6 Lessons We Learned From the Pandemic

Lesson on how to write the letter R

In the past months, we’ve read a lot of “takeaways from the pandemic” articles. So many, in fact, that we thought adding one more to the conversation might be redundant. At the same time, we are still reading them, and it looks like you are too. So here is our take on what we learned.

The pandemic was bad. Worse will be if we don’t take away any lessons it taught us. Worse will be if we fight against what we learned, to scratch and claw our way back to the good old days.

The scratching and clawing have commenced.

Will we accept the lessons?

Lesson 1: People form relationships in a lot of ways.

I (Katrina) talk to many in C-Suites who feel that we must get back to in-the-actual-room office settings. I’m avoiding the phrase “face-to-face” because you can’t get more face-to-face than a one-on-one video call with one head on each screen. I can sometimes see people’s skin pores on those who don’t yet know about the “make me look better” buttons on most platforms.

But many, if not most, of the people making decisions about how well we work from home, are in the C-Suite. These executives learned to do business by being face-to-face in the room. This group prefers that situation (for the most part) and presume others do too, regardless of their role. It’s a hard conversation for subordinates to have with a CEO. There may be an empathy gap.

Lesson 2: Remote work works.

Our employees, by and large, turned out to be more productive from home. Most prefer to work from home. Let’s acknowledge that not everyone has the benefit of a good home working environment. But for those who do, we found out that they can do great work and form great relationships with skillful use of technology tools.

Social good organizations have a hard time keeping staff. If we ignore our discovery about the efficiencies and comfort of work-from-home, we will have an even harder time keeping them. The labor market is incredibly hot in the mid-range at this moment. While “chiefs” seem highly available, people to run campaigns and do other middle management tasks are not. Many of these people don’t see the wisdom of long commutes to sit at a different desk and do the same job. Commutes may go the way of heels, pantyhose, and ties—we only do those things for special occasions, and most of us hate them the whole time.

Lesson 3: Women are at risk.

Paula Schneider, President and CEO Susan G. Komen, alerts us to an almost certain negative outcome for women. “You have to think long and hard about the ramifications on the female workforce of the future. Women have the leading role in childcare and left the workforce in droves during the pandemic. If it is optional that people come into the office or stay home, I believe you will have many more men come back in while women may either prefer to work from home or can’t as easily return to the office. In the long run, I believe that this will lead to more inequality in the workforce for years to come.”

Lesson 4: Volunteers are the answer.

Just as it resulted in greater flexibility in allowing work-from-home, the pandemic has also made “volunteer-driven” suddenly seem way sexier. When we were flush, maybe complacent with our net revenue production, it felt easier to put staff to work. You can tell them what to do, what metrics you need, and fire them if they don’t perform. Volunteers require much more work to handle, and you have no real control over them. Nevertheless, we are all turning back to them.

Kathy Hayes, Vice President Revenue Operations American Diabetes Association, said, “Utilizing our volunteers to a larger capacity in 2021 will be the key to success in 2021. Staff cuts have happened across so many nonprofits. As a result, staff has to do more with fewer resources. However, we have an army of volunteers ready to help. They just need to be asked.”

Lesson 5: Volunteers and donors want community.

Every psychologist in the world will tell you people are satisfied when they have three things. Autonomy, (let’s put those volunteers in charge again!) the ability to excel and be recognized, (thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you), and connection to something bigger than themselves (community). But what we had been focused on was revenue.

Kathy continues, “As fundraisers, the pandemic has forced us out of our comfort zones. Traditionally we look at acquisitions every year in the same ways. Ask current participants to bring on one person, grow your corporate teams, etc. We don’t always look at it through the lens of building a community—we look at it in terms of revenue.

P2P events typically have an extended lead time until event day, and that is our opportunity to highlight the communities we have built to new constituents and ask those already engaged in the community to help us grow.”

Lesson 6: The pandemic leveled the playing field and made work output transparent.

I have seen some interesting examples of needed corrections. For example, the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation events always had a problem—those living with cystic fibrosis couldn’t be at the events. Now, they are much more engaged, not with accommodations but by being included in part of the main event planning.

Employees who worked from home before the pandemic were shut out in many ways from typical office functions. I think we all recall being the one person on-screen with a projected head that is roughly two feet diameter, looking back at a board room table surrounded by little bodies and tiny faces. It didn’t work. Now, we have all accepted the “one head, one screen” rule.

Before the pandemic, we often defaulted to measuring effort. How hard did we try? How many trainings did we do? How many clicks did we get? Now, the thing we measure is output, results. Having lost the ability to look at an employee hard at work at their desk, we have been forced to become better managers and to evaluate the results of their effort instead of how hard it looks like they are working.

Summary:

We’re still learning.