You hear it every day. The arguments from the healthcare perspective followed by the arguments from an economic perspective.  When will we turn the economy back on? Will we be able to shake hands again? The health of our citizens and the economy both matter and there is no easy answer to all our questions.

I can’t speak to the healthcare front (plenty of folks sorting through that data), but I can speak to the economic front.   

With the exception of government workers, most everyone in the private sector finds themselves on the economic battlefront in this war. The soldiers include people in all industries from an employee of a large public company all the way down to an independent contractor in the gig economy.   

Some would say that the corporate employee has no options but to wait until he or she can go back to work when the government allows them to. I disagree.

While it is true that these shelter in place and stay at home orders have turned off much of the economy, we all have the option to be creative and innovative and to use this time to prepare for the Rebound.  It will happen. I have no idea how strong or how fast, but it will happen. If you don’t believe this too, well, then you might as well stop reading now.

There are so many questions:  What do we do? What is our work-from-home playbook? Hopefully, most of you, like me, have used some of this time to personally reach out to loved ones and to friends. There has clearly been more activity at the dinner table too; a beautiful side effect from COVID-19. 

The playbook for you, as a business person, should also include personalized outreach and connecting. Although there are no trade shows, conferences, or in-person meetings, you can take time to reach-out to co-workers, customers, prospects, and to create authentic conversations online. Nurture all these relationships with Zoom, Teams, LinkedIn, etc.  Create a daily plan-of-action using this playbook. So that when we (and the economy) rebound, you will have secured your place as top of mind.  

Yes, the world will look different as we turn our economy back on. I have no idea what it will look like, but I do believe that if we all make the choice every day to start a conversation then the future will be fine.

Conversation is our, all of our, greatest asset (and the lack thereof is our greatest liability).  Use it.

Soundboard makes sure you always know what to say.