Reflections on the Pandemic Quarantine Development Strategy

Taking stock of this pandemic period, mainly looking at the last 4 months. I am proud of what has been delivered to generate business impact and value.

I was promoted and took over the area of Culture, Development and Strategic Partnerships amid the pandemic. Having a team that operates totally virtual was not something new for me, but extra elements appeared: fear, isolation and the fact of the team's little experience in the world of virtual work. But that, I will leave for another post, where I will explore Leadership in the virtual world.

With the strategy of continuing business, with the least possible loss and always with a view to maintaining productivity, not losing the drive for our purpose and vision what correspond to our ambition as a company. It became essential to work on what matter most: Our people. Therefore, equipping and training our employees promoting the re-skilling (*) and up-skilling (**), strengthening our leadership and promoting continuous learning would be essential. With that, I posed the challenge for our team to act as a single and united group aiming to accomplish this journey. Following the strategy : BUILD CAPABILITY – BUILD CONNECTION - REENGAGE

BUILD CAPABILITY

To start the ride, we immediately build content through several e-books covering themes like: digital work, how to make home office with children, how to lead the distance, reverse feedback among others, we brought fast reading and learning in pills and very pragmatic.

In parallel, and given the need to be creative to avoid additional costs, we map our professionals who have a high level of intellectual capital and many make investments in continuous training. With that, we use series and webinars. What generated a lot of connection and opportunity to agile learning.

BUILD CONNECTION

To be closer and closer, even kilometers away. We took advantage of Virtual Cafes. Not only intensifying the President′s Coffee time, that now are more frequently and virtual, as well as HR Coffee time, as Strategic Partners, we were there listening actively and been emphatic, promoting connection between people, bringing data and fostering a space of trust for collaboration between all. It was from this space for dialogue that other initiatives emerged at the request of the employees themselves, such as the conversation circle of parents. Promotion of happy hours and conversation circles for women who embark, among other openings for dialogue. 

Connection with our core  business is key. Our offshore professionals, are the heart of our business. Using UX strategies where we map the friction zones and work to increase the pre-shipment experience, we are able to work with the most important aspect that no digitization will replace humanized service and placing the Employee at the center of everything.

Still pursuing the increase in CONNECTION and paving the way for reskilling and upskilling with a view to REENGAGE to continue our growth. The podcasts were a faster, easy and an opportunity to connect our professionals with reference market professionals. Once again the dialogue was an important piece for us to invite everyone in the company to visit our app and enjoy pleasant and relaxed conversations, always with a lot of knowledge on board.

Focusing on our leadership team an online Workshop was promoted. The key message was based on vulnerability, trust and empathy. Key for leaders in times of crisis.

REENGAGE

Now after the storm it is time to enjoy the sun . It is time to be together again even more stronger. In order to deliver this mission, we formed a Return to the Office committee (we call our return fondly Better Together ). The return brings a great opportunity for protagonist attitude from our leaderacting as important spokespeople for our ambition and inspiring our team to drive our ambition (proposal + vision + strategic direction).

"In times of crisis, stressed employees expect their leaders to be tame and confident”

Stanislav Shekshnia & Maria Nazarova

With all this strategy, we have opened doors for even more powerful dialogues, where we have reduced (not yet eliminated) the distance between sea and land. This was possible because we didn′t loose the drive on the human side and on how emotions and its impact on business. Emotions are so key to keep performance and drive results that major educational institutions such as Columbia, INSEAD, Stanford and strategy consulting firms as McKinsey are bringing articles and interactive sessions to their digital channels about how emotions .  (want to check, visit: https://covid-tracker.mckinsey.com/emotion-archive)

In times of great need for resilience, remembering the great Brazilian musician Paulinho da Viola's music named Argumento is always good methapor.

"Do like the old sailor, before the

storm take the boat slowly. "

Argumento - Paulinho da Viola

XX and see you soon!

Alessandra Nogueira

Want to continue the ideas change, text me.