In the past few weeks we have both received invitations from a number of organisations to work with them on developing their new business plans. This got us thinking about sharing our emerging thoughts about how to plan in a Covid-19 world.
The task of crafting a new plan will be familiar to many but the context within which plans are being developed and processes themselves have been radically reshaped and remain highly fluid, unpredictable and complex. We have all been changed by the events of 2020 and the pace of change is not going to slow down. We are definitely not in Kansas anymore. The normal organisational rhythms have been disrupted if not destroyed. We are continually adapting to working remotely and virtually. Many of us are exhausted, stressed and anxious. Our teams are smaller, and we are still working out how to work together in this new world we unwillingly created.
These are our top tips for what we are finding helpful in our client work right now.
Dawn
- Hold the past lightly. It was never a particularly good indicator of future performance, but it is likely to be even less so now
- Embrace learning. Use every opportunity you can to review and build on your learning
- Behaviour change is hard. We have all had to manage externally enforced change at speed. Almost the worst possible combination. We need to recognise people may struggle to adapt
- Practice paradoxical thinking. Setting boundaries and plans, vs keeping very flexible and adaptable, working fast vs. taking time to reflect, building on strengths vs starting from scratch and so on
- Keep testing your relevance. Be very honest with yourself about how relevant your work is in this changing world
- Experiment with new tools. Explore creative thinking tools that in the past you might have avoided, Thinkertoys is a great place to start
- Update your ecosystem knowledge. Much as the world has change for your organization it has also changed for your partners, audiences, artists, etc. find out as much as you can about their needs now
- Go radical. Think about approaches like the regenerative business model we mentioned last week
- Be realistic. It will take longer than you think
- Team rebuilding. Don’t neglect your team processes, take time to recover, rebuild and get ready for the next phase
Susan
- Accept that it is going to be different in many, sometimes unexpected ways. Beware of old habits and assumptions about what works and what doesn’t. (I am talking to lots of people about the Ladder of Inference at the moment.)
- Give yourselves time. In the arts we are great at meeting tight deadlines and working all hours to get the show up or the exhibition open. Stop. In this crazy world, spare capacity is your best friend.
- Set aside time every week in diaries for everyone to work on the plan; treat it like a meeting you cannot cancel.
- Think about the process itself. How are you going to work well together with remote working, zoom and furlough? How can you build in effective collaboration? Think about how you could bring more creativity and fun into the process; for example, through incorporating elements of design thinking.
- Invest in some (digital) tools to help you and in learning how to use them well. This will not only benefit this project, and other projects you are working on together, it will also give people skills that they didn’t have before, which always feels good when our agency is being restricted.
- Involve everyone. It is not the job of leaders to have all the answers (even if they feel pressured to do so) but to create the right environment for good questions to asked, explored and hopefully answered.
- Innovation is inevitable – own it. Accept failure as a learning experience. Plan and carry out small experiments to test ideas.
- Embrace ‘good enough’ and get comfortable with sharing work in progress not just the finished product. This applies to both words and numbers.
- Include tests, experiments or pilots in your plan. The learning from these can inform your next, longer term plan.
- Think about how you will manage the expectations of others including staff, board and funders. How can you create a collective understanding that certainty is unobtainable, and that predictability is not merely a mirage but a dangerous delusion.
We wish you well in your planning endeavours and hope that these ideas may be assistance. Do let us know how you get on and what is working for you. If there is anything you’d like us to cover in more detail get in touch.
Resources
The Ladder of Inference and managing expectations
Managing for Collective Creativity with Linda Hill