I’m about 10 weeks into my own Covid 19 lockdown. I have to admit to some Zoom weariness, impatience with not jumping on a plane and meeting with clients face to face, even a nice dinner at a restaurant with friends. But we will continue with some version of the lockdown for some time.
It’s been an interesting time. Many look forward to things getting back to normal, to the way they were Before Covid (BC) As I reflect on the past several months, there’s a lot I/we have learned that I hope we don’t lose. There’s a lot we’ve learned about working/engaging differently, much of which is much more effective than what we did BC.
We’ve learned, perhaps reconfirmed, the importance of caring–for ourselves, our families, our communities, our colleagues, and our customers. Too often, we get consumed with our personal and business goals, with what is important to us, forgetting about others.
But caring is the secret behind engagement, to talking and working with people, to learning about them and having them learn about us. Caring opens everything up.
We are better together than we are individually. By working collaboratively, by exploring how working together, we accomplish more with each other, as well as for ourselves.
We are better people when we diversify our interests and spend our time doing different things (Read: All work and no play makes Dave a very dull boy.) Taking time to do things different, perhaps together, but not work focused is important. Learning new things, outside of business, developing new relationships, exploring new ideas. They help make us better people and enable us to develop new skills.
We may not be “essential workers.” Too often, we think we are critical to our business success and the ability of our organizations to achieve their goals. We are essential—but we can’t forget those that may be really essential are the people we don’t notice, the people that may not be in leadership or top positions, but are the one’s critical to getting things done. Whether it’s the stock clerk, a person on a manufacturing line, a service provider, we often overlook these people. We’ve now learned without them, nothing gets done.
What have you learned that you want to make sure you continue as we move forward?
BC – hahaha Dave!! I am an essential worker and as such have been working these long 10 wks. And my team & I are tired. At the end of my 4 day wk, I’m so happy to get home on a Fri night to my farmette, feel my shoulders relax, play with my dogs & know I don’t have to leave for 3 days.Know I’m safe.The only places I’ve been have been the grocery store or gas station. What have I learned (or I guess more importantly, as these clients were always there before) is some clients really are dicks. Self important, demanding, unreasonable and often abusive. Of course they always were BUT in normal times (ya know BC), you put up, smiled & delivered the best you could. With Covid-19, we have to practice differently, telemedicine, parking lot medicine etc, strict locked door policy etc. The great clients shine through! The dicks never disappoint – but NOW their actions put myself & team at risk. Unacceptable. So now we don’t accommodate them, we fire them! We don’t need them.
Hope you are well Dave. We must chat soon. xoxo