Commentary, Translations
by Rob England

Rebuilding the Organisation in Times of Crisis

This post is also available in: Tiếng Việt

Recently in the FaceBook Open Managers Club in Vietnamese, Cherry wrote a positive message in a time of crisis, which resonates with our Project Better 2025:

The imposition of tariffs up to 46% by the US on goods from Vietnam is a clear signal of an increasingly volatile economic future. This not only significantly impacts businesses exporting to the US market but also indirectly affects the entire domestic economy and supply chain. When export businesses are affected:

  • Local suppliers lose orders

  • Logistics, warehousing, and financial partners also see reduced revenues

  • Supporting service providers are indirectly impacted. The disruption can spread rapidly like a domino effect.

And that is why rebuilding the organisation and upgrading internal capabilities is no longer optional—it is a matter of survival for all businesses, whether they export directly or not. However, the most dangerous thing I’ve observed is the instinctive reaction of many businesses: worry, contraction, and waiting. At this time, waiting is a high-risk behaviour.

But I also see something hopeful: many people among them are ready to change—they just need a clear path. Some business owners and CEOs, after reading the article “46% Tariff: Open Thinking is Survival,” have asked me, “Cherry, what should I do now?”

Here are some pieces of advice I’d like to share with everyone. I hope you find them useful.

Consider this an opportunity to reinvent your organisation.

There is a lot of talk about “digital transformation,” “green transformation,” and “business model transformation.” But few talk about transforming how we manage and operate organisations. What I’ve seen in many Vietnamese businesses is this: they’ve innovated products, expanded markets, changed distribution channels, and changed how they sell—but haven’t transformed their internal structures to become truly agile.

An organisation that is bulky, heavily layered, slow to make decisions, lacking transparency in data, and lacking autonomy at the frontline will undoubtedly fail to respond swiftly to major upheavals.

How to reinvent the organisation?

I don’t recommend chasing a particular model. I recommend improving your organisation in a way that allows you to proactively face any upcoming disruptions.

Here are some questions you and your team need to answer—right now:

  • Is our decision-making system fast enough and sufficiently decentralised?

  • Do operational departments truly understand the organisation’s overall objectives or are they operating in silos?

  • Are financial, cash flow, inventory, and work data transparent and real-time enough to support accurate decisions?

  • Can teams within the organisation self-organise, self-learn, self-improve, and collaborate flexibly?

  • Ultimately, is your organisation operating with a proactive strategy or merely reacting to situations?

Specific actions for businesses in the next 3 months

Don’t just set up a crisis response committee—design an intelligent roadmap to reinvent the organisation:

  1. Rebuild your organisational structure around value streams: Reduce layers, clarify roles and responsibilities based on customer value outcomes rather than traditional functions.

  2. Redesign operational systems for transparency and responsiveness: Apply Kanban systems, make workflows transparent, and use data so people can monitor work without waiting for reports.

  3. Build Agile Teams instead of waterfall or siloed models: Train a core group capable of hackathons, decision-making, and rapid response.

  4. Identify alternative markets and distribution channels: ASEAN, the Middle East, Africa, cross-border e-commerce, service exports… Select 1–2 new spearheads and develop them flexibly: test small, fail, improve, repeat, scale gradually. Don’t make big investments or do big-bang rollouts.

  5. Invest in human capability towards Open thinking: We need elite, creative teams. Create an environment of dialogue, feedback, courage to propose and fail in order to learn. If the team isn’t liberated, the business can’t be flexible and thrive.

I believe that if you were brave enough to lead your organisation through major crises like COVID-19, then you also have the strength to reinvent it. Start by answering:

  • What should we keep?

  • What should we discard?

  • What new things will we start doing right now?

When others are still panicking, that’s your moment to calmly rebuild your organisation—leaner, more flexible, and more innovative.

I hope you not only survive the crisis but grow through it.

P.S. translated by ChatGPT which now far outstrips Google or Facebook translation. Only one minor edit required.