The COVID- 19 pandemic has swiftly metamorphosed into a global mechanical snare, having such an unprecedented domination on national, individual programs and freedoms. The virus is not only a health crisis of massive proportion, but also a looming reorganisation of the traditional global social, political and economic world order, into a new normal that needs no underestimation of its impact and reality.<\/p>\n
We are currently inundated with news on the virus every day. Deaths of people in their thousands, a surge in capital loss and employment as a result of businesses folding their operations across the globe, and a possible cyclical recession in the offing, are some of the gloomy consequences of the highly contagious virus. Companies around the world, big and small, are now struggling to rethink their future. Already, we have started to witness a swing in the discourse by political and institutional leaders across public, private, religious and social sectors, about what the next normal could entail, and how sharply its delineations will diverge from those that previously shaped our lives and businesses. The conclusions are humbling, our traditional metrics and assumptions have been rendered inadequate in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic.<\/p>\n
However, Human Capital International\u2019s<\/em><\/strong><\/a> analysis, grounded on multiple sources, indicates that post COVID -19 will create a sporadic shift in the desires and expectations of governments, employees, and customers. The impact of these alterations on how we live, work, and the unapparelled global craze for technology, will not only be massive but more evident. It is said that crises necessitate creative solutions, thus, the coronavirus crisis has not only divulged the failures and weaknesses in the traditional metrics and assumptions; but has equally revealed the immense opportunities for businesses to adapt, stretch their brands, reshuffle strategy and improve the performance of businesses by catering for new needs.<\/p>\n Unfortunately, however, these opportunities can only be identified and exploited by governments, policy makers and business leaders with prepared mindset<\/em><\/strong>, heartset<\/em><\/strong>, soulset<\/em><\/strong> and healthset<\/em><\/strong> for the soon coming post coronavirus new normal order.<\/p>\n Our commitment is to draw your attention to some of these opportunities in this article, as we have always done, and hope that, you can reinvent your leadership skillset and imagination and succeed as these opportunities unfold.<\/p>\n Related article:\u00a0Four tips on leading and managing your teams during quarantine<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n Technology driven solutions is the future<\/strong><\/p>\n Clearly, the online world of commerce where there is less physical human interaction would be bolstered in ways that reshape consumer behaviour forever. No institution, public or private, will survive in the new normal, if they do not invest substantially in developing effective and efficient digital solutions that ease their interactions with customers and stakeholders.<\/p>\n The need to swiftly and innovatively embrace technology will be intensified because of the demand to drive productivity in the face of inaccessible physical labour and a stronger demand for the best strategy to make businesses and institutions more resilient to future shocks. Already, there is a steady rise in digitization and cloud services as demonstrated by some institutions, both public and private. In China, for example, the judiciary system is going online by digitising the filings and hearings, thereby enhancing the speed of executing work and getting rid of the backlog. The UAE, with its unpleasant environment to support agriculture, is investing over $100 million in indoor farming, to commercially grow tomatoes under artificial light, as it tries to become more resilient in the coming future. The farm is one of the many innovative approaches, Abu Dhabi is using technology to transform food production in the United Arab Emirates and increase her GDP.<\/p>\n Digitization of the financial service sector<\/strong><\/p>\n New technologies are transforming business models and causing disruptions across the financial services value chain.\u00a0 Customers who were once tech shy are now becoming mobile-dominant for improved experience making it clear that the status quo will no longer be viable in the post COVID -19 new normal.<\/p>\n To become a truly customer focused financial institution in the new normal, banks will have no option but to leverage data analytics, improve their customer experience and transform their culture.<\/p>\n Thus, financial institutions, that will matter in the post COVID -19 new normal economy, would need to move beyond conservative, incremental adjustments toward effectively implementing and executing broader customer-centric organization-wide technology innovations. There will be no other alternative ways to achieve the transformation needed to succeed in the new normal digital age. The transformation requires swift cultural and back-office process changes. It will also call for improving the customer experience journey across all channels using data and advanced analytics channels and tools to deliver the mobile digital experiences customers want in order to drive revenue.<\/p>\n The pandemic should act as wakeup call for all institutions, especially banks that have been lagging behind on this front because digitization and massive cultural shifts in favour of customer experience will determine the success or failure of financial service institutions in the succeeding new normal.<\/p>\n This article will interest you:\u00a0Six lessons to learn from COVID-19 pandemic<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n Software engineering and office cost reduction opportunities<\/strong><\/p>\n Like it or not, in the new economic order, following the end of this pandemic, the most pervasive new business model will be a Digital Operating Model (DOM) where customers evaluate experiences on three fronts; ease of use, effectiveness and emotional resonance, <\/em><\/strong>otherwise known as \u201cDigital Emotionally Empathetic Experiences or \u201cDigital E3.\u201d<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n That means in the coming days, every business that will like to compete and survive in the new normal, will have to adopt a comprehensive digital solution strategy to replace outdated business processes and tools as a response to the shifting expectations and experiences of the customer. Such a digital operating strategy will have to aim at enhancing the contactless interactions between the customer and the business.<\/p>\n Predictably, this will lead to a surge in the trend in online shopping, office space redesign and cost reduction as many businesses will operate remotely from home or even garages. It will open up opportunities across multiple and linked sectors, such as building remote work systems, software platforms, and cloud-based solutions.\u00a0 In the entertainment, education, well-being and sports industries, for example, there will be massive opportunities for entrepreneurs, digital solution engineers and service providers. Netflix, which is a pioneer and leader in the new ways of disseminating entertainment content, long before the outbreak of COVID-19, is a classical case in Point. Starbucks which started experimenting concepts like electronic payments, mobile apps, pickup-only stores, third-party delivery networks, as part of its innovative delivery channels in their Chinese market, way before the outbreak, is set to emerge stronger and more profitable, far ahead of its contemporaries.<\/p>\n New businesses such as online cooking classes, virtual classrooms, online fitness classes will equally abound in the new normal. Organizers of conferences, trade shows and other large group activities will have to rethink and adopt the use of virtual equivalents in order to offer greater protection and safety for the participants. That means, the demand for electrical appliances such as video conference equipment, and other house hold appliances like dishwashers and washing machines, sterilization machines, or even sweeping robots, will surge in the new normal.<\/p>\n You might be interested\u00a0in this article: <\/b>Five Behaviours to help C \u2013 Suit Leaders Manage Complexity and Uncertainties<\/a><\/p>\n Focus on healthcare and e- health\u00a0\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n There is no doubt that following this pandemic, pressure will be mounted on all governments, especially public and community health delivery institutions to rethink their health care and pandemic response systems all over the world. Importantly, huge investments will be expected to be made in preventive healthcare programs, processes and systems as citizens will now be concerned about adopting healthier eating habits and lifestyles in order to strengthen their immune system.<\/p>\n And in Africa where health care delivery and facilities, have proven to be inadequate, perhaps it is that time to reprioritise and make huge investments in recruitment of new health workers, the use of e-health programs, such as telemedicine, smart hospitals and online consultations, digital medical assistants, self-diagnosing medical devices, not forgetting better and improved pharmaceuticals, supplements, medical devices and personal protective equipment (PPE), , as the new alternative in health care delivery.<\/p>\n These developments are crucial especially in societies struggling to cope with an increasing elderly population. Bottomline, the post COVID-19 next normal will require more investments in the health sector which will require a much deeper partnership and collaboration between governments and the private sector. This may even require bilateral collaborations among nations due to the cross-border impact and implications of COVID -19.<\/p>\n Conclusion<\/strong><\/p>\n There can be no better time for public officials, entrepreneurs and C-suit executives to be more creative and demonstrate such levels of innovation and make this world a better place as the coming days following the end of this pandemic.<\/p>\n From now on till the lockdowns and social distancing are over, every moment must count for creative and alternative thinking. These are not normal times to invest in watching television and having fun. It is time to use these new levels of anxiety to nurture a more formidable resilience and be more determined to bounce back courageously and make this world a better place than before. Let us belief that we can turn this situation around and make a far more positive difference in the world we live in today. Let us all pursue this noble course of making that difference beyond financial success.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The COVID- 19 pandemic has swiftly metamorphosed into a global mechanical snare, having such an unprecedented domination on national, individual programs and freedoms. The virus is not only a health crisis of massive proportion, but also a looming reorganisation of the traditional global social, political and economic world order, into a new normal that needs […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4343,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3310","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-personal-and-professional-transformation"],"rttpg_featured_image_url":{"full":["https:\/\/humancapitalinternational.org\/articles\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/Post-COVID-19-Rethinking-the-Opportunities-in-The-Next-Normal.jpg",1140,400,false],"landscape":["https:\/\/humancapitalinternational.org\/articles\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/Post-COVID-19-Rethinking-the-Opportunities-in-The-Next-Normal.jpg",1140,400,false],"portraits":["https:\/\/humancapitalinternational.org\/articles\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/Post-COVID-19-Rethinking-the-Opportunities-in-The-Next-Normal.jpg",1140,400,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/humancapitalinternational.org\/articles\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/Post-COVID-19-Rethinking-the-Opportunities-in-The-Next-Normal-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/humancapitalinternational.org\/articles\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/Post-COVID-19-Rethinking-the-Opportunities-in-The-Next-Normal-300x300.jpg",300,300,true],"large":["https:\/\/humancapitalinternational.org\/articles\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/Post-COVID-19-Rethinking-the-Opportunities-in-The-Next-Normal-1024x400.jpg",1024,400,true],"lshowcase-thumb":["https:\/\/humancapitalinternational.org\/articles\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/Post-COVID-19-Rethinking-the-Opportunities-in-The-Next-Normal.jpg",200,70,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/humancapitalinternational.org\/articles\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/Post-COVID-19-Rethinking-the-Opportunities-in-The-Next-Normal.jpg",1140,400,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/humancapitalinternational.org\/articles\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/04\/Post-COVID-19-Rethinking-the-Opportunities-in-The-Next-Normal.jpg",1140,400,false]},"rttpg_author":{"display_name":"Ojambo Joel","author_link":"https:\/\/humancapitalinternational.org\/articles\/author\/joelhumancapital\/"},"rttpg_comment":2,"rttpg_category":"Personal and Professional Transformation<\/a>","rttpg_excerpt":"The COVID- 19 pandemic has swiftly metamorphosed into a global mechanical snare, having such an unprecedented domination on national, individual programs and freedoms. 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