It’s remarkable how quickly we all have adapted to the new way of working and meeting. Apparently we can do huge parts of our professional (and social) life from behind a screen, looking at each other’s faces on small rectangles. Something my two gaming children embraced already years ago.
On Thursday the 28th of May, also the Brightlands Business Club held their first online meeting. The catering was done by de Bisschopsmolen in Maastricht via home delivery van, and the two speakers of the day were kind enough to show their home offices to us during the presentations.
Luc van Neer of FAST Automotive explained how their principle of business-chain cooperation is an excellent means of bringing essential protective gear to a struggling market. They understood that teaming up of raw material suppliers, designers, engineers, and production companies allows for mass production (meaning cost effective) of Corona face masks, with the right price-performance ratio. They went for a high quality, easily re-usable, and ultimately recyclable concept, that has drawn a huge reaction from the market. For contact professionals this is an excellent way of protecting themselves at acceptable costs. And the ultimate take-away for us as entrepreneurs is that if you manage to apply the principles of (our) successful companies to a crisis that suddenly appears, you can do meaningful business even when the chops are down.
Then, visionary Yuri van Geest drew our attention to the (near) future, as many more changes and challenges lie ahead. A second wave is inevitable, and so is a recession. Think 1929 for a reference. We will have to make considerable changes as a society, and after the Corona-crisis, the real threat is the Climate crisis. Companies that will survive are the ones that take nature, circularity and creativity as their first priority. They need to be purpose-driven, not shareholder-driven. This is however not a call to go back to last century, but rather embrace the opportunities that new technologies bring. Think AI, machine learning, quantum computing, neurosciences, personalized healthcare, personalized nutrition (hello MiFood!), vertical farming, solar energy.
Who you are as a company becomes leading in the future, not the money you generate. Yuri’s motto: “Your vibe creates your tribe!”.
Interesting times ahead, indeed! If you want to slowly digest all this information, you can read back the slides of Luc, and you can watch the entire session again in the video below.
