In the midst of the Covid-19 lockdown lots of businesses are wondering what can I do now how can I survive, where can I get some support? Now is not the time to be stubborn, but to get some support to have the best opportunity to be relevant once the crisis is over.
A key to survival, in “normal” times is to keep relevant which means keeping an eye on the markets. Your market place may have changed beyond recognition during the last 6 weeks and you should be busier than ever working out how you can adapt what your organisation does to support current and future clients going forward
How can I afford support?
This is a common question. There are plenty of free webinars available right now, for example check out https://pro-actions.com/events/ , packed full of ideas.
Many companies are offering massively reduced fees, or even some free sessions. So, now is a time to get busy “on” your business as much as you may have to be doing “in” it.
Here at Eye Bray Limited we are offering free support for qualifying businesses of up to 4 hours a month for April and May 2020. This may be extended until the end of June 2020, depending on when lockdown ends.
How should I use my time?
It really depends on your situations and whether you have had the time to think about operating in a crisis before. Those who have been flooded, or suffered a fire, will understand how a business will have to either temporarily close or have an alternative way of supporting customers. They are, funnily enough, a little ahead of the game right now.
What they have had to think about before is; how can carry on in some way. I have seen restaurants changing into home delivery businesses, hardware stores operating just a “click and collect” service. There are others, like pubs, that have been forcibly shut down and not given any options.
What to do then? Do those things that other have done already and make plans for the future. What will be your re-launch like. An important element of this is how will you market your re-launch, so there’s more thinking there.
Once the thinking is done, talk to people. Everyone in your organisation should about what your thoughts are. They may even be able to make them better. Your clients, will also want to keep in touch with you as you are as important to them as they are to you.
Cash is King
Not truly a focus within Eye Bray, but being a business owner I also know this is a focal statement. Take care of what you pay out as much as talking to people about what you can collect .
If you haven’t got any type of cashflow formulated get one “pdq”. It will be the one thing, if done properly, that will highlight what you need to do to survive this period. Continued it will show how important taking control of the most important thing for you is.
Support With Security.
As part of your thinking you should review how you complete your admin tasks and how you back up the data it uses. IT has become a large part of our changed reality and you should continue to think about how using IT equipment and services can make you more efficient.
This also means thinking about how to keep information secure in any changed processes, be it physical, electronic, or voice data.
Are you going to be stubborn about your structure?
How your organisation should look at the end of this period of change may be very different to how it was in January. Do not resist these changes.
People may need to re-train, some may decide to leave, others will thrive with the opportunity being presented to them. You have to be realistic about being relevant in your market as it re-establishes itself.
Getting the right people doing the right jobs is probably never going to be more relevant as it will be in the last six months of 2020.
If any of these topics are things you are struggling with, please do get in touch.
Related Articles.
- https://eyebray.com/why-is-change-difficult/ : An introduction to thinking about change and the impact it can have .
- https://eyebray.com/gdpr-the-basics/ : This contains some considerations when thinking about how to comply with data protection rules.
Do feel free to call on 07943211611 or email us using enquiries@eyebray.com .
