Jim Blasingame

Business futurist, award-winning author, speaker and columnist

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Demographics, Generations

The New Regular: In the wake of the coronavirus pandemic

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This is the third installment of my New Regular series (seen anything normal lately?).

The first was about customer expectations and cheese, the second one was about paradigm shifts, tiny and not so much. The goal is to establish perspective and maintain focus on whatever is coming at us in the post-pandemic marketplace.

This offering is about identifying the implications of a pandemic shutdown. In that quest, another book came to mind that perfectly reveals the power of gaining 2020 perspective clarity from the 20:20 hindsight of history. In the Wake of the Plague, by the late Norman F. Cantor, chronicles the bubonic plague pandemic of the Middle Ages. Don’t leave – you’ll thank me later.

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The New Regular: Your pre-pandemic paradigms are shifting

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This is the second column in my “New Regular” series (“normal” checked out in February). The focus is on how familiar, pre-pandemic customer relationships are likely to morph into less familiar post-pandemic customer behavior and expectations.

You’ll hear those twin-terms – pre- and post-pandemic – more and more, perhaps for the rest of your life. Like December 7, 1941, the date that lives in infamy as it marked a global generation, the events of 2020 will bisect memories and lives for decades.

In thinking of that pre/post bisect, another book comes to mind: Paradigms: The Business of Discovering the Future by my friend Joel Barker, one of the great futurists of our time. Joel didn’t invent the paradigm concept, but his landmark book and companion film reestablished it in our modern consciousness.

Barker: “A paradigm is a set of rules – written or unwritten – that establishes boundaries within which we learn how to be successful.”

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The New Regular: Your Cheese Has Been Moved

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These are rough days on Main Street. Business owners are experiencing extreme stress and anxiety, unprecedented in cause, abruptness, velocity, and impact. 

Just now we’re dealing with a one-two punch to our lives and livings. The first blow was from a novel coronavirus pandemic and the second from the shutdown response to it. 

The shutdown punch – however necessary and politically-variable – has dealt a devastating financial blow to millions of small firms. And as the arc of the disease danger seems to be descending, business owners are increasingly struggling with an unprecedented internal conflict I’ve termed “Owner’s Choice”: Having to daily reassess the risk of a deadly disease against ongoing damage to their family’s financial future.  

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A big black bird is coming at you. Are you prepared?

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What do a rock, a flea, and a plate have in common with a small business? Hint: they’re all associated with surprise and danger. Any ideas?

Here’s another hint: a bird is sometimes used to refer to them. Anything yet? Okay, I’ll stop.

The rock is the dinosaur-killing asteroid that slammed into what is now the Gulf of Mexico 65 million years ago. The flea contributed to wiping out half of Europe during the Dark Ages. The plate was the tectonic kind that slipped on Boxing Day 2004, creating the south Asia, 9.3 megathrust earthquake and tsunami. And that small business? Patience, grasshopper. I’ll get to that in a minute. But first, about that bird …

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What politicians, small business and mice have in common

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As we stand here on the threshold of another national election year, it’s appropriate to turn to the legendary book by the late Dr. Spencer Johnson. Who Moved My Cheese? tells the story of four characters who ate only one thing: cheese.

Every day, all four characters went to a specific place in their world – a maze – where they found cheese. The first two were not picky about their cheese, nor where they found it – it was just food they found in a place. Then, one day – you guessed it – somebody moved their cheese. These two unfinicky fromage finders immediately began looking for the new place where cheese was being put.

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Jim Blasingame’s 2020 crystal ball predictions

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Here are my 2020 Predictions – my 21st set – by major category. Through 20 years, my record is 73% accuracy.

Small Business

Prediction: Small business confidence will remain strong for the fourth consecutive year, exceeding the NFIB Index’s almost half-century average.

Prediction: For the 13th straight year, small businesses will continue to limit borrowed capital and rely on organic resources to fund growth.

Prediction: The USMCA and China trade deals will deliver direct and indirect economic benefits for U.S. Main Street businesses.

Prediction: A growing number of state minimum wage increases will cause harm to the least of the marketplace participants: the smallest small businesses and low-skilled workers.

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