The Novel Coronavirus. COVID-19. Global Pandemic.

You would need to be a real cool cucumber if you would manage to keep your amygdala in check upon hearing these words out loud. There are two reasons I can think of what causes our reptilian brain to trigger in these instances:
Because this virus is a real global health thread.
Because the media feeds on this as panic and fear sells better.

But let’s put the biological and economic dangers aside and unpack the opportunities these times provide for. You don’t read this stuff on the news pages as it doesn’t sell, however, this should be hand delivered on a note to each doorstep.

Let’s look at our current economy and we see that a big apportionment is Services Based and the majority of that can be done from home. Instead of in-person meetings, one can conduct those meetings online. Zoom is a great example of this, many people are able to conduct a meeting while still seeing each other.

Virtual reality has been a thing in the past few years, but imagine what will happen now that the big companies really start throwing money at it. In no-time we would have the ability for a group of people to meet in virtual reality where you feel as though you are actually in a meeting room with your colleagues, or your clients. This is how immersive Virtual Reality is.

By the time the dust clears, would a big player such as Telstra even need big offices ever again? They’re trialling 20,000 staff working from home currently. Would they change the business model for their staff to continue to work from home and make a lot more profit without office expenses? If so, which other large companies will follow? What if office space is a thing of the past? What if retail shops are a thing of the past with society getting used to shop online?

The opportunity cost of the Coronavirus is too high for companies to protect the status quo and pretend that things are going to be the same when the dust settles as we will be seeing the innovation of 10 years being fast tracked over the next 12-18 months.
It’s survival of the fittest. Are you going to miss out or be part of creating the way we conduct business in the future to come?

It’s up to you!