Peter Hinssen suggests that “maybe this is truly the end of the ‘new normal’ but this is the beginning of the ‘never normal.’“ Likewise, David Cushman invites us to “take the next step on this journey to a better normal”  with a foundational sentiment: “Yesterday was Usual. Today is Unusual. Tomorrow is Better.”


As Micro Strategies confronted the COVID-19 crisis, its marketing group partnered with the leadership team to catalyze the whole organization in response to the crisis, by reimagining the company’s marketing initiatives to integrate human, societal, business, and technology dimensions.

The marketing group manifested a global virtual conference (Leadership Through and Beyond the Crisis) with a diverse collection of panelists, partners, and supporters to explore the emerging reality and the dominant themes of uncertainty, risk, complexity, resilience, antifragility, future-proofing, black swans, gray rhinos, etc.

A number of guests were invited to contribute their perspectives, insights, and guidance for navigating through and beyond this unprecedented time, and Michele Wuker became the grounding force for the global community of panelists.

Through the preparation for the virtual conference, the overarching narrative for the event emerged: to survive and thrive as a global community, we must be technology-enabled, business-focused, human-powered, and society-embracing.

As Regis McKenna’s classic work suggests:

The goal is adaptive marketing, marketing that stresses sensitivity, flexibility, and resiliency. Sensitivity comes from having a variety of modes and channels through which companies can read the environment, from user groups that offer live feedback to sophisticated consumer scanners that provide data on customer choice in real time. Flexibility comes from creating an organizational structure and operating style that permits the company to take advantage of new opportunities presented by customer feedback. Resiliency comes from learning from mistakes—marketing that listens and responds.

Watch as the Micro Strategies marketing team explores how sensitivity, flexibility, and resiliency were embraced in response to a world in crisis.