January 5, 2022 at 12:00 am
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Challenging Trends
January 5, 2022 at 2:52 pm
I'm a software developer and like many software developers said to you, Steve, I totally LOVE working from home!!!
It certainly was true that a lot of our business had to change, because of the pandemic, which we're still dealing with today. However, a substantial proportion of what we do hasn't changed. COVID required bypassing much of the bureaucracy that's in place, to get things done to serve our state's people. (I work in state government.) But a sizable proportion of projects still followed a waterfall, plodding very slowly, approach. In 2020 I'd say that acting quickly because it had an impact upon people's lives, was the major project approach. But in 2021 that balance shifted back the other way, big time.
Concerning the corporate culture, I don't see that as having changed much. Even within my team it hasn't really changed at all. For one thing my team was already distributed, so using email or MS Teams was how we collaborated. Even when I needed to communicate with a colleague that was in the next office, I never went to his office, nor did he come to my cubicle. That hasn't changed at all. It's just this team's culture.
Kindest Regards, Rod Connect with me on LinkedIn.
January 5, 2022 at 3:56 pm
Is that quote still applicable to your business? I wonder how many businesses have started to see new trends and needed to abandon some amount of historical data from their charts and graphs. If that's the case, then is it worth archiving some of that data away, rather than needing to keep it in an online database? Do reports need beginning default dates that start sometime after the pandemic affected the world? Interesting questions.
It's always important to understand the context of report. And yes having default date ranges often times does make sense, as does having different reports for different departments or any other variation. That doesn't mean the old data is not useful and should be dropped it just means that it's important to understand the context it was generated in. For example I used to work in a call center and when a new advertising campaign used we would have reports for that time period, or is a certain group of people were using a different sales script they would have their own reports.
The pandemic might have highlighted that difference in any number of different metrics for companies that hadn't needed to consider it before.
January 5, 2022 at 4:33 pm
I work for a lab and basically any lab that's capable of running PCR / antigen testing probably is right now. This obviously skews our data from over 2 years ago. Back then, the data would be all about tests concerning cardiovascular disease. Now that's a small piece compared to COVID testing. So looking at statistics of the types of tests being run is very different. The distribution is different as well. Previously, most of our testing could involve as many as 70 or more tests for a single patient. Now the majority of testing is just 1 test and I'm sure everyone can guess what that is. Also, being a lab we have retention regulations so we retain data regardless of how different the patterns are.
As far as collaboration, we used Skype and email a lot even when we were on site and in the same room. We've added Teams to the mix now but it's the same usage pattern. The only real change was adding a second check-in meeting in the afternoon. I was only in 2 days a week before the pandemic. Now I've only been in the office 1 time since March of 2020 for a development meeting and even that was not mandatory. Several people joined over Teams.
January 6, 2022 at 7:34 pm
".. I wonder how many businesses have started to see new trends and needed to abandon some amount of historical data from their charts and graphs. If that's the case, then is it worth archiving some of that data away, rather than needing to keep it in an online database? Do reports need beginning default dates that start sometime after the pandemic affected the world? Interesting questions. .."
I wonder if organizations asked themselves the same question in the aftermath of WW2, social unrest of the 1960s, 9/11, the real-estate crash of 2008, and Jan 6 riot. While some things change the system permanently, many basic things stay the same. I think we have to adjust to the fact that events which were previously thought to be highly improbable and not worth planning for - may actually be cyclical and common going forward. While things may operate normally for extended periods of time, we have to create business models, supply chains, and IT systems that are resilient and can recover when faced with a sudden novel disaster.
"Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the wise. Instead, seek what they sought." - Matsuo Basho
Viewing 5 posts - 1 through 4 (of 4 total)
You must be logged in to reply to this topic. Login to reply