Because of social distancing and sheltering in place, many of us have been forced to adapt and learn to do new things. For example, I finally used my mobile phone to deposit checks into my checking account. I know, I know, what took me so long? A pandemic, that’s what.
Personally, I’ve never washed my hands so much in my life as I have in the past month.
This morning I went to Whole Foods to pick up a few items, but before I left the house, I made sure I had my hand sanitizer with me. That was an interesting experience with signs outside the store noting that the carts inside had been sterilized (That didn’t stop me from wiping mine down with hand sanitizer.). At the door, we were greeted by an employee who reminded everyone to stay six feet apart. To help us keep our distance, yellow tape was placed on the floor throughout the entire store. I was extremely conscious of keeping my distance and not crossing those yellow lines. I couldn’t find toilet paper but was able to get everything else on my shopping list. For the record, I did explore ordering online through Amazon Prime, but there were no deliveries available for the next two days so I took my chances.
One of the most important lessons I’ve learned during this crisis is that Zoom is my friend. This past Monday, The Cannata Report team had its first Zoom staff meeting. Previously, our meetings were teleconferences. Because some of us were having issues with cell service dropping out during our weekly calls, we tried something we should have been doing all along. It was a joy to see everyone, particularly now that we aren’t traveling.
As I mentioned in a previous Business as Unusual post, we broadcast our church service on March 15 via Zoom. That was done from the sanctuary. The following Sunday, March 22, the service was Zoomed from our homes. The first Sunday we had 125 participants, the second Sunday, 176. People are catching on.
This is an excellent opportunity to be creative. On Monday night my significant other and I got together with friends for a Zoom dinner. Some ordered takeout, others cooked. At 7 p.m. we sat down at our dinner tables with our food, bottles of wine, and laptops, and enjoyed each other’s company.
Allow me to share a few additional observations about how life has changed during the past two weeks here at The Cannata Report.
- Industry news is on the light side. The number of press releases we receive from companies in the imaging industry about new products and other company news has slowed down considerably.
- There is plenty of COVID-19-related emails. My inbox has been inundated with emails from publicists pitching me on experts who are available for interviews to talk about any and everything COVID-19-related, from dealing with pregnancies during this time to branding, to maintaining your financial health, to making sure you’re not getting screwed by employees who are working from home. I kid you not on the latter. One of the bullet points described how to deal with employees who are drinking alcohol while working.
- Acquisitions are on hold. To date, we have not reported on any acquisitions in March. That doesn’t mean there haven’t been any, it just means they haven’t been publicized. Still, that’s quite the contrast to February, which was an extremely busy month in terms of acquisitions.
- Postponements and cancellations are the new norm. None of the postponements or cancellations of industry events and conferences were a surprise even though it took some organizations longer to pull the plug on their events than others. Although I hope things will be back on track for the fall, it wouldn’t surprise me if this is the year that wasn’t for industry events.
- Silence is not golden. It’s become more challenging to schedule interviews with industry thought leaders as their organizations scramble to conduct business as unusual.
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