Covid-19 has significantly impacted all industries across the globe. While the world’s largest cinema chain, Cineplex, is suffering massively, companies like Amazon are prospering due to the global pandemic.
The global pandemic affects different businesses and industries differently, but no industry has suffered more than small businesses. Small businesses that can’t handle multiple months without any revenue have been closing down left and right.
Companies have mostly moved to work-from-home systems to manage their employees if possible, and many people have lost their job. It’s fair to say that this global pandemic has harmed business and the overall economy. In this article, we’ll see how it has affected entrepreneurship.
The Full Effect of COVID-19 At This Moment
The virus has affected a lot of things, most notably people. Economics aside, many people have lost their lives battling the disease. The consequences are catastrophic, to say the least.
Let’s now examine how this virus has affected the economy and entrepreneurship rather than humans themselves. While lives are the most precious resource, livelihoods are also being greatly impacted.
The Negative Effects
Entrepreneurship has suffered massively in the wake of the global pandemic. Estimates show that industries directly affected by COVID-19 can expect to lose anywhere from 50% to 80% of all of their turnover rates. This will compel most small businesses to shut down operations for good.
Aside from the turnover rates, COVID-impacted areas and businesses can expect to lose their market value.
Companies have had to resort to alternative modes of operation to stay alive and relevant during the global pandemic. The industry that has suffered the most by far is the hospitality and live entertainment industry, which reported an unprecedented loss during the worldwide pandemic. Other sectors that suffered massively in light of the global epidemic are:
- Foodservice
- Gambling
- Airlines
- Cruises
- Transportation
- Automotive
- Oil and gas
- Fitness
- Construction
This dreadful situation has cost so many lives and livelihoods – bigger businesses are buying out smaller companies. That has prompted governments worldwide to place a federal ban on predatory acquisitions and buyouts during the global pandemic.
The Positive Effects
While the consequences of COVID-19 on entrepreneurs are catastrophic, to say the least, there is a bright side to this situation. The global pandemic has shifted the way businesses operate, and some companies are finding out that their new modus operandi works better than the old one.
E-Commerce companies for instance, have been seeing spikes in monthly orders. As people are staying home and thus less frequently visiting physical stores, they meet their shopping needs by purchasing products online. Trending ecommerce products during Covid-19 are for instance home fitness equipment, hygiene products such as Tushy’s bidets, games, gardening and kitchenware. At the beginning of the year, companies were struggling to meet demand as shipping infrastructures starting to get overloaded. Luckily companies like Floship managed to offer ecommerce order fulfillment solutions to mid-market ecommerce brands that allowed them to continue meeting consumer expectations by having solid shipping strategies in place to ship ecommerce orders during the corona pandemic within days.
Working from home is a relatively new concept to most businesses, as well as most of the workforce, but it’s already showing a massive improvement when compared to traditional offices. While productivity seemed to be a bit down when the global pandemic started, employees regained most of their work output after getting used to it.
Aside from productivity, working from home has significantly cut down on monthly company spending. No longer do companies have to account for large office spaces, electricity bills, and operation costs as all of the work are being done from home.
Smaller companies that work over the internet have found new ways to manage their employees. It has provided a far more cost-effective solution than in-person hiring, training, and management.
In short, the COVID-19 pandemic has changed the way companies do businesses on quite a considerable scale.
COVID-19 and Rise in Entrepreneurship
Entrepreneurship has sprung up during COVID-19 in a certain way. People are looking more and more into ways they can use this COVID-19 situation as an opportunity. Many businesses have suffered, and many people lost their jobs, so the number of aspiring entrepreneurs is continually rising.
At the start of the global pandemic, some people looked to exploit it in an abundance of ways. There was the hand sanitizer craze and the toilet paper craze, where individuals would purchase as much of the desired resource as possible and resell it to the community at higher prices.
That is not only morally and ethically wrong, but it is illegal – so luckily, most of these opportunists failed.
But for dedicated entrepreneurs, the world impacted by COVID-19 mandated different solutions to old and new problems.
The Changes That Corona Brought
The COVID-19 global pandemic has shifted the world of business in more ways than one. One of the most significant changes is that most employees now work from home instead of the office.
That has mandated the implementation of software solutions to continue work. Some of the most exciting software solutions are employee training software. Online training software takes a different approach to training employees and eliminates many of the duties a human would do.
Today, employees don’t need to participate in live courses, training, or specialization, as top-of-the-line software tools let them do so at home.
Online Employee Training & Management Solutions
Learner-centric employee training software solutions such as ProProfs Employee Training Software, Lessonly, and Bridge help you educate and train employees with minimal intervention by instructors. This enables instructors to devote their time and attention to more pressing matters.
Lessonly is software for teams, but software such as ProProfs’ takes a much more individual approach. ProProfs Employee Training Software is a fantastic tool utilized by top entrepreneurs to train their employees remotely. When using this software, a company can save resources while still providing quality training.
Training Platforms & Courses
While employee training software and online training software are slowly becoming the industry standard, learning platforms such as Udemy and Docebo are also gaining popularity. While Docebo is more business orientated, Udemy offers an abundance of courses for any learning need.
Learning Management Systems
Learning platforms and employee training software are among the most ambitious changes that COVID-19 has brought to the table. Aside from simple software, full-stack employee training and management programs such as SAP Litmos and Adobe Captivate Prime LMS are fundamentally changing the employee training landscape.
Payroll & Human Capital Management
Setting learning, training, and education aside, human capital management software has been skyrocketing in popularity during the global pandemic. Software such as Paylocity has completely revolutionized the way employees are getting paid through easy management systems.
Paylocity automates payroll and HR, enabling companies to streamline their human and monetary resources.
Ready to Capitalize On COVID-19?
The COVID-19 pandemic is a tragedy – there is no getting around that fact. Merely comprehending the adverse effects that it has had on humanity and the economy is unfathomable.
But just like everything in life, nothing negative comes without its positive sides. Online training software and employee training software have changed the way companies approach employees, while payroll and human capital management software have automated the payment process.
Floship has proven to have solid order fulfillment solutions in place even during the COVID-19 pandemic. If you’re looking for a shipping strategy reach out to Floship today.
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