PURPOSE & FRAMEWORK - SACCNY PRESIDENT As the Covid-19 pandemic has raged on and upended business-as-usual, challenged capacity to adapt and stay both afloat and relevant, including the ability to accurately and effectively foresee the future and “new normal” - the team at SACCNY continues to keep our finger on the pulse and help our members best approach these many challenges. This Phase II of our Covid-19 Action Study follows on the heels of Phase I, completed and published this past spring, and with the intention of understanding continued viability of early actions, as well as take a look at updated or tweaked response strategies, additional lessons learned, and, a look into the future. Similar to Phase I, we compiled questionnaire generated responses, while also deep diving through numerous personal interviews. To our knowledge, this comprehensive review is unique in its scope and perspective and continues to garner interest and response from our diverse and important member industry leadership, as well as a number of academic, media and other interest organizations. As described in “About This Study”, this report is divided into two different sections with data segmented accordingly, and to best demonstrate findings from questionnaire responses and interviews. The goal of Section 1 of this Phase II study is to evaluate how early response and adaptation strategies reported as part of the Phase I study, held up and remained relevant as the pandemic progressed. Section 1 evaluates data with respect to industry group and company size, and contrasts the findings to those found during the early phase of the pandemic. The ability to act nimbly in the short term may not always be a good indication of ability to anticipate in the longer term, and knowing the difference may prove lessons well learned for future challenges and crisis management. The goal of Section 2 of this Phase II study is to explore how, as the crisis prolonged, yet another set of adaptation strategy emerged, and what impact this has had on other areas of business and industry, including potential differences between Sweden and the U.S. As such, Section 2 evaluates the data with regards to company nationality and whether the study respondent is stationed in the U.S. or in Sweden. A heartfelt thank you and word of gratitude to the many who gave of their time and thoughts – all of whom are busy and pre-occupied with both the traditional, but now compounded by new, challenges and workload. Thank you! It is our sincere hope you will find the findings and content of our Covid-19 Action Study Phase II both interesting, insightful and useful. Please don’t hesitate to reach out with thoughts or comments you might have – we are eager to hear them! Anna Throne-Holst President The Swedish-American Chamber of Commerce, New York
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