“A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step” – Lao Tzu
We are now entering a very strange and unprecedented time in our history.
Somewhere in the murky intersection of successfully “flattening the curve”, slowing rates of new COVID hospitalizations, and the promise of a future vaccine, political and business leaders around the globe are beginning to contemplate exactly how we begin lifting the shelter-in-place quarantines and re-starting the economy.
Absolutely nothing in this equation is easy, nor do we have a proven roadmap to follow.
The ugly backdrop to this story is the impossible goal of trying to find an acceptable balance between the horrifying loss of life and the unfathomable devastation we’ve seen in our economy over the past 60 days from COVID-19. There really isn’t a good answer in this situation.
What we do know is that we cannot sit still.
We have to take some action.
It is still too early to have a national, let alone global, plan in place. But I suspect that once we start there are some proven strategy execution principles from the world of startups and business growth that might translate and prove to be useful in this situation. A few that come to mind:
- Segment the market. Taking an example from the very diverse United States – the approach we take in the populous and hard-hit state of New York will very likely be more cautious and measured compared to the largely rural and relatively unscathed state of Montana.
- Take calculated risks. Instead of going all in, we will need to loosen restrictions and open up commerce in a thoughtful and measured way. This is the classic hypothesis/test/learn/refine approach from the startup world. It will allow us to validate what works, then rapidly accelerate. It might mean we open up more risk mitigated venues and businesses first – for example parks and low-volume stores before travel and movie theaters.
- Iterate and learn. We will most certainly not get everything right the first time. However, taking an agile approach, executing rapid iterations and making decisions based upon data will lead us to the right path forward.
- Maintain flexibility. We must remain open to confronting hard truths, and changing direction as a result. Not everything is going to work, and we may end up taking steps backward if the virus mounts a resurgence. The willingness and ability to pivot is vital for startups, and it will be for our political and business leaders. We must be willing to pivot when the market provides us with new lessons.
- Focus on people. If “getting the right people on the bus” is startup 101, then keeping them happy and productive is startup 102. When the economy picks back up, business and political leaders need to maintain a focus on the wellbeing of the populace…not just the citizens of the country, but the citizens (i.e. the workforce) of each and every organization. I really believe many people have incurred economic and emotional trauma from this drawn out event, and it will take a lot of work help everyone recover. Getting people back to work and productive will prove to be good medicine!
- Build momentum. Positive momentum is a secret startup force. It is the one remedy that cures nearly every ill. The simple fact is winning feels good. Small victories can lead to bigger ones. All of them provide motivation and positive energy. Its hard to argue that we couldn’t all use a little bit more of that!
I’ve often used the phrase “walk before you run” with growth teams during my career. This is a shorthand expression for acknowledging that we need to move fast and take some action, but we must strike a balance between executing strategically versus executing in a haphazard tactical way. If we go slowly first, we learn valuable lessons and can perfect the approach along the way before ramping up the pace. The end-goal is always to achieve the most economical and impactful outcome, with the least amount of pain and thrash to get there.
This mantra of crawling before you walk, and walking before you run, has served me well. Hopefully it also gets some adoption by business and political leaders in the upcoming weeks and months.
I’m looking forward to seeing how this unfolds.
– Onward