The pandemic leaves us with countless lessons and lessons learned. We may forget some of them in a few months, but we will certainly not regain the sense of stability that we had before COVID-19.

This disease has changed everything in its path: our concept of safety and risk, the way we interact and, the habits in the work environment: Organizations open their way.

During this time, companies have made a huge effort to adapt to new circumstances. Within a few days, they have enabled contingency mechanisms to continue working and to provide business continuity. Over the months, they have been recovering some of the routines from before the pandemic, but few have returned to the original format.

In this changing and uncertain new environment, companies have been forced to reinvent themselves, to adapt to the new situation with the means they had.

Employees, for their part, have responded with commitment and generosity, often far above what was expected of them. They have had to re-learn to work and do it from other spaces, with other tools, and living with their environment.

“Culture is simply a shared way of doing something with a passion.”–Brian Chesky, Co-Founder, CEO, Airbnb

Survival and competitiveness

Organizations are becoming increasingly important in this context: undefined enterprises that adapt to the circumstances of each moment. And they do so not only as a survival mechanism but to boost the important competitive advantage that the agility and flexibility that they have been able to develop give them.

Traits that define them

Many traits define organizations. I will focus on seven of the most relevant:

>Flexibility is the main characteristic of liquid organizations: their ability to adapt constantly to the needs of the environment allows them to evolve and transform more easily. They are more open to change, enabling them to drive innovation processes more strongly.

>This flexibility has a strong impact on schedules: the job becomes a time to access the corporate environment. This allows liquid employees to have access to conciliation scenarios and greater guarantees about their right to digital disconnect.

>Agility is another essential component of organizations. They have adopted agile methodologies and have an extraordinary ability to make decisions quickly and reduce time to market.

>Moreover, these types of companies have simple, horizontal, and less hierarchical structures than traditional organizations. Work teams are built to develop a project and completely restructured when it is completed. Processes flow naturally, without bureaucratic artifices or excesses. This makes them much more efficient organizations.

>Transparency in communication and open collaboration. Organizations can’t afford room for silos or opacity of processes: information flows without limits.

>The ubiquity. Organizations can operate from anywhere in the world, employees need not share the same location. The technology works as a bridge or driver between the company and its collaborators.

>Finally, these new organizations rely on liquid employees and recognize human capital as their main source of energy. Therefore, they place the employee at the center of their decisions, constantly seek their well-being and happiness, as well as how to retain talent within the organization.

Transforming Corporate Culture

This model poses a huge challenge for Human Resources departments. It pulls them out of their comfort zone and forces them to rewrite the rules of people management.

Among the main challenges they face are the need to train employees, flexibility and boost their continuous training, be able to identify, value, and reward soft skills, and have the right tools to attract and retain talent within the organization.

The management of change as a continuous process

But the biggest challenge, no doubt, is the transformation of corporate culture to adapt it to its new material state.

Management is no longer a one-time project, with start and end dates, but a continuous process that accompanies the organization throughout its lifetime. It is necessary to transform traditional habits and routines into attitudes with which to adapt nimbly to the different situations that may arise at each moment.

The bottom line

Fortunately, technology has become the main ally of such organizations and provides the solutions needed to work anywhere, anytime: voice and data communications, collaboration, that encourage open cooperation and teamwork and devices.

On the other hand, human resources management tools can connect employees with the organization. They enable mechanisms that integrate all processes and allow a simpler and more transparent relationship to ensure the best employee experience or, likewise, that they feel like fish in water in liquid organizations.

Resuming: working together is better.

“I think as a company, if you can get those two things right — having a clear direction on what you are trying to do and bringing in great people who can execute on the stuff — then you can do pretty well.”– Mark Zuckerberg, CEO, Facebook