5 Key Areas Where Business Policy Needs To Be Readdressed

For small and large business owners, the business policy is the heart and soul of their brand. Everything rests on their ability to create and implement effective policies in all areas of their business. It’s a matter of fact, that good policy leads to good businesses.

The opposite is true for bad policy. So it’s in your best interest to invest heavily in business policy research or hire policy experts that can come into your business, and boost its level of competency and efficiency. For many people, this is the boring bit. The policy is very difficult to understand sometimes and can be so complex that it can hinder progress. There are two schools of thought regarding the policy approach. One side believes in ‘light touch’ regulation, while the other beliefs in ‘central control’. We are going to explore lots of areas with both approaches in mind. These are the 5 areas where business policy needs to be looked at again.

Sustainable business

In this decade, we will see a gigantic shift in business policy around the world. Sustainable business has become a major issue, especially for the younger generation. Those who have not inherited the planet in a much worse state than their own parents are demanding something be done. However, they are not just pouting and folding their arms. The majority of consumers would make the shift to a more sustainable business than a brand they have been loyal to. It really does now mean, green businesses will have people voting with their feet and wallet, to their side. 

But where does green policy in the business matter? 

• Manufacturing. The cleaner manufacturing policy is at the head of the board. You need to use less fuel, better tools with less waste involved, and also, better waste management policy too. Recycle your waste and perhaps, recycle the energy that is wasted in the process?
• Recycling. As mentioned, recycling is a major issue and it can be solved by collection and separation practices in your own business. If you don’t want to do the sorting at your premises, then don’t worry, recycling services specifically for businesses are rising rapidly.
• Sourcing. Just buying better-sourced material is a good start. Don’t buy from companies that do not try to be more green. Those that are churning out raw materials with no care for their footprint, must be avoided if one can avoid them. It all starts somewhere and time and again, sourcing correctly has shown to have a massive positive effect for good sustainable policy.

More contact with customers

Having more contact with your consumer is deathly important. Time and time again, we have seen the negative impact of leaving customers in the lurch for too long. The key here is ‘too long’. Customers like for brands to pop in and out of their everyday lives. But it has to be more than just a promotional email, it has to be a genuine checking in with them. This can be done on social media, such as taking polls and asking questions that they might be contemplating. It can also be done by asking them to give you an honest review via email. But, it must be done in the email itself, they should not have to open up a new page to do so. 

Another way to keep in contact with customers is to have in-site chatbots. This allows customers to ask questions about your products, where to find certain things and what your policies for returns and or refunds are. This is how you can add a chatbot to your website. Hooking up with a professional chatbot service is going to unleash a raft of options for your customers.

ur brand. This means that the responses that you offer customers or perhaps lead to answers, will be set by you yourself. As you can imagine, this has a brand tone continuity effect allowing you to give customers a ujni1ue experience despite having a chatbot service that is a third party.

Risk identification

Nobody would have guessed that we would be in such dire straits as we are now. But the pandemic has really put us all in a spiral of chaos and uncertainty. But, this should at least give us pause to ask, what can we see coming? 

Risk management shall become the highest area of inquiry once this is all over. It may actually be right now, as many companies around the world, are deciding to hire more risk professionals and set up risk departments and risk teams in their establishments. The main role of the risk professional or team, is to locate, identify and understand risks that are or could affect the business. This is how it works.

Corporate risk types

Industry risk: This technique involves understanding the sea that you are already sailing in. What kind of risks do you see in your own industry? This could be supply chain risks, B2B risks, investment drying up, or perhaps, rivals getting the better of you. List all the possible and relevant risks to your company and get to grips with what they mean.

Internal risk: Compliance and internal risk, is a major issue that should not be overlooked. It usually falls into the lap of the business admin professionals to know what the risks are, regarding these two areas. But risk professionals can provide solutions and not just identify and audit. 

Root risk: When you have a fundamental flaw in your business, root risk is the route you need to take. You will identify why you are losing investment, taking too long to complete projects, or being beaten out to contracts by your rivals, etc. The root cause of problems will be identified and it can call for a major shakeup in the structure of your business.

More employee services

In-office help. Employees will probably be working from home for the foreseeable future. However, for some, this isn’t ideal. They would prefer the office environment from their remote work location. Some of them don’t even have a home office. They are working from their laptop on the dining table. So, come to think of it, employee services will become very important for not just this year, but perhaps from this point onward.

Mental health support is extremely important, with millions of people now having contacted their doctor to be prescribed anti-depression medication. This is a very real threat to the economy. If employees don’t feel motivated and seem to have a bleak outlook on the world, this can cause major disruption in project time schedules, quality control and even just showing up on time. So companies must provide some kind of access to mental health support, whether it be through health insurance or third party service.

Help with filing taxes. This is something that has been done in the past but not en masse. We think that this shall be the next frontier that every business owner will want to cross. They can point employees in the right direction for how they should file their taxes. This is especially important for corporations and normally, employees will be filing for expenses too. So getting it right is in everybody’s interest.

Build a home office grant

As mentioned, many of us will be working from home from now on. But morale can dip negatively if the employee doesn’t have a home office. This is why many companies are choosing to set up a home office grant for their workforce. But guess what? It’s actually proving to be very beneficial.

If you don’t have to buy or rent as much commercial real estate, it will end up costing you a lot more throughout the year. But if you can funnel that money into giving employees a one-time grant to build a home office, this could save you a lot of money, net, in the long term.

This is something that major corporations are doing too. So smaller businesses that cannot offer a grant like this, because maybe they have been working in coworking spaces up until this point, might be a threat of losing their employees. However, you may also find that because there is more space in high-rise buildings, that you can rent more space or the same space, for much cheaper.

Small businesses can, however, adapt to give smaller grants or perhaps, work with partnerships that the government is offering, to get the grant they are after. Alternatively, they can do independent home office builds, by hiring a third party. 

These 5 areas of business policy need drastically, to be readdressed. A great change is coming. Work life will never be the same again after this pandemic is over. Act now, and you won’t be late to the new way of the professional world.