Business innovation could be victim of Covid crisis
The past few months have been tough for many New Zealand businesses, especially those in the hospitality, travel and tourism sectors.
Business commentators and soothsayers keep talking about a new normal, as if life as we knew it has taken a 90-degree turn.
From behind my espresso machine, I haven’t seen that, although a few customers havementioned they are working from home one or two days a week and that their employers are happy with that arrangement.
Whether this will persist, I don’t know. I ampretty sure, though, that things in the general New Zealand business community will get a bit worse before they get better, if only because many people have lost their jobs and there is a large Government debt taxpayers need to support.
Those in the know are also telling us that we, as business owners, need to think about doing things differently to retain customers and attract new ones.
To do this requires novel ideas and initiative.
This is probably somethingwe should be doing all the time, but successful new ideas are not easy to come by, otherwise someone would have done it already.
Often, new ideas come to a business or organisation with new people.
Put a creative person in a new environment and they’ll come upwith something the incumbents haven’t thought of.
So it’s healthy to get new people and ideas involved in a business, or at least provide staff opportunities to mix with others who do things differently.
That’s not to say institutional knowledge isn’t important – it is – but a mix of old and new is what can fashion new ideas and provide positive development.
In the university sector where I used to work, those opportunities included going to conferences overseas, or organising one at home to get the latest innovations and best minds together in a room.
There was also the sabbatical – spending a semester working at a university overseas – when upon one’s return some new method would get up and running, or a new doctoral student would follow.
But when money is tight, the first thing that gets chopped by the bean counters is travel and conference leave. And anyway, with closed borders such opportunities will be scant.
Bringing in new minds from overseas will also be impossible for the foreseeable future. The effect of this knowledge ‘‘inbreeding’’ won’t be immediately apparent, but it has the potential to stymie innovation and creation if we remain in lockdown. There are some things No 8wire can’t do after all.
Perhaps devising alternative means to build opportunities for idea cross pollination should be our first creative task?