Welcome: Let’s open our minds

Ann Francke OBE, Chief executive, CMI

This edition of CMI’s magazine is about what comes next.

The process of lockdown has come in waves. First, there was the crisis management period, when managers and leaders had to react decisively to an unprecedented set of circumstances. Staff were redeployed, operations were upended and whole business models had to pivot.

Then, as we established a new set of operating norms, we had to engage and communicate as never before, to make sure that teams and individuals were coping personally and performing professionally. It has been inspiring to witness how managers and leaders have stepped up to that aspect of the crisis.

Now, as we come out of lockdown, we all have to think about the next phase. What are the new working practices that we must implement – for example, for health and safety reasons? What are the new working practices that we want to retain because they’ve enabled us – perhaps to our surprise – to be more productive during lockdown? And, on reflection, what are the statues that we need to topple forever, the legacy ways of doing things that, thanks to the crisis, we realise are no longer fit for purpose? The crisis, like rising water beneath a building, finds the weaknesses in our foundations. There are ways of doing things that simply don’t work anymore, and we need to have the courage to shed them.

Forecasting is a dangerous business, but we’re lucky at CMI to have access to awesome collective intelligence. This edition of your magazine is built on the insights we’ve gathered through regular member polling during the crisis. It is built on the revealing personal stories that you’ve shared with us directly (see the Rethink section on page seven). And it is built on the countless conversations we’ve had with members over the past few months (see Conversations on page 62).

If I were forced to identify the changes that I believe will stick around after COVID-19, I’d say...

We’ve learned – really learned – the value of different perspectives. By being forced to look at society and business in the round, we’ve come to realise that people of all backgrounds, races and socio-economic groups have a part to play. Matthew Syed calls this “cognitive diversity” in his fascinating interview on page 44 – and congratulations to Matthew on winning this year’s CMI Management Book of the Year award. Megan Reitz says on page 26 that we must make ourselves have different conversations and allow people – using her powerful phrase – to “speak up”. Rebecca Robins CMgr CCMI shows how younger people’s voices can be heard in the boardroom on page 38. I really feel that the dam has burst on the whole diversity debate. There’s no going back now – and that’s just great.

We’ve also seen that we must build resilient systems and organisations. We can see now that we were running on margins that were simply too fine. Just-in-time left us dangerously exposed. Ian Goldin explores this on page 50.

And we’ve learned to move fast, to innovate at speed. Just look at what Sam Allen CMgr CCMI has achieved at the Sussex Partnership Foundation NHS Trust (see page 18). The way she and her team accelerated the process of digitisation by switching to digital consultations is incredible and shows just what well-led organisations are capable of.

I’d like to say a huge thank you to all CMI members for what you’ve done, and continue to do, at this extremely testing time. I know that many of you have been adversely affected by this crisis. It has been genuinely inspiring to hear your stories, and to read your comments and insights. Thank you for being so open and engaged throughout.

I do hope you enjoy this edition of your magazine, published digitally for the first time. Please let us know what you think.

— Tweet Ann @cmi_ceo