Kopi Chat Da Bao: What Businesses Should Reflect on during the COVID-19 Outbreak
With the ongoing COVID-19 outbreak, most businesses have to digitalise their operations shedding light on B2B platforms that are facilitating these. We welcomed Logan Tan, CEO and co-founder of Eezee, for our April edition of Kopi Chat Da Bao who shared his thoughts on maintaining his start-up during this period, in addition to his entrepreneurship journey. His start-up Eezee, founded in 2017, is a platform that enables businesses to carry out procurement in a marketplace environment, as well as helping suppliers scale by being the bridge between them and the online market.
The evolving outbreak is taking a severe toll on the business sphere. In fact, with or without crisis, entrepreneurship always comes with its fair share of challenges. During our chat, Logan has shared some critical points of reflection for start-ups during this pandemic.
- The company’s leadership team rising to the occasion — It is relatively easy to be a CEO during peacetime, where economies are doing well and sales are high. But when it goes into a war state, companies require someone who can quickly shift to a different set of mentality towards doing things. A capable leader, in times of hardship, will be able to steer the company and its people to a new direction.
- The mentality of the business stays nimble and adaptable — In the world of entrepreneurship, change is the only constant. Business can quickly go downhill even for big companies that are reluctant to adapt. The pandemic has been forcing organisations to make a conscious decision to change or pivot to a new practices that will help them stay afloat during this downtime. While these businesses may eventually shift back to their original model, the value of adaptability will serve well as a competitive advantage.
- Imposing a flexible Organisation Culture — Ensuring employees’ productivity and morale while working from home has become a widely discussed topic. Start-ups should reflect back on the fundamentals and framework that motivate team members to continue performing. These basics include a clear expectation of employees, their day-to-day tasks, clear job descriptions, and promotion frameworks. For example, Eezee’s Leadership Framework assesses employees’ eligibility to join the management team through the display of certain leadership traits, such as competence and hunger for knowledge.
- Ensuring technical infrastructure are in place — Most companies do not realise that they are lacking technical facilities, until COVID-19 hits. With remote working, the right digital infrastructures such as a documentation arrangement, a proper internal chatting system and communication channels for clients must be set up before work can be carried out at home. (For instance, we are able to continue having Kopi Chats with you with the right platforms in place 😊)
- Prudent spending is the key — Being prudent has been an ancient virtue for businesses, needless to say under the existing circumstances. Eezee has cut down on their marketing budget and every single spend has to go through Logan and another of his chief operations manager now. The practice of being prudent should not only cater to the pandemic situation. Instead, it is an important mindset for companies to hold onto as they expand. So the advice for start-up founders out there is to take a more curated approach, and spend a bit more time in seeking the most cost efficient solution.
Through our conversations with Logan, he also revealed that Eezee’s listings are available for consumer purchase! Find out more about Eezee here — https://eezee.sg/about-us.
Our next Kopi Chat Da Bao is on 6 May, 12.30pm with Varun Chatterji, Chief Software Architect from Sevensense.ai. Grab your virtual seat here — https://bit.ly/2VJy0F2
