At Snipply, we’re making sure to re-evaluate certain things we are doing. On March 5th, Sequoia published a Medium post titled “Coronavirus: The Black Swan of 2020”. While the post self acknowledges the fact that the founders of their portfolio companies need to ensure the health and safety of themselves, their families, and their employees, they also acknowledge the need to ensure the health of their businesses and that swift decision-making will be required.
Within the post, the most highlighted snippet reads “Nobody ever regrets making fast and decisive adjustments to changing circumstances. In downturns, revenue and cash levels always fall faster than expenses. In some ways, business mirrors biology. As Darwin surmised, those who survive “are not the strongest or the most intelligent, but the most adaptable to change.”
As a founder, there are things you need to understand, reevaluate, and take into consideration before continuing your daily life as an executive.
Question your cash runway and evaluate opportunities to trim expenses.
In times of uncertainty, extraneous expenses should be eliminated, and other avenues for extending your runway need to be explored.
Know that the time it takes to close financing will be extended.
Travel is going to be limited, meetings will be pushed back and/or canceled outright, and getting to close is going to take longer than previously expected.
Understand that private financing will soften in an economic downturn.
If you were working towards a fundraise in the next year, you need to prepare for the worst and make timely decisions now to ensure that you have the financing you need to sustain a potential extended economic downturn. You also need to evaluate whether or not you should pushing up or pushing back your timeline for fundraising.
There will be limited face-to-face marketing and PR opportunities.
Events, conferences, and tradeshows are already being canceled and postponed and will likely not resume on a normal schedule for a few quarters. While you’ll see a trend of virtual events you need to understand how these lack of face to face interactions will affect your business.
Revaluate your sales pipeline.
Anticipate that your customers may decide to spend less and that certain deals may not close. A renewed focus on closing your existing sales pipeline in the short-term might be an appropriate course of action.
Evaluate full-time vs freelance headcount.
Evaluate headcount and evaluate whether you can do more with less. Again, does hiring remote talent or filling in gaps with freelancers as opposed to full-time employees might make sense. If you need help with building a freelance team I’d recommend checking out this guide.
The silver lining to everything is that you now have a reason to better prepare your company for the future, and hopefully, some time to work on yourself as an executive as well. I’d recommend looking into the following during these times:
Reevaluate how you work on projects and communicate progress.
As an example, we’ve implemented OKR’s for all team members to have insight into what everyone is working on, what is expected to get done each week, where projects are stuck, and where we are in terms of short term execution moving the company towards achieving long term goals.
Document what you do for future reference.
Anything that is going to be collaborative or handed off should have a living handbook. During projects, document the mistakes made and steps missed so that you are continuously building more comprehensive instructions and guides. This makes it easier for you to delegate, but also empowers others to find answers to their own questions and solve their own problems.
Learn while working.
Listen to podcasts, take breaks for reading blogs, scroll through news feeds etc. Find things you find interesting AND beneficial for your knowledge and skillset. It’s amazing what you can learn by playing a podcast or webinar in the background while working.
Focus on output, not input.
When you are working in a distributed team fixed working hours likely won’t exist and it doesn’t really matter. By following the previous advice, setting up OKR’s, and making sure you have the right documentation and systems in place, you’ll be able to focus on results and ultimately save time while being more productive.
Make sure to live our company culture, even digitally.
While it doesn’t seem like rocket science, make sure to continue your office culture digitally. Company culture is more than ping pong tables and snacks, so try to continue what you can online.
These are just a few things to keep in mind, and aren’t challenging to put in place — just make sure to stay willing to adapt during these times. While we are currently experiencing unimaginable times, remember that the strongest companies survive these types of business climates and you’ll be forced to be a stronger, more decisive, and more responsible executive.
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