Lockdown travel rules are a serious impediment to business. Our business in particular, relies on listening intently to people and reading the meaning of what they are saying.
We have studied this hard and trained ourselves in it. It is a very important part of our process.
Zoom has been an invaluable tool but it is not a complete replacement
Many have agreed with me that Zoom is just about OK for maintaining existing contacts but not for developing new relationships.
So much of our business is based on analysing information and people. We need to understand what makes an organisation tick and the people are the organisation.
One tool we often use in our engagements with clients or in analysing deals is Structured Visual Thinking. It can often be a significant aid to getting to the heart of issues, challenges and opportunities. It enables structured conversations to take place in an informal setting and for everyone in a team to be heard and valued.
But the most valuable insights we gain is from time spent with people. That is often informal, even social.
You can learn a lot from laughing with people, sharing a joke, maybe over lunch.
It has taken a worldwide pandemic and a lockdown on travel for me to realise just how restricted we really are.
As signs of reopening emerge in some countries, France is in a mess and for me, in terms of travel, that is important as Nice is the gateway to and from my home in Monaco.
Here’s hoping that things will ease soon and we can employ the full range of our tools.