When online shops were required to limit sales to essential goods, back under level 5 lockdown, they had to scrabble to remove all other goods from their websites — not a trivial project. I was interested to see one (smaller) local company get it right in hours, while another (bigger) company’s site was down for days.
One of the distinguishing features between businesses that are surviving the pandemic and those that are not is the speed with which the former adapt to the changing environment. Another related feature is a focus outward on the needs of their customers rather than inward on their own difficulties. The latter focuses on problems, while the former sees opportunities, leading to innovative ways to do the previously impossible.
Speed almost defines entrepreneurial spirit. While the rest of us are still complaining about the problem, an entrepreneur finds a solution people will pay for. Having one’s livelihood depend on how quickly one can change track is a great motivator.
Size often seems to slow things down. This struck me during level 4 lockdown when the online service of the department of home affairs, eHomeAffairs, was not available — because of the lockdown! That struck me as sadly funny. No company dependent on customers for its survival would have considered closing down its online channel just when it became the only way the public could access its services. It would have looked for a way to make the impossible happen.
It’s a different mindset. I recall one small SA online company that faced a crisis years ago when the provider hosting its server suddenly went offline. Disaster. Its developer happened to be on leave thousands of kilometres away, but after frantic phone calls located him he managed remotely to switch the company’s entire operation to his development server sitting in his wardrobe back home. Clients had hardly noticed a problem when the company’s services were up and running again.
That’s what small, entrepreneurial and often scared enterprises can do when faced with a threat to their survival. But big organisations such as home affairs don’t do that. Why? One reason is that ownership sits at the top while everyone else just does a job. Another is that big organisations develop an internal frame of mind — this is what we do, and if a crisis stops us from doing it the best we can offer our customers-clients is to explain why we can’t help them.
Good leaders ensure that urgency in meeting the needs of those for whom we exist is communicated throughout the company and becomes the guiding principle. It’s caught from the example of one’s seniors and the expectations of those around one. The government has on the whole been quite quick and effective in coming up with policy for the pandemic, and at first gained our trust through it. But then we watched in horror as those lower down the line just didn’t get it. Some junior managers seemed to believe that if they kept on plodding along in the same way as always, the new demands would miraculously be met, despite clear evidence to the contrary. Now 1-million desperate workers are destitute because Unemployment Insurance Fund (UIF) payments cannot be distributed quickly enough.
No doubt from the inside it looks entirely logical and normal. There are perfectly valid reasons why we fail. But from the outside it looks impossibly blind and irresponsible. At a time such as this, excuses are not enough. Leaders need to liberate the minds of their staff to look outwards and envisage how to do the impossible, quickly. It has become trite to say we all need an entrepreneurial spirit, but in the face of drastic change it’s true. Even for the bureaucrats.
• Cook is co-founder and chair of the African Management Institute (AMI).
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