Leading people through the COVID-19 era
The outbreak of COVID-19 is fundamentally changing the way we work. Every business and industry sector is being impacted differently. Ensuring the safety and well-being of people is the key priority of Cypriot businesses. In the hope of slowing the rise of the contamination curve, many organisations have resorted to remote working practices, which in turn give rise to a number of challenges and opportunities.
Managing cash flow pressures
As the COVID-19 global response evolves, organisations are experiencing significant operational, financial and liquidity challenges.
In order to ensure these challenges can be addressed, a key concern expressed by our clients has been how they can manage their cash flow requirements to ride out the crisis.
Impacts of COVID-19 on cyber security
Many organisations and employees need to rethink ways of working in light of considerable operational and financial challenges. Without appropriate consideration, this could fundamentally increase the risk of cyber security attacks. We are seeing both the likelihood and impact of cyber attacks increasing and cyber security good practices falling by the wayside, as organisations become more technology dependent than ever. We are also beginning to see the nature of the threat changing, as attackers exploit uncertainty, unprecedented situations, and rapid IT and organisational change.
Organisations should take three key actions to mitigate these emerging risks:
- Secure their newly implemented remote working practices
- Ensure the continuity of critical security functions
- Counter opportunistic threats that may be looking to take advantage of the situation
Learn more on how to manage a remote working environment & mitigate emerging cyber risks
Review your digital transformation strategy
Consider accelerating digital transformations as the shift to remote working reveals gaps in IT infrastructure, workforce planning and digital upskilling. Run your digital capabilities at full throttle to secure the well-being of your people, optimise operations, ensure security, increase collaboration with your customers and build trust. This crisis will test your digital transformation strategy. Embrace the situation as an opportunity to identify gaps that need to be plugged.
Capture the correct data & reliable information
Capturing the correct information and verifying its reliability is vital. Reliable information underpins both crisis planning and response, and allows organisations to make informed decisions. Build quick BI solutions to monitor operations and finances and run forecasting models with alternative scenarios to understand potential financial impact of government and internal decisions. Produce daily dynamic reports on organisations’ activities to support quick decision-making and actions.
Dependency on Third Parties
Organisations that are typically dependent on their vendors’ and suppliers’ ability to deliver in compliance with their requirements are likely to be impacted as third party providers may deal with remote working, supply chain interruptions, distribution delays, service level instability and many other potential developments.
As the duration of this status quo is still unknown, organisations should focus their continuous scrutiny of third party compliance on critical points of failure.
Key immediate next steps:
- Inventory your critical third party dependencies (e.g. IT Service Provider)
- Engage with your service providers
- Define action plan to address key risk areas
PwC’s Cyprus Response to Covid-19:Dependency on Third Parties
