Well, 2020 is sure one for the books. Memorable at best, yet I would suspect for most of you, it just sort of sucks. I don’t need to enumerate all the fiascos that have happened January through September, but the one that has impacted lives the most is of course COVID-19 and the country’s response to it. In many ways the contracting community was hit the least hard by the pandemic, at least in its early months, as the one thing that never truly shuts down is the Federal government. That doesn’t minimize the freeze on growth, small integrators that were adversely affected, the changes we’ve faced in operating our businesses, or the now inevitable loss of contracts as Federal budgets are rearranged. So if we chalk up 2020 to a learning experience, what exactly have we learned? Here are 4 COVID-19 lessons that we need to learn.
Expect the Unexpected
In January when impeachment proceedings were all the rage, I saw one person on the nightly opinion shows say that COVID-19 is coming to America and it’s going to change our lives in unimaginable ways. Like many, I shrugged it off as hyperbole. Bad call. 6 weeks later I was pulling my kid out of college at the beginning of 6 months of some form of shutdown that we are still in the middle of. The Federal government shut down in person meetings too, for all intents and purposes. I went to an AFCEA luncheon event on March 12 (surprisingly well attended), and that may have been one of the last gatherings in the DC / northern Virginia area before mass lockdowns. Even when this first began, I and many others anticipated things being clear by no later than the end of May. Wrong again. There is little left to surprise me after this summer and the phrase “That can’t happen here” has been stricken from my vocabulary. You should rid yourself of that thinking as well. Businesses were thrown into the pandemic fire without warning, and many adjusted to survive with practices that may help them thrive long after the crisis is in the past (getting very good at teleworking comes to mind). Anything can happen. Be prepared for it.
Think Critically
I’ll avoid any political discussion here regarding the pandemic and acknowledge that there are opinions on many aspects of this virus and our response to it. What is not in question is that this event, perhaps more than any in the last half century, has ginned up massive amounts of misinformation.
How deadly is it? To whom? Are masks effective? Why six feet?
There are facts, and there are opinions, and the line is more than blurry between the two, it’s a pea soup fog. We also have dealt with something rarely seen in my lifetime, and that is large scale censorship on this issue, predominantly by America’s favorite sources of information, social media platforms. Some opinions just aren’t allowed because they are dangerous and jeopardize public health.
Look, we are still learning COVID-19 lessons about the virus and the impacts of shutdowns and striking a balance regarding what to do. I believe people are basically intelligent, maybe not book smart but at a minimum endowed with good old-fashioned horse sense. Recognize that there are “experts” on all sides telling you what to do. Trust yourself. If it smells fishy, it probably is. When you hear the opinions, even when disguised as facts, ask why this source might be expressing this idea. It’s unfortunate that even in a global health crisis like this, politics and greed have infected the dialogue. Think critically and make decisions based upon what makes sense to you.
Recognize the Real Impact
Events lead to actions, and actions have consequences. If the entire country is focused on death, we will most certainly be thinking about death. If the social commentary is about recovery, we start getting more positive. The COVID-19 virus is what it is, outside our control in many ways. Our individual and collective responses to it are things we can affect. Washing your hands with disinfectant, going to a house party, or wearing your mask or not may all have effects on your safety and perhaps those around you. Yet so does living in near isolation for half a year and keeping kids out of school, not to mention shuttering businesses by the millions. We can clearly see that America’s virus response, perhaps in some states more than others, has created unintended consequences on a grand scale. When focusing on how to react to a major event, make sure you consider the ripple effect across other areas of your business, family, and those around you. Ask yourself, “So what happens then?”, and keep asking it until you run out of answers. If the sole focus is on the major calamity and avoiding it at all costs, often the cure creates more havoc than the disease. This is one of the critical COVID-19 lessons that we all could have learned sooner.
Respond Appropriately
This lesson is an extension of impact recognition. During this pandemic, there is no arguing that worldwide, mistakes have been made. Depending upon what or who you focus upon, some are larger or more numerous than others. Suffice it to say, there is plenty of blame to go around. That is to be expected. America has not encountered something like the COVID-19 pandemic for about 100 years. The number of people still alive that lived through that can be counted with an abacus, and you can guarantee that they don’t really remember it.
So, what is appropriate response? I’ll suggest it is comprised of three tenets:
- Don’t over-react. When we’re in the heat of battle and something bad has just happened, people tend to respond emotionally with what happens next. This is generally a bad idea, and there are numerous laws on our books to prove it. A measured response based upon critical thinking (there’s that phrase again) leads to better long-term results.
- Avoid the big mistake. These are the mistakes that, in hindsight, get almost universal response of, “What the hell was he thinking?” If you’re leading a corporation, a state or a country, these whoppers can cost lives. These mistakes tend to happen when we feel we need to act immediately, as in this minute. The grizzly is charging, do something! We’re sometime confronted with these situations, but usually we have time to consider things critically, anticipate real impacts, and make a call that we can all live with.
- Move the ball forward. Appropriate responses always do something to quell the negatives and get us moving toward something positive. Responses to mass calamities like a pandemic will never be perfect, and if that is the metric, we will all fail. Measure progress that can be tied directly to your decision, and if things are better today than yesterday, this is goodness. Try to improve upon what works and mitigate what doesn’t. Many Federal contractors accelerated and cast in stone the trend of virtual work that was already in progress and will be evaluating in the next six to twenty four months if the cost savings and efficiencies generated are worth the potential downsides of disconnection from the office.
In the big picture, none of what I’ve just told you should come as a surprise nor is it specific to your business alone. Events like natural disasters and pandemics simply help to put a fine point on things to make us aware of things we already know, but often don’t plan for until they happen. COVID-19 and our national response to it has exaggerated these lessons that hopefully leads to increased national wisdom.
In the next article we’ll extend this thinking and discuss lessons we need to un-learn as seen by attitudes and actions that evolved during the COVID-19 crisis.
