Nyle Casey 
Businesses must be resilient in today’s ever-shifting economic landscape in order to thrive, such as handling uncertainty such as COVID-19 pandemic or other disruptions that could potentially negatively impact them.
Resilient business owners know how to remain calm in tough situations while prioritizing team wellbeing and growth opportunities. They’re open-minded, flexible, and capable of shifting focus when necessary.
1. Focus on Customer Service
Customer loyalty and retention can only be increased with exceptional support services. Prompt issue resolution and effective training sessions are vital elements to the success of any organization.
Professionalism means taking the time to recognize each individual as an individual, treating them with kindness, and remembering that any transaction only holds value due to its relationship ties.
Resilient companies celebrate diversity, embrace change as an ongoing reality, and are focused on building organizational and supporting systems that allow for rapid collaborative adaptation in times of uncertainty – including COVID-19. They use these traits to succeed despite all odds.
2. Build a Resilient Team
Resilient teams exhibit more positive attitudes, are faster to adapt, and exhibit higher degrees of creativity.
Build a resilient team by understanding its needs. A key factor is creating an environment of psychological safety within which team members feel safe to express concerns or new ideas.
Candor, resourcefulness, and compassion are hallmarks of resilience among teams. Resilient teams concentrate on controlling what they can and use their energy to find solutions to problems that arise.
Resilient teams need to be able to adapt well under stress; otherwise, it can cause them to feel powerless and compromise resilience.
3. Create a Plan of Action
Running a business is no simple endeavor. From dealing with industry disruption and adapting to consumer trends to complying with new regulations, businesses face continual obstacles on their journey towards success.
Create an action plan to keep you on track during challenging times and build resilience. Planning can allow you to identify and respond to potential risks before they affect your business.
An effective action plan can be as straightforward as creating a two-column checklist listing each activity and providing space to mark them as complete. For a more in-depth plan, add columns listing individual responsibilities for each activity as well as an anticipated timeline of when you would like each action completed.
4. Develop a Culture of Resilience
Cultivating a culture of resilience is critical to your business’s success. Resilient teams can respond swiftly and positively when facing difficulties, taking each challenge as an opportunity for growth and innovation.
One key aspect of creating a resilient culture lies in developing adaptable leaders who can quickly adjust the time horizons for their company. They might use temporary groups composed of experts from multiple departments called Tiger Teams to address specific issues.
They also encourage open communication in times of uncertainty, helping reduce stress levels and enable employees to make more objective decisions more quickly while also responding faster to customer inquiries and concerns.
5. Be Flexible
Uncertainty is an ever-present part of business life, yet its severity varies considerably. A resilient company will adapt to these changes by adopting new technologies or production methodologies as appropriate or investing in employee training to benefit its customers.
Companies seeking to build resilience must be adaptable in all aspects of their operations, and be willing to make adjustments even if it means short-term changes that go against their long-term interests. For instance, during the pandemic many businesses adapted their work models by permitting employees to work remotely – this was a key component in creating business resilience.
6. Be Creative
creativity can be an invaluable asset during times of economic uncertainty, helping businesses find ways to thrive. Reimagining business models or developing innovative products are two powerful creative methods of resilience for any organization that strives to keep pace with modern business demands and remain competitive.
Staying in constant communication with customers about operations, services and safety measures helps ease anxiety and demonstrate your dedication to transparency. Furthermore, promptly responding to customer concerns shows your team’s dedication to providing exceptional service.
Engaging creativity for sustainable leadership can also help businesses prepare for uncertain times by exploring multiple possible future scenarios and cultivating an environment of resilience, which bolsters this strategic process. Learn more here about this key strategy.
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