The COVID-19 pandemic has affected businesses around the world. If you are struggling during this time, you need to keep in mind that you’re not alone. The most important thing right now is to keep yourself, your loved ones, and your employees safe. It is also useful to turn to other entrepreneurs and professionals to see how they’re handling the current situation.
Travelpreneur and podcast host Michael Peres took the crisis as an opportunity to reflect on himself and his business. “It has been a great time for me to introspect on my services, skillset, and structure and see if what I offer is truly adaptable to an unpredictable and ever-changing environment,” he said.
This does not mean, however, that Peres has slowed down since the pandemic began. On the contrary, he claims he’s never been busier. “We’ve contracted six new team members and my schedule consists of back to back meetings, making amazing connections, and closing new clients via LinkedIn and other social media platforms,” he shared. “Even the number of clients hitting my inbox has more than doubled over the past five weeks.
Peres, who currently operates several businesses including, Hexa Tiger Web Design, Hecto Fox Premium Web Hosting, and various other news publications, believes that professionals should use this time to improve on how they communicate with colleagues and clients. “You should assess the tools you’re using to communicate and how they can be better,” he suggested.
Speaking of tools, tech entrepreneur Paulius Gedrikas recently shared some of his favorites when he guested on The Michael Peres Podcast. “It’s not only important that we are keeping ourselves safe by staying at home, we also need to keep ourselves safe online,” he said. So his recommendations included LastPass, a password manager, and Sync, a backup tool.
Born and raised in Montreal, Canada, Gedrikas is the current CTO of Canadian telecom service provider VoxSun and the Chief Gorilla of Web and Cloud Hosting company GorillaNerd.
Gedrikas also believes it’s important for professionals to remain productive even while working from home. He recommends the use of time-management and time-saving tools such as Tomighty, RescueTime, and aText and reliable communication tools such as VoxSun and Kiwi for Gmail.
If you’re finding it hard to be productive while working from home, it’s probably because you miss the office environment. “The best solution is to replicate your office environment at home,” according to digital nomad and writer Nikita Duggal. She recommends setting up your laptop and office files in the manner they were positioned on your office desk.
The English language and literature major also advocates maintaining work/life balance especially if you have a family. “So you’ll need to plan out entertainment, education, and other things for your kids as well so that you can be productive at work,” she said.
The home environment is also filled with distractions. But for student and entrepreneur Nick Abraham, the key to staying productive lies in having self-discipline.
While most people his age have spent the COVID-19 lockdown bingeing on Netflix or playing video games, Abraham used the time to improve himself and his business. Abraham currently runs a marketing agency that helps businesses increase their sales, leads, and exposure through social media with the help of fully-trained virtual assistants.
He creates a to-do list every night to have a clear understanding of what he needs to complete the following day. To maximize his productivity, he blocks out the same hours every day for focused work. “No phone, no distractions, nothing but you and your work,” he said.
Abraham does allow himself to have breaks, which he spends being outside to recharge. He also follows a strict sleep schedule to make sure that he’s always efficient during his working hours. A follower of the Pareto Principle, Abraham believes that 20% of an individual’s effort bring 80% of the results. “Focus on the 20% and delegate the rest, he said.
The COVID-19 pandemic and its effects may have shocked many people but Peres wants to remind everyone that change actually happens every day. “Our environment is ever-changing, and those who fail to recognize that risk getting caught off guard. The COVID-19 pandemic is simply a stress test for our current mode of operation by condensing that environmental change over a more narrow timeframe. If one can adapt and weather this storm they’ll be well equipped for the sunnier days ahead,” he said.
