In a recent Harvard Business Review, I was struck by an article about Best Practices for small businesses. From that piece, “To successfully navigate Volatile, Uncertain, Complex and Ambiguous (VUCA) challenges like Covid-19, family business leaders can look to best practices from another organization that specializes in VUCA situations—the U.S. military’s Special Operations Forces (SOF)” (emphasis added). There are a lot of good ideas in the article that organizations can implement immediately. Moreover, we have long recognized that properly vetted and adjusted as necessary, Best Practices from others can add significant value to organizations in other industries.
Out of the Darkness
It is easy to be overwhelmed these days. Mildly put, most if not all organizations were thrown into chaos in less than a month. Depending on your business you are either partially operating or still waiting to open-up.
Regardless, how you work in June will be different than early March (~60 days as of this writing). Traditional recession management and recovery techniques may not be applicable this time.
There are lots of ideas about how to use technology going forward. Digitalization, IoT, IT-OT, among others are hawked as THE solution. Problem is, it is not that simple, and it takes time and money to implement. Many midsize firms do not have those privileges/resources.
There are a lot of actions most organizations can take without major CAPEX investments in time and money.
Years ago, we recognized that certain industrial sectors, particularly those with a high-risk profile such as energy or others deemed to be part of Critical Infrastructures face unique challenges. Some have a tendency towards incremental change or even the status quo. Change is often slow with setbacks.
Moreover, for every major firm there can be thousands of organizations in the supply chain ecosystems all of which must work well if total costs and profitability for all are to be effectively addressed.
This seemingly daunting task yet it need not be. There is a solution set available that can help organizations manage through this dark period and into the light, thriving.
The mission of The Rapid Response Institute is;
“Helping Clients Achieve Organizational Agility, Resiliency and Sustainability”
To that end, we have developed solutions, methodologies, and tools enabling enterprises of all sizes to not just survive but thrive after disruptive events. Much of this is either free or at low cost.
Rapid Response
In our 2009 White Paper, Rapid Response Management: Thriving in the New World Order we posited our new approach to managing your business. “Rapid Response Management (RRM) is an organizational construct or mental model that enables the organization and its key partners to rapidly sense changes and respond accordingly–quickly. While it maximizes the effectiveness of management knowledge to address change, it is not simply gut feel. Rather it is a simple yet sophisticated, methodical paradigm any organization can quickly and inexpensively implement.”
RRM is a creative and well documented method for running your business. The thinking was well advanced by 2009 and has been further ‘stress tested’ over the past decade.
We have updated RRM with our Operational Excellence Platform and interested readers are invited to check that out as well. Our offerings are designed to help our clients get through crises such as Covid-19.
We are updating this white paper and it will be available as an e-book in the near future. If you would like to reserve a free copy, Contact us.
We are here to shed some light during this dark period. For no cost, no obligation discussion contact us. We can put decades of experience dealing with business cycle adversity on your team.
Feel like your trapped? You’re NOT!
For More Information
Please note, RRI does not endorse or advocate the links to third-party materials. They are provided for education and entertainment only.
For more information on Cross Cultural Engagement, check out our Cross Cultural Serious Game
We presented, Should Cross Cultural Serious Games Be Included in Your Diversity Program: Best Practices and Lessons Learned at the Online Conference, New Diversity Summit 2020 on April 9, 2020. The summit will be offered again soon. Check it Out!!
You can contact the author as well.