You know what it was like… trying to lead an organization during Covid. At first, we didn’t know what we didn’t know. It felt like free-falling. Can we actually get this thing by touching groceries or should we wash our items down with Lysol wipes first? We had no PPE. We wanted our employees to be safe but we also had goals and objectives and tried to continue to operate and perform. We worried about our family members, our kids who were out of school, and maybe even suffered a personal loss as the pandemic raged on. Then the variants hit and prolonged things, more activities were canceled, we acclimated (mostly) to mask wearing and debated whether we were taking all of this seriously enough, or perhaps too seriously. Like many things these days, we were divided and it got salty at times.

During those days, leaders got a pass. No one could be expected to perform as though it was business-as-usual because clearly it was anything but. We got governmental relief funds and that helped. A lot. Productivity was down but output was too. We did the best we could.

But as we emerged, we found ourselves in the post-Covid phase. Expectations of performance and production remained dampened since the effects of the pandemic could still be felt, most notably when it came to recruitment and retention of staff. We all experienced the “Great Resignation” which was, in my view, brewing long before Covid and then was only partially ignited by it. Societal mores were changing and generational shifts were in play long before most of us knew where Wuhan actually is.

At board meetings, we used the phrase “post-Covid” over and over again to describe our current state. And that was fine and fair… and well accepted.

But I have detected a marked shift in board rooms over the past few months. It’s subtle but I sense a collective eye roll whenever the term “post Covid” is mentioned, as though people are tired of hearing about it, viewing it as excuse-making, and feeling as though it’s time to move on and back to ‘normal’. And this is a real conundrum for managers. We are still post-Covid and like it or not, we are feeling the effects of that in many ways. These include staffing, supply chain, demand management, and contending with the fact that we long suppressed strategic decision making and problem solving. Those things we had to sweep under the rug have made for some unsightly bumps on the floor.

Let alone for the fact that the numbers are creeping back up again. But most of us are long past pandemic fatigue and are, instead, choosing to essentially ignore the early warning signs of a resurgence. We’re so done with all that.

So, it’s a leadership balancing act: to deal with the lingering effects of Covid while not making that seem like a crutch, an excuse.

How is this is going in your organization?