Let’s face it - in these last few days, the world has been changing at a blinding pace, right in front of us. SARS-CoV-2 has brought us a health pandemic, but also deep changes to the way everyone lives, works, and communicates.
At Whitesmith, we count ourselves along with the lucky ones where the disruption can be minimized: we have a lot of experience working remotely and even though we call ourselves a Product Studio, most of our expertise is actually in quickly identifying and solving problems - from mobility to energy, ecommerce to health, we’ve spent the past 8 years working with some of the best entrepreneurs we know, building great products. With that in mind, we thought it might be helpful to share with other companies - both tech and non-tech - how we’re handling this crisis, and what we’ve been doing with our clients to ensure they’re prepared as well.
How's Whitesmith Doing?
- We’re keeping our team safe and sound at home. Gathering ideas and suggestions from them, ensuring everyone has access to information from reliable sources and follows good remote practices
- Keeping transparency and engaging employees. Everyone is being kept in the loop, with a clear understanding of the challenges ahead of us, and that People are still our #1 priority.
- Preparing for the worst. We know we’re in a volatile market, and at the mercy of the economy, so we’re ensuring we have a lifeline - we’re cutting our non-essential costs and investments, redirecting them towards the safety of everyone that works with us. Also leveraging available national and international (EU et al) measures for SME support.
- Reaching out. The same way people have been encouraged to reach out when isolated, businesses thrive in crisis by reaching out and finding common goals. We’ve been doing that with our network, looking out for each other, new opportunities and novel ways of collaborating in a growing digital world.
What you can do?
Everything will be online, physical offices and interactions are suddenly outdated, the world already is a different place. So, now it’s the moment to look for ways for your businesses to prosper in a new environment.
Ask yourself this: is my business answering a current or future need, and is it thriving and growing in this environment? Or should it shelve its current model and look for new opportunities?
Aiming for growth in changing times
- What parts of your business should work on today’s situation, but aren’t because of the way you operate? Or are they unable to scale/adapt to new demand?
- What is the smallest thing you can do to get them working in this changing reality?
- What are the things your team needs to know/learn to put in practice these (new) processes?
- How can you be there for your customers now in a way they won’t forget?
- What is your action plan for the next few days? For the next few weeks?
A new way of facing society means new opportunities
- Is there any part of your current business that can bring new value to people?
- How can you adjust your business to bring that value?
- What opportunities do you have on your ideas notebook that make sense to put in practice now?
- What are your skills, experiences, contacts that you can leverage to follow a new opportunity?
We’ve been helping our clients answer these questions, leading from the front in these changing times and on the lookout for the new opportunities that are certainly arising.
How about you? If any of these questions resonate and/or you want to talk about how to grow or re-target your company to this changing reality, get in touch.
