Business Continuity during the Second Wave

With the increase in the number of Covid-19 cases, lockdowns and night curfews, the situation seems to be back to square one. Social media is flooded with April 2020 ‘then’ and April 2021 ‘now’ memes. But, being an optimist has its own advantages as I believe this time the industry is better prepared and as mentioned in my previous blog, we still need to tread with cautious optimism.

This weekend musing is an extension of my experience at the office – reflections from my perspective.

At the start of the financial year (April), we at Panasonic, like every organisation, come together to collectively set growth targets for ourselves at the Policy Meet. It is usually a physical gathering with our team leaders across various business divisions, under one roof, to understand their respective business plans and align towards a common vision of delivering value to our customers as – ONE Panasonic. A collaborative effort to get every business on the same page to understand, learn, exchange ideas, gather key insights and opine together. This entire day of goal-setting is followed by the President’s Excellence Awards and a gala dinner which everyone looks forward to. However, Covid-19 led pandemic changed the course of events since last year, shifting it from physical to a hybrid model which was mostly attended virtually with a few physically present and with all protocols in place. I was delighted to note that while the course had changed, the spirits weren’t dampened. Looking at the year gone by I believe, during this time of crisis, capabilities have been tested; characters built.

This year, we continued with the same rigour, ensuring social distancing and utmost safety. (With, of course, one small digression - we had to postpone the awards and the networking dinner). This time, it was optional to attend and many chose to do so virtually. With the second wave spreading at an alarming rate once again, things are becoming unpredictable. This led me to think about the transformation that we as individuals/leaders and businesses have to undergo. If you think from a humanitarian point of view - if you care, you will continue to share each other’s pain. And, the only way out here is following safety protocols, ensuring social distancing, wearing masks, using sanitisers, in-short not dropping the ball on safety. On the other hand, businesses need to ensure continuity without compromising the safety of employees. In fact, learnings of the past year must be utilised and opportunities must be converted into necessary capabilities for business sustainability. It is the time to introspect. It is the time for transformative thinking and not in an incremental manner but, in an exponential manner.    

People in a position of responsibility inadvertently have to put themselves to scrutiny, in order to emerge stronger. That doesn’t mean we spearhead without weighing the odds. On the contrary, leaders should be extra cautious and put all those learnings and skills into use to ensure business sustainability. For, I believe that this pandemic continues to test our capabilities as leaders of tomorrow and how we manoeuvre through it defines our character. Hence, leaders must rise to the occasion to deliver transformation, even it is about merely taking baby steps but one mustn’t stop till the goal is achieved. I also realised another constant that helped us (at Panasonic) stay grounded throughout these times was our strong value system, our founder’s beliefs, seven principles, basic business philosophy and our ethos. We as individuals, as business leaders must keep an open mind and must ask ourselves - what is the change that we want to make?

Time and again, what I’ve learnt from adversities is to take them head-on. Either you will fall only to rise stronger or, stay resilient and ride the wave. Both ways, you set an example for your team, for your company and more importantly yourself, as a leader. The easiest thing in life is to give up but let me tell you the happiest or, the most satisfying thing to do is to not give in to this temptation and rise up to the challenge. So, let us come together as a community to deal with this challenge (second-wave) and continue to battle it with the right protocols – Wear a Mask, Sanitize, Practise Social Distancing.