Many of the major communications and social media platforms experienced major issues yesterday (Wednesday 13/03/2019) which caused severe disruption globally. This included Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and WhatsApp. Although most users (personal and business) still had access to their accounts, most could not post or upload media, could not do Facebook or Instagram Lives, and in some cases messages could not be sent or received.
Now being people with the right mindset we are going to focus not on the causes and solutions to fixing tech problems but how to respond as professionals
‘Don’t Worry About A Thing, Because Everything is Going To Be Alright’ – Bob Marley
How did you initially respond? Did you panic? – Be honest.
Life is going to throw you into situations where your emotional intelligence will be tested. This is a good time to check in with yourself on how you respond under pressure and how you react to problems. If you are a leader, business owner, or manager it is even more crucial that you remain calm and composed as others will be looking to you for guidance and reassurance. Your teams will be looking to you as the example to follow in terms of emotional state. Even if you are not a leader/manager you need to make sure that you too have self-awareness and emotional intelligence, as how you are affects everyone around you as a team member. Remind yourself and others that everything really will be ok.
‘The Only Thing You Can Control Is Yourself’
Leave it up to the platforms and their teams to sort out their issues, in the meantime the only thing you can do is control your response. It is important that you remember this and understand that you are in control of YOUR situation. Do you have a contingency plan in place for when such a situation occurs, or for emergencies in general? Does your whole team know what to do in said situations? If not then this is the perfect time to develop them
‘Do Not Put All Your Eggs In One Basket’
If there was one thing that a lot of people learned from this event was that you need to diversify the method through which you interact with your audience. So if one type of platform goes down, you are able to use another way to interact with your audience, clients, customers etc. So have the following in place, as although there are still online based they are not directly connected so will not affect each other if they are facing issues; website/online store, social media accounts (Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest, etc), and Messaging platforms e.g WhatsApp.
EMAIL IS NOT DEAD – You must have an email list, believe it or
‘Every Problem Has A Solution’
The world did not come to an end, even though for some it felt like that. You as well as others need to have solution based thinking in place. Come together as a team, more minds are better than one, with every crisis there are not only solutions but also opportunities. Open your minds and see the bigger picture. This can be tough however this is how some businesses have thrived in economic or global crisis.
#Look Up
The internet and online world is a powerful commodity and is positive progression (when used for good). However it is important to look up and away from our online devices personally and professionally and interact with those around us offline. Of course when there is an issue with operations you want everyone to focus on the solution, and it is when we are in crisis that we come together. However take this as an opportunity to take a birds eye view of your business and team, what is your team culture like? What team building activities do you do and how can you empower your team more?
Remember survival of the fittest is won by those who learn and adapt
Join the discussion!