As companies in the world begin to  resume activity, they may be the world’s first to shape the “next normal.”

What will that look like? Four dimensions could define it:

 

  • Rethinking social contracts. In crises, the state plays an essential and expanded role, protecting people and organizing the response. This power shift transforms long-held expectations about the roles of individuals and institutions.

  • Defining the future of work and consumption. The crisis has propelled new technology across all aspects of life, from e-commerce to remote-working and -learning tools, including Alibaba’s DingTalk, WeChat Work, and ZOOM Meeting. New working and shopping practices will probably become a permanent fixture of the next normal. 

  • Mobilizing resources at speed and scale. Within weeks, the UAe added tens of thousands of doctors and hospital beds. For example, the sprawling halls of Dubai's World Trade Centre have been transformed into the Middle East's largest hospital. It is able to provide 3,000 beds – including 800 for intensive care patient. Several governments invested in new tools to map transmission and rolled out huge economic-stimulus plans. The UAE has a proven ability to mobilize resources in a crisis. 

  • Moving from globalization to regionalization. The pandemic has exposed the world’s risky dependence on vulnerable nodes in global supply chains. China, for example, accounts for about 50 to 70 percent of global demand for copper, iron ore, metallurgical coal, and nickel. We could see a massive restructuring as production and sourcing move closer to end users and companies localize or regionalize their supply chains.

It might be too early to fully understand the "next normal" but with the right strategy and strong execution, we will be able to come out again to a safer, more united world.