Build resilience into the bedrock of your company

Who benefits when companies build resilience into the bedrock of their operations? The real question is, who doesn’t? Small business owners, their employees, customers, investors, suppliers, and partners all gain critical financial security when plans are put in place to anticipate, react, and recover from natural disasters, economic crises, cybersecurity threats, and even geopolitical volatility. For larger companies, the story is the same – risk planning and mitigation deliver results for everyone connected to the organization, from team members to outside shareholders.

But for your business, the decision to invest time and resources to create a more resilient organization should reflect factors beyond the direct beneficiaries of your plan. As the COVID-19 pandemic has illustrated all too well, when businesses are confronted with fractured supply chains, wild fluctuations in demand, and widespread workforce interruptions, the effects are felt broadly and indirectly, with local economies weakened, municipal budgets fractured, and entire communities in disarray.

The fact is that operational resilience empowers your bottom line, but just as importantly, it plays a role in creating a more stable and confident business ecosystem, and that has critical implications on a global level for our shared social and economic future. Let’s take a closer look at what your company can do to embrace resilience.

To identify and anticipate potential risks to your organization, your employees should be empowered to communicate openly, share concerns, and propose remedies. Not only are your company’s people its most important asset, they can also be its most vigilant protectors. At DHL Express, my focus on communication includes conducting “Deep Dives” with my teams to share information, monitor events and gauge future risks. These Deep Dives are held at multiple management levels to encourage awareness and to promote good communication up and down the organization. Of course, effective communication is also central in the event of a crisis, such as a natural disaster. A fully-tested plan for company-wide communication will speed recovery efforts and minimize disruption.

Beyond open lines of communication, sound risk management requires a culture of highly-trained and engaged employees. When your teams embrace their work, have positive relationships with their managers, trust the decisions of company leaders, and understand the purpose and value of your organization’s mission, they will more effectively respond to disruptions and stay focused in the face of adversity. The process of developing resilience in the workplace starts at day one. In other words, it means hiring the right people and the best talent, and then quickly and consistently training them to thrive. At DHL Express, we integrate skills assessment into the hiring process, matching the right talent with the right positions, and our Certified International Specialist (CIS) training initiative has been consistently recognized for empowering employees to succeed and take initiative. We also regularly seek feedback from employees and monitor the strength of our culture with DHL Pulse Surveys. In fact, regular check-ins with your employees will help boost employee engagement, while helping identify areas of risk.

Effective communication and the quest for feedback doesn’t end with your employees. By engaging with your customers and stakeholders and establishing a dialogue about their experiences with your company, you are building important alliances that can weather difficult times. You can also gain valuable insight into service problems before they occur, helping you to anticipate customer concerns before they develop. Communication with your suppliers is equally vital, allowing for better prediction of disruptions in supply, as well as improved coordination throughout the supply chain.

For many businesses, the largest area of risk lies in the supply chain, where disruptions can result in lost business, reduced customer satisfaction, and increased workplace conflict and stress. With around 28,000 employees in more than 55 countries and territories within the Americas region, we know the importance of driving economic growth and individual prosperity. Creating redundancy and establishing protocols to respond to changing supply pressures are critical mitigation strategies, but there is also a need to ensure that your supply chain is not contributing to larger social threats, such as climate change, Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) violations, or forced labor practices. By establishing an ethical supply chain that aligns with the values and standards of your customers and partners, you are eliminating potential conflict and disruption, and engaging in tactics that protect the fundamentals of your supply framework. 

Consider the key ESG pillars that are becoming increasingly essential for businesses:

• Environmental: Green logistics practices, such as those pioneered at DHL, not only boost customer and employee trust, they reduce the very real threat to the supply chain that climate change represents. As part of a commitment to reduce emissions from 33 million metric tons in 2020 to 29 million tons in 2030, we continue to invest in sustainability solutions to electrify our fleets, increase the use of sustainable fuels and design our buildings to be carbon neutral.
• Social: Provide a safe and inclusive workplace by increasing diversity in upper and middle management and embedding human rights awareness in day-to-day work to prevent human rights violations.
• Governance: Take action to ensure trusted, transparent and compliant business. This includes reviewing policies and guidelines regularly and assessing high-risk suppliers based on a structured due diligence process.

Your organization should address new dimensions, such as where your business stands on social responsibility – and that means developing, measuring and controlling relevant and comparable KPIs, similar to established finance KPIs.

Companies that are adaptable and flexible on every level are better equipped to manage change and recover from business interruptions. Flexible work systems, including technology that allows people to work from anywhere while keeping your data always accessible and stored securely, and the ability to quickly align with new partners and vendors are all part of the equation. For logistics organizations like DHL, flexibility includes being able to respond rapidly to transportation disruptions, from severe weather issues to natural disasters impacting entire regions of the globe, by having alternative transit plans and systems. For every company, flexibility needs to exist in the workplace, in the supply chain, and in customer service operations.

Published: April 2021

Images: DHL; AdobeStock (branded)