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Here we are, entering another year where the only certainty is uncertainty. Take a deep breath and recognize all the growth you’ve achieved and the stability you’ve provided in spite of rapid change. You’re helping to build a culture of resilience and action in the face of ambiguity. 

Digital transformation today is taking place at a pace that is 20-25x faster than pre-2020. Changing at unprecedented speed comes with inherent risk, and in this case, digital transformation is largely treated by leadership and operations teams as a series of independent IT projects instead of realizing its full potential as a driver of competitive advantage.

Mergers and acquisitions present challenges to even the most seasoned leadership teams. Executing a strong and organized communications plan—one that delivers the right messages to the right constituents at the right time—can help a merger or acquisition go smoothly and establish unity and profitability. Yet, despite the best-laid plans, change management is always hard and you’re sure to encounter challenges along the way.

A Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system is a place for businesses to collect data that can help increase productivity, internal communication, and training support within your sales team. It can also help to create a bridge of information for marketing to use for optimizing campaigns. But, your CRM can reach beyond these two teams, providing valuable information for many other departments at your company that can help your executive team make decisions.

In a high-growth economy and tight labor market, understanding your company’s core competencies can help you quickly and effectively seize opportunities and improve financial performance. These are the foundation for:

What’s next for the markets your technologies serve? It’s hard to get a clear read. There’s a dichotomy right now that is challenging for C-level leadership to interpret and declare a clear direction. With a broad perspective on markets like biotech, biopharma, diagnostics, instrumentation, medical device, aerospace, manufacturing, and industrial, we notice:

Welcome to 2021! We’re rested, recharged, and ready for a fresh start. While last year didn’t go quite as planned, as we look back, by and large, clients we work with met or outperformed their targets. We can’t help but notice some standout successes. Let’s take a closer look at how some of our clients managed to thrive despite less-than-ideal conditions.

Well, 2020 didn’t go quite as planned. Even for those in essential businesses with products and services in high demand, some basic assumptions changed. WHAT you do may be a constant, but consider if the HOW, WHO, WHERE and WHY are now new variables.

For a company who hires for ability to deal with ambiguity, 2020 has really put us to the test. I am incredibly grateful to work with clients and colleagues who put people first and move forward despite such unusual times.

Now that we’ve entered the second half of a challenging and unpredictable year, it’s time to re-look at 2020 goals, and begin the planning and budget cycles for 2021. But how? Maybe it’s the unknowns, maybe it’s concern for the impact goals can have on your team’s morale and motivation—this feels particularly hard this time.

The Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act (CARES Act), is a $2.2 trillion package to address the coronavirus crisis. There are many programs available to help small and medium sized businesses (SMB) adjust and survive during this time. The U.S. Senate Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship has put together a guide to the CARES act, which you can download here. Some of the resources available for small businesses include:

This February, I was honored to present at SPIE Photonics West with other photonics industry experts. With business development (BD) and marketing tied up on the exhibition floor, sessions like our AR/VR Market Outlook, Photonics Outlook, and LFW’s Laser Marketplace, tended to attract C-level thinkers. Their strategies, experiences, and questions revealed some trends: