Coronavirus affects the world of work (Part 2): Facing the next phase of the crisis

Part 2 of this Spend Matters PRO series will focus on where things stand with the coronavirus crisis about a month since many countries and most U.S. states issued stay-at-home orders. It also has been about a month since the publication of Part 1 of this series. Now, governments are considering plans for “re-opening” the economy that they will likely start executing in mid- to late May. Part 2 of this series will discuss approaching the transition/mitigation phase of the crisis. And it will consider how the challenges and priorities may be shifting for enterprise planners and human capital managers in procurement and HR.

This PRO coronavirus series is being posted outside our subscription paywall to inform more readers about handling contingent workforce/services issues during the coronavirus crisis.

In the middle of March, we published Part 1, in which we suggested that organizations, reacting to what eventually became a shutdown of major swaths of the U.S. economy, might begin thinking about the crisis in terms of four stages. We also suggested they begin thinking about relatively new, alternative digital solutions for sourcing and managing contingent workforce/services, given a new business environment that is both highly uncertain and subject to new constraints. (For more details, read Part 1.)

We made these suggestions to reinforce that:

* This crisis is not a one-time emergency to be stanched, but an unfolding of conditions over months, if not years.
* There is an opportunity — or a compelling force — to re-examine previous assumptions, strategies, approaches.
* There are alternative, digital means of sourcing and managing CW/S that can complement established technology and sourcing channels

We are continuing to recommend solutions for sourcing and managing CW/S in the “CORONAVIRUS RESPONSE” PRO series (here and here). At the same time, this series (“Coronavirus affects the world of work”) will continue to discuss problems and solutions, issues and opportunities over the different stages of the crisis.

We believe it is helpful to break down the coronavirus disruption into four crisis/post-crisis stages in order to discuss how different solutions can be usefully applied (or planned for):

* Reactive/acute
* Transition/mitigation
* Recovery/upswing
* Long-run/business-as-usual

Let’s jump into Part 2, and look at the transition/mitigation phase of the coronavirus crisis.

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