Atlanta’s Female Business Leaders Share Top 5 Pandemic Pivots

The pivots these leading business women describe may have come about as a response to an immediate threat, but they represent more than mere crisis management.

By Meredith Moore

It isn’t the year any of us expected as we entered 2020. The pandemic has disrupted so many aspects of our lives that it’s hard at times to remember what “normal” looked like. But successful women have always faced a balancing act; their talent for combining innovation and consistency in just the right amounts — and with grace, no less — is an inherent element of their skillset, and one that helps qualify them for the senior leadership roles they hold.

This year, I have been privileged to learn about different ways such women have pivoted to meet the unexpected challenges of a pandemic-driven world. My 2020 passion project has been hosting a series of luncheons for Atlanta-based women in senior leadership roles from a variety of professional settings: Fortune 500, entrepreneurial and government.

The conversations are invariably fascinating, with diverse guest lists and a varied assortment of topics. But no matter what else we talk about, I always raise this question: How are you pivoting this year?

The answers, as you might imagine, are wide-ranging, but five distinct themes have emerged in our discussions.

1. How we conduct business communications. When the traditional workplace environment vanished, the ways leaders typically communicated key messages was no longer effective. Lisa Tilt, founder and CEO of Full Tilt Consulting in Atlanta, recognized the need to help her clients pivot on the fly at the outset of the pandemic. “It became clear to us that 2020 would be relentless for business and necessitate leaders make the best decisions they could with less information and more pressure,” Tilt said. “That required clear focus and planning to adapt company messages and modes of communication to hit the intended mark. In response, we created tools and consulting modules for strategic ‘pivot messaging’ to help organizations stay brand-centric, avoid blind spots, and increase inclusivity.”

Networking routines were disrupted as well. “In a virtual world, spontaneous networking doesn’t work like it…