Coworkers

Typically on this blog, the posts are geared to owners of small businesses but this one is geared to the people who work for small business owners. Coworkers in a small business probably have more pressure to fit into the cliques than it would be for coworkers at larger companies. The reason being that if coworkers in a small business don't get along, it can be quite disastrous for moral and office politics than in a larger organization because the spread of negativity and toxicity takes less time in a smaller organization - usually.

One reason for that is that in larger organizations, it is easier to find other groups of coworkers to bond with and to hang out with so people don't feel so ostracized and they also have a chance of "fighting back" when they have back up from their own clique. In smaller companies, not fitting in with the established cliques can spell the end of your job because they can freeze you out, gang up, and force you to leave or get you fired.

In small businesses, not fitting in with established cliques is a zero sum game. The lesson is, get along and fit in with your coworkers, or find another job.

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Coronavirus

Everybody is terrified of the coronovirus. Now they are even saying that the coronavirus will lead to a spike in the divorce rates. Can you believe it? On top of that, a lot of famous people are getting it, from Tom Hanks to Edris Elba, to Britain's Prince Charles. Go here to check out a coronavirus vocabulary list.

As a small business owner, you must be worried about your future and the future of your enterprise. First of all, you have been forced to close your doors for the indefinite future and in some cases lay off employees who have been ordered to remain at home by the state and federal government. Even if your employees are still coming to work (for example they are considered essential workers) you are still very stressed, no doubt because after all, they could fall ill at any moment because of this coronavirus. It is a truckload of problems and worries with this virus because if they fall ill, what can you do?

But in the end, is there any silver lining for small businesses? Are there any valuable lessons you have learned from all of this as a small business owner?

AMAZON

For one thing, I sure hope you had insurance in place to cover yourself in the event you were unable to open up your doors (like with this situation with the Coronavirus) and if you did not, this is a good lesson that you need that - Insurance. And other CYAs too. I think also just seeing how easily everything can just be wiped out, in a second, like the wind, will be a lesson in terms of prioritizing, planning, forecasting and strategizing. Do you agree?

The Coronavirus probably also revealed your true identity: fighter or flighter. For many, the first instinct was to run away and hide. For others, the first instinct is to walk right up to the brink and defy gravity - so to speak. Which one were you?

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Amazon

Yesterday, Jeff Bezos, founder and CEO of Amazon issued a statement to his employees on Instagram which has been widely lauded open letter to his hundreds of thousands of employees about changes Amazon would be making to its logistics, transportation, supply chain, purchasing, third party and seller processes order to prioritize stocking and delivering essential household items during the Coronavirus Covid 19 outbreak in 2020.

Surely, small businesses can learn a lot from Jeff Bezos who started Amazon with a small loan of about $300,000 from his parents only to build the most lucrative company in the world a few short years later and catapult himself to the top of the Forbes List of Billionaires.

No, we don't all have to be the next Jeff Bezos. However, we can learn many lessons from him, including the lesson of adaptation. A small business has to adapt to changing tides and times. The change may be temporary or it may be permanent, but in the middle of crisis, it is the small businesses that can hunker down and keep going and adapt and reinvent themselves and prioritize and discern that are going to succeed and survive.

It is also necessary, in addition to taking care of yourself and your business, to think about people. Those working for you, those who are involved in your life, and even those who you may not know but who could need your assistance in a time of crisis.

Pulse Massager - Amazon

Hiring

Hiring can obviously be an anxiety-inducing situaition for some small business because there is a lot of risk of getting it wrong and even if the employee is being hired for a short term, a bad hire can be both costly and stressful. The thing to keep in mind is you have to be sure you have followed all neceesary rules with respect of employment law regulions to avoid any kind of litigation or dispute. You also have to be careful to be transparent about the job tasks and what it entails so that everyone - especially the new hire - is on the same page.

During the Great Pandemic of 2020, many workers in the United States and around the world lost their jobs. Small businesses were forced to close in some cases and those that were able to remain afloat, often did so by the skin of their teeth. But the news was not bad for all companies. Certainly big companies like Amazon could not keep up with demand and had to hire thousands of part time temporary help to help with their warehouses and delivery and things like that. Other big companies such as Walmart also hired a lot of temporary help as did supermarkets that could scarcely keep up with the demands.

Manufacturers of home goods and food chians, as well as pharmaceutical companies, bakeries, e-commerce companies  and tech giants also fared pretty well.

As for many small businesses such as those in the fast food businesses and delivery business they also needed to hire temporary workers as demand for the products and services soared with millions of people homebound due to the virus.

So as a small business owner, you have to be prepared to exploit and explore your opportunities but at the same time you have to have strategies in place to manage risk and avoid bad hires.

Shop Amazon  Women's Wear

 

Shop Amazon Men's Wear

Telecommuting

Today, I highlighted the word TELECOMMUTING on my blog Business English Paris. I think it is also an appropriate word for SBSIB - Small Biz Society International Blog. Of course, I realize it has been a long time since I have blogged on SBSIB. Indeed, the last update right before this one was done when Barack Obama was still president of the United States.  That's a long time.

Today, as I sit in my home office blogging, I am a world away from where I was when I wrote that last post - no doubt my apartment in Brooklyn New York. I have been gone so long that I did not remember what SBSIB stood for! And this is my own blog! My own creation! I had set it to private for about a decade and promptly forgot all about it and it wasn't until I was cleaning out my digital archives that I stumbled upon it and wondered why the heck I stopped blogging on this topic in the first place.

AMAZON FOR MEN

So here, I am, at my home office, in of all places, Paris, and the coronavirus is wrecking havoc on the world and just about everybody is telecommuting these days - both small businesses and large businesses. For many small businesses, telecommuting has always been a norm. Independent workers and small business owners have always had these alternative "smart" work site options for themselves and their employees - by necessity. It is just cheaper to have workers work from home and is a great way to save on overhead.

AMAZON FOR WOMEN 

Of course, this time around with the coronavirus, telecommuting is not a question of saving on overhead. It is a question of sanitation.