In this recurring post, I highlight some of the best thought-leadership articles and reports that cross my desk. I note why they rise to the top of the pile and are worth reading (or skimming), even if they focus on functions or industries outside your areas of interest. Among the criteria I use to make the selections are freshness and provocativeness of insights and timeliness, analytical rigor, depth of prescriptions, and overall readability.
Roughly a year into the COVID-19 pandemic, professional-services firms continue to publish extensively on the implications of the crisis on business and society. I have reviewed dozens of articles that they have published in the past two months. Finding distinctive work is becoming harder and harder, as if firms have exhausted their intellectual property and are getting by recycling older ideas (“The post-pandemic world means you have to be more agile than ever”). There is also a surprising lack of examples in articles about how companies have coped with the pandemic.
That said, here are a few of the more interesting pieces of thought leadership on the pandemic that I have seen recently.
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We observed strong opposition to the Trump administration among some professional-services firms. Most recently, leaders of Accenture, BCG, Deloitte, EY, KPMG, and West Monroe partners joined dozens of other business executives in an open letter demanding that the administration move ahead with the presidential transition. “Every day that an orderly presidential transition process is delayed, our democracy grows weaker in the eyes of our own citizens and the nation’s stature on the global stage is diminished,” they wrote.
This PwC survey on the future of remote work in the United States is filled with interesting tidbits. The broadest conclusion is that “by design or default, most US companies are heading toward a hybrid office workweek.” But employers and employees aren’t in sync on how much time to spend in the office. Another interesting finding is that employers are increasingly concerned about the effect of remote working on company culture.
Taking a stand on the presidential election
We observed strong opposition to the Trump administration among some professional-services firms. Most recently, leaders of Accenture, BCG, Deloitte, EY, KPMG, and West Monroe partners joined dozens of other business executives in an open letter demanding that the administration move ahead with the presidential transition. “Every day that an orderly presidential transition process is delayed, our democracy grows weaker in the eyes of our own citizens and the nation’s stature on the global stage is diminished,” they wrote.
Bain on
videoconferencing
and food delivery
These Bain authors apply what they call turning-point analysis to examine two pandemic trends and whether they will stick—the increased use of videoconferencing and food delivery. Spoiler: the surge in adoption of videoconferencing technology is likely to lead to a permanent change in the level of use, resulting in lower demand for commercial office space. But food delivery hasn’t reached a turning point, and its use is expected to decline from COVID-19-era highs.
McKinsey on economic disbursement programs
Once in a while, firms land on a pandemic-related topic that others haven’t yet covered. In this case, authors from the McKinsey Global Institute studied 12 government COVID-19-related economic disbursement programs for individuals and small and medium-size enterprises in seven countries. Their goal was to assess the relationship between a country’s financial infrastructure and performance of the disbursement programs, focusing on the importance of digitization in maximizing disbursement value. The research approach—country-level research and estimation of potential value at stake—was ambitious, and national policy makers should find the conclusions both enlightening and relevant.
Taking a stand on the presidential election
We observed strong opposition to the Trump administration among some professional-services firms. Most recently, leaders of Accenture, BCG, Deloitte, EY, KPMG, and West Monroe partners joined dozens of other business executives in an open letter demanding that the administration move ahead with the presidential transition. “Every day that an orderly presidential transition process is delayed, our democracy grows weaker in the eyes of our own citizens and the nation’s stature on the global stage is diminished,” they wrote.
Bain and BCG on appliance makers
and airlines
Some of the sharpest recent pandemic-related work was done at the sector level.
This author team from Bain reflected on lessons appliance makers have learned marketing their products online during the pandemic.
The pandemic has devastated the airline industry. These BCG authors offer airlines some ideas about how they might make the best of an awful situation. Meantime, Bain has produced a useful interactive on recovery scenarios for air travel.
PwC on remote work