New Zealand’s businesses are encouraged to tackle a multitude of challenges as the country prepares to enter Level 2. With so many issues to address, this can seem like an overwhelming task, but strong leadership will help.
Our network is telling us that they are extending their strategic plans from an initial six months to the next 18 – working out what’s achievable now and establishing where they want to be by the end of 2021. This will be done by assessing risk and weak points in their organisation, while developing innovative new strategies to emerge from survival to thriving.
| Your leadership will drive success
Businesses need their leaders to be inspirational thinkers who are capable of building high performing teams around them to make this happen.
Sound too difficult? Not at all. You’ve been developing your leadership skills to unprecedented levels over the past few weeks – perhaps while not even realising it – because COVID-19 has changed the way we work, permanently.
You’ve strengthened your business digitally through remote working, developed emergency action plans, established better frameworks around how you communicate to your staff, managed your teams by motivating them and building positivity during extremely complex times, set boundaries, become more empathetic to the needs of your employees and developed new resilience.
You’ve been present and authentic. You’ve also made some gut-wrenching choices in difficult circumstances which have demonstrated that you don’t shirk the tough decisions. That’s not bad!
| Where to next?
Now is the time to get more help to focus on the future and use company culture and the accountability of teams to build a better business. A good starting point would be our continuing webinar series.
For example, ‘Building Culture During A Crisis’ with John Olsen, examined how a crisis can test company culture in ways never imagined by leaders. Crisis doesn’t destroy your culture but instead can help make it better and stronger.
If you caught Bill Bain’s recent webinar ‘Building Stronger Leadership And Teams In These Times’, you will have grasped how good leadership and top team performance are needed for a company to achieve optimal success at the best – and the worst, of times.
A good leader can utilise team performance to positively influence many of the problems faced by businesses today: silo mentality, mediocre performance culture; high staff turnover; poor customer retention; misalignment throughout the organisation; an inability to execute strategies and initiatives to their full potential successfully.
| The message is…
What does all this mean? It means that you mustn’t be too hard on yourself. You don’t have to do this alone, and help is close at hand. You’ve adapted and built on your leadership skills in the most challenging of times. Great leaders are the ones who can successfully navigate the treacherous waters, not just sail serenely along when things are calm and the weather is fine.
You’re still here, and your teams will now be looking to you to drive the business forward as we reach Level 2 and beyond. ‘The importance of leadership in tough times is significant, but those who are up for the challenge will have an incredible opportunity to reimagine a bright new future of work.’ Forbes.
Check out our dedicated resource for businesses impacted by COVID-19. It’s full of useful information and resources, support and offerings, funding opportunities and partnership and coaching details.
For more business ownership and leadership advice, check out more of our blogs.