It has now been widely discussed that the pandemic has accelerated a process of change. Changes to behaviours, habits and opportunities that were already, in part, in our lives have quickly evolved modifying our lifestyles and creating imbalances that are difficult to manage at any level. Businesses have had to face many challenges, and still have to, to adapt to new needs and to return to a situation that is as normal and forward-looking as possible: they need to find the strength to rethink their model and work on people’s motivation to seize new opportunities and variable level of deep transformation. Organisations flex to protect people’s health; social relations move from a physical to a digital space.
Smart working is transforming the office from a physical meeting place to a virtual space in which people interact towards common goals. Places, times and ways of working are re-defined and the internal organization is moving from a hierarchical structure to a community of people who bring skills and relationships for a shared purpose. Space and time become fluid, and even in the smallest organizations it becomes essential to rethink the mission, build a vision, and communicate it to all the members of the network, inside and outside, to express the value of activities and create trust, manage expectations and promote the desire to working together.
Communication is one of the first steps in the transformation process aiming to keep people’s morale high and continuing to motivate. It helps to build and maintain consolidated and new relationships with customers and partners over time. A wise and targeted use of digital channels enables the strengthening of the brand and the vision that guides business processes. Reputation preservation is needed even when difficult decisions have to be made, such as downsizing or suspending an activity while waiting for different times, without compromising the possibility of starting over. This allows new opportunities to be seized in order to strengthen the local dimension of the business, to expand it outside a given geographical area and to reach a potentially global audience. Where a business is manufacturing-based, this preservation of reputation enables the offering to be proposed to an unlimited audience.
The navigation of transformation isn’t easy. At Skippers Project, we bring on board the compass, maps and experience to communicate change and help maintain cohesion and consistency between vision and behaviour.