Coronavirus: Fast-Forwarding Our Future?

The debilitating impact of Coronavirus on the social, economic and healthcare fabric will take weeks, if not months, to gauge. The tangibles will be measured in terms of opportunity losses, business losses, consumption losses, job losses, life losses, etc. It is said that growth in majority of the countries will be thrown back by few years. It is also suspected that the world may see new leaders emerge. All this is understandable and conceivable. The Coronavirus pandemic has taught a few things that the humanity was too lazy to learn.

What is difficult to comprehend are intangibles impacting us. Our emotions, ethics, concerns, relationships and the like. Our parents, society and education have engineered us to have some goals of a particular kind. We were expected to chase these goals throughout our life by creating strategies and plans to achieve them. The methodology has been passed down through generations with a bit of refinement every time the baton changed hands. The game and the motivation of the participants remained the same. To win. 

The world is addressing the Coronavirus challenge a bit differently. As I write this, more than half the world is locked down. Forget the area, city or the region, Corona Virus has shown us that the entire country can be locked down. Fear is the key. The fear of death. When the fear of death is strong enough, one can bring the world down to its knees. We were always taught that love is our greatest emotion and mountains can be moved by love. The Coronavirus episode has shown us that the fear (of death) is greater than love. Humanity seems to come a full circle and has the same motivation that it had when the story began. To survive. 

Coronavirus pandemic, in the age of technology, will alter our lifestyles. The question humanity is asking now is how much is enough for us to survive? Is the rat race worth it? What is the role of family in one’s life? And the resultant all important question of having the cake and eating it too. Is it possible to earn enough by sitting at home? Are we going to live in an idea-driven society? Today, banking, investments, travel arrangements, most of healthcare, advertising, PR, food purchase, fashion, entertainment, shopping can be done sitting at home. Now consider the two facts together. It is dangerous to step out of home due to Coronavirus and most things important can be done from home. Coronavirus pandemic demonstrably proved that staying at home for health reasons is a good idea. If you can live by staying inside at home, then why go out? 

But wasn’t this the situation that we were likely to encounter after a decade or so? 

Has our future been fast-forwarded? Coronavirus was to take us back by few years.

Sushil Bahal is Managing Director of Raka Reputation Management Services Pvt. Ltd., a 20-year old, Mumbai based PR and Advertising company offering integrated communication solutions. Raka Reputation has experience across sectors, particularly Banking, Financial Services, Healthcare, Hospitality, Education, Lifestyle, Manufacturing and Technology. With nearly 250 IPOs in last decade, Raka Reputation has been associated as a communications partner to some of the most complex challenges.

Please visit the website www.rakareputation.com for any further information. Sushil can be contacted on sushil@rakareputation.com