What Covid-19, digital innovation and the built environment have in common

Some of you might have read Michael Moritz’ (partner at Sequoia Capital) FT article, stating that “The global plague has turbocharged the growth of the internet, catapulting us into the future.“ — and we couldn’t agree more.

For sure, some industries got hit stronger by the crisis than others, but who says that the next disruptive wave won’t hit you and your industry — and potentially even harder than Corona?

“We have moved to a recession that will be worse than the one we experienced in 2008” — UN Deputy-Secretary-General Amina J. Mohammed

It’s no secret that climate change is already happening, but the action taken to prevent us all from worst-case scenarios happening are far from reaching full-speed. But isn’t it our responsibility to take action? We need a global mindset that understands the pressure and is willing to make big movements instead of incremental steps. Covid-19 proved that far reaching actions can be applied from one day to another, enormously impacting our day-to-day life and even more impacting the quality of life for many of us for years to come. If this is only the beginning, let’s better roll up the sleeves.

“Nature is sending us a message” — Inger Andersen, UN’s environment chief

Exploring digital platforms as solutions to bridge the impact of the crisis has definitely been a “survival-mode” action for some businesses, but it might lead to long-lasting changes as the unexpected shift towards web-based services has unveiled untapped business opportunities or simply improved existing business processes — not even talking about all the travel costs saved that will now lead to updated travel policies.

As human beings it seems natural that we often wait for external effects happening until we start to change. But the next hit might not be of a similar, somehow digestible size. Instead, we need to look beyond and explore the opportunities — today.

As business leaders we have to ask ourselves, how can we strengthen our business to become crisis-proof? How can we benefit from digital transformation today? How we can radically eliminate inefficiencies and instead implement digital shortcuts to improve the value provided? How can we become more agile and flexible by shifting resources without losing quality and keep running under full capacity?

We have to look even further and widen our view towards our value chain. What kind of possibilities do we see here? How could stakeholder X improve from my innovations that in return will strengthen my core business and overall positively impact our massive environmental challenges? This will only work if we gather, with a common mindset and mission, to act together.

The built environment plays an important role in this scenario. More than ever, the key stakeholders have a responsibility to rethink the way of living in the future. They have to rethink materials, living standards, housing, working, infrastructures, use, financing, designing and demolition of our living environment.

To get a glimpse of the current situation and the thoughts of the women and men in charge, we are currently running an interview series with the title “Actions for the Built Environment”. If you are interested in the results of the white paper that will be published in June, you can sign up to have it delivered straight to your inbox via this link: https://joinfightback.com/built-environment/