INSIGHTS WITH VICKIE MITCHELL
TAKEAWAYS FROM 2020
M
ore than a year into the pandemic, we’ve learned valuable lessons and reevaluated our lives in the face of personal and professional loss and change. There’s a lot about 2020 we’d like to forget, but as with any devastating experience, there are parts we will remember as we move forward. Writer Danya Ruttenberg, in a recent Washington Post column, called this “a time of possibility.” “We have opportunities to create new social structures, new ways of being,” she said. “We don’t have to accept what we had before…. This is a moment when creativity and new thinking can help serve us and help us make the new chapter better.” Here are five pandemic lessons to keep in mind in 2021 and beyond.
Lasting lessons from a tough teacher
To turn things around, pivot.
Pivot has become the pandemic’s most-used verb as we have watched businesses large and small turn on a dime. Shifting from tableside to curbside in a matter of days instead of months has saved many a restaurant; medical professionals’ quick innovations have saved lives. Many meeting planners — who routinely face disasters of varied description — already know how to pivot. But for those still learning, Jay Campbell of Ken Blanchard Companies offered tips in a recent column for Chief Learning Officer. Emphasize experimentation, he said. And pull people together to problem solve and brainstorm. “Cultivate an attitude of open-mindedness and gratitude,” Campbell said. “We are in a time of dramatic change. Pivoting will only become more important.”
6
www.smallmarketmeetings.com
