Leaders are building new muscles to deal with the pandemic

Getting better at prioritizing, innovating, and leading with humanity.

As the pandemic has broadsided the global economy, one of its striking features — for executives, at least — is how each month of the crisis has had a distinct feel to it, based on how companies and their leaders were coping.

March was the month of reeling and reacting. What just happened? We’re shutting down the offices, and everybody who can work from home needs to do so. Can we do this? April was more about taking stock of the economic damage. We’re clearly in this for the long haul. We need to run our models, plan for grim scenarios, and take whatever drastic actions are needed to save the company.

And starting in May, across the many interviews I’ve been conducting with senior leaders, I’ve heard more optimism in their voices — a sense that their companies were settling into a new normal, and that for all the health and economic damage the pandemic has caused and all the uncertainty that remains, they were seeing positive developments in the cultures of their companies.

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The ExCo Group’s Adam Bryant wrote this article for his column in Strategy + Business. It was originally published here.