaging changes, your marketing team should be working in real time to adapt collateral and messaging.
As business might slow down, this is not a time for productivity to slow down. Take this rare free time to focus on YOUR business. Focus on enhancing your marketing collateral, digital presence, videos and go-to-market strategies.