The Accountant – Business as Usual?  –  Spring 2020 (MIA Publication)

THERE IS NO ONE SOLUTION TO ALL THIS AND THERE IS ONLY A FINITE NUMBER OF THINGS ONE CAN DO TO WEATHER THE STORM, SOMETIMES YOU JUST HAVE TO EMBRACE IT. GOING FORWARD, WE NEED TO BE PREPARED AND CANNOT LET ‘WHAT IF?’ BECOME ‘NOW WHAT!’ FUNDAMENTALLY, THE CURRENT CRISIS POSES AN OPPORTUNITY FOR BUSINESSES, AND THE WHOLE WORLD TO BECOME MORE UNITED THAN EVER BEFORE.

Up until a few months ago, businesses were easing intothe idea of disruption as a concept which threatened conventional operations. Fast forward a few weeks, the world has woken up to one of the world’s largest disruptions caused by the unexpected powerful pandemic, COVID-19. Businesses are being forced to rethink their strategies and keep up with this intense current development that will potentially transform the face of industry for the forthcoming months ahead. But what adjustments do business managers have to make considering all this?

Taking a reactive approach would be recipe for disaster. Most businesses are indeed seeking to understand their team’s ability to manage these real-time challenges in the wake of such crisis and ensure they become equipped with the necessary skills. Yet the reality is, that in order to get ahead of this disruption, business managers need to learn to be instinctive rather than reactive.

The next question becomes, how do you cultivate a proactive instinct? It has become salient to focus on growing the team’s empowerment and widen their ability to foresee risks and discover opportunities to the best of their capabilities. This can be done by putting some initiatives to best practice, whereby the whole organisation is able to establish processes which enable Business Continuity Management (BCM).

If tomorrow the business had to face a force majeure event, what can we do today to maintain modus operandi and still deliver successful results? Techopedia, 2012 defines Business Continuity Management as “the management of core conceptual resources that address future threats to a business and help business leaders handle the impacts of these threats.” As a starting point, businesses need to establish a baseline, which enables them to identify where they lie on the preparedness scale. ‘Are we highly prepared? Somewhat prepared? Or relatively unprepared?’

This will gauge what the level of extremity with which the BCM is put into action. If enough resources are in place, some companies may choose to participate in business continuity standards practices and obtain professional certifications such as ISO 22301, to benchmark themselves against competitors. Other businesses can do this by participating in focus groups and conventions with other organisations to discuss a range of possible crises situations. This approach to planning however mostly tends to focus on past events, as one can ‘safely’ learn from the experience.

When the storm is out of sight, to what extent can business focus on the risk?

It becomes rather vague to shift too much energy into the ‘unknown’. Unfortunately, this is precisely the challenge most of us are facing now following the outbreak of COVID-19. Facing this sudden war has brought most businesses to their knees trying to cope with testing and reworking their Business Continuity Plan (BCP) every day that passes. With multiple situations demanding urgent attention, even well drawn up needs to remain in flow and mindsets need to change as we are in uncertain times. With most teams working remotely from home, businesses cannot afford to pick things up again when ‘back in office’ and wait till this is all over. This is only possible with the right Enterprise Management Systems (EMS) in place to create a ‘business as usual’ environment and as much as possible maintain the routine.

MANAGING RESOURCES

Information is power, and this applies for every decision maker out there. When ploughing through crisis, it becomes intensely important to know how much the business is receiving, and how much it is paying at any point in time, in other words, managing its cash flow. A financial plan needs to be drawn up for a longer period than usual which can prove to be a good time to cut most of the avoidable costs. Moreover, it is critical to maintain communication with customers, who are paying off their debts. Letting them know that your business is on top of things in this unprecedented time avoids confusion and disappointment.

Last but not least, one thing that ensures business continuity is how well any company can take care of their workforce. This is where empowerment comes in. Guidance needs to be in place which allows everyone to cope with the business

BCPs are suddenly in a state of hardship. The reality of this story is that the ‘unknown’ is already way ahead of the story, and nobody knows how long this will last! Businesses need to focus their efforts in 3 major facets:

MANAGING TIME

One thing that may need strengthening is Business Agility and time management. A resilient organisation is one that manages to operate at full speed in the face of adversity. Risk is unavoidable but one thing we can do is to dampen the impact when things go south. The cost of not being resilient can be severe and possibly fatal therefore it needs to be designed into every single business process, including the IT disaster recovery plans. This echoes what was mentioned earlier, the striving need for cultivating proactive instinct. How close are we to the next big disruption? How can the available resources be redirected in the specified time before the crisis strikes? For how long can the company survive in the worst-case scenario? These are all questions which evolve in a proactive culture, and they are not only questions to be addressed by top management but rather need to be present in every function, process and person within an organisation.

MANAGING TECH
Decisions need to be actioned quickly and in real time and this can only be done if the right technology is in place. Communication is key and needs to be multifaceted for the work to continue as CEOs need to remain in touch with investors and lenders, other competing businesses and most of all, their management team. Information challenges and everyone needs to work more closely, now more than ever. Working from home can be a struggle to some employees, therefore some flexibility needs to be allowed, keeping an eye on possible declining productivity. It does become overwhelming to leverage and manage everyone remotely and it particularly becomes hard to manage time, but the safety and well-being of employees is a major driving force of any future business.

There is no one solution to all this and there is only a finite number of things one can do to weather the storm, sometimes you just have to embrace it. Going forward, we need to be prepared and cannot let ‘what if?’ become ‘now what!’ Fundamentally, the current crisis poses an opportunity for businesses, and the whole world to become more united than ever before.

Annabel Bonavia, an accountant by profession who currently holds the position of Finance Manager at Attard & Co Industrial Group, managing a team of accountants in various industries within the group. She is also a teaching assistant at the University of Malta lecturing in Management Accounting.