Why do some companies survive the pandemic and others not? One word: 'Learnability'

  Rassegna Stampa
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6 min read

This article was translated from our Spanish edition using AI technologies. Errors may exist due to this process.

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

Let’s do a little test. Search in Google: “How to sell in Mercado Libre México” . You will be surprised to know that you will find more than 64 million results (I just reviewed it). While if you look only for videos on the subject you will find 1,890,000.

Now, do you already sell in Mercado Libre? Possibly you would say no to me because you don’t know how, right?

If we had had this pandemic 30 years ago, the world would have suffered three times as much as it has been affected today. How to work from home without high speed internet, without Zoom , Skype or Google Meet ? No home delivery services like Amazon , Mercado Libre, Rappi or Uber Eats ? Without a smart phone with which you could do practically everything you do today?

30 years ago there was already an important use of some technologies derived from the internet, but we were still learning and today we are still in diapers compared to what may come.

Today, thanks to the Internet and all its derivatives, ONLY SOME businesses have been able to withstand this pandemic in a totally different way than we would have had in the past. Why haven’t all businesses been able to withstand the pandemic in the same way?

By the following: Learnability .

For those who were already marketing products on Amazon and Mercado Libre, they got prospects through Google Ads and Facebook Ads, for those who already had their online store and their ERP in the cloud, this pandemic was difficult, but it was not impossible to front facing. For those who had none of that, this health crisis was a nightmare and what happened was inevitable: THEY HAD TO LEARN .

This is learnability in a nutshell, it is a “spin off” of Industry 4.0. It is the most important change or revolution in recent decades and it has to do precisely with these new information technologies that we use more and more often today.

Learnability is the ability of an individual or an organization to quickly learn new skills.

In the case of companies that did not use as much the communication, marketing and distribution technologies that the internet offers, the pandemic came to push this capacity, and although it seems that we are beginning to “adapt” to the aftermath of the pandemic, learning new skills will play a major role in the months and years to come.

You will see, to the extent that you have discovered how to get new customers through Google Ads , how to sell on Mercado Libre or Amazon, or how to use a remote desktop to be able to work (you and your employees) from home, your competition too it has done.

And when you think that you have more or less resolved the matter, you begin to realize that now the clicks will be more expensive (marketing) or that your products are sold less (in online channels) or that your “new customers ”They buy again from your competition. Why? Because your competition did not stand idly by and also learned.

Learnability is not a passing fad or a good name to identify a trend. It is a new way of living and doing things.

In my last article on planting acorns I mentioned it in different words, but the concept is the same. Today with the pandemic you have had to learn new things; This cannot be stopped if you want to keep growing. On the contrary, now you have to make it become a kind of culture within your organization. Today the job is to get your team to seek and learn new skills in the shortest time possible.

That instead of you being the only one who is looking to create an electronic catalog, it is the whole team that also learns how to do it.

The great beauty of our time is not that there is internet, but that with this tool everyone has the ability to specialize very quickly.

Today, learning about a new industry, software development, or business philosophy doesn’t necessarily require taking a course or a diploma that could last weeks. It is enough to connect to the internet and search on sites such as Udemy, SkillShare, Monday, Train for Employment, or even YouTube to acquire said knowledge in the time that is necessary (as fast or slow as you want) with a minimum investment compared to previous models. Many of these platforms have hundreds of courses in Spanish.

Do you remember the little test about looking for how to sell in Mercado Libre at the beginning of this article?

Now ask yourself:

  • How many of the people who work with you have seen a single video about it? Less than 1 percent.
  • How many of the people who work with you have the ability to watch the video and do something about it? Probably 80 percent.

Be that guide that pushes others to discover new and better ways of doing things. What are you waiting for? This is the moment!

Learnability is what made it possible for you to have a different business today than you had when the pandemic began, and learnability implemented as a culture with all your employees is what will make your business a leader in its field.

https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/358624