The most significant way in which organisations can help their stakeholders is to stay economically active - especially in the very short term - though even in 6 months this was seen as important. The public seems to be genuinely grateful for the effort that organisations put into keeping their services going. This is emphatically the case for B2B services and products - “we need you to keep going!” is the message. The next most important was the provision of flexible hours followed in almost equal scores by changing the way services could be delivered and digitisation of services.
It is significant in a survey of this size that no suggested service support was considered any less than ‘between somewhat’ and ‘very useful’ to businesses and consumers, supporters and service users as we would have expected, for at least some groups, a proportion of cynicism or self reliance. There is also a correlation between respondents scoring highly on how they could be helped, and having a high need for services. This has significant implications for building loyalty with the correct product and service development approach. This point is explored in another macro insight.
Guidance and policy leadership are seen as useful in the short term tailing off over six months by which time we are assuming people are expecting new behaviours will be established. The reality may be that there will still be contracting policies across national and even regional boundaries which may make this a longer term requirement.
Help with payment terms and cash flow increase in importance over time, though this is not the highest scoring category.
Whilst it is for all organisations to analyse their own data, it does appear at a macro level that what people are looking for is an alignment of organisations with their own lives. Different hours, new services and digitisation are likely to be a reflection of the mass-public behaviour change with work from home, home-schooling, fewer travel miles, more local purchases and other COVID-19 lockdown and health related considerations. This request for flexibility may be challenged in the short term as firms scramble for recovery, asking for longer hours and more commitment from staff. It is possible this will have a higher negative impact on staff wellbeing than would have been the case before lockdown.
