After 20 years in the specialty chemical business, Bahtera began a business transformation exercise to expand our value offering to customers and extend our contribution to the industry. Naturally, this was followed by extensive managerial adjustments. The COVID-19 pandemic only further confirmed our belief that this transformation is necessary. This sentiment is echoed by other business leaders: a majority of executives agree that the pandemic will change the way they do business, although only 21% believe their organization has the capacity to make this change. 

Managing a massive transformation in the middle of navigating the incapacitating pandemic is no easy feat. If managed right however, crises can be an opportunity for meaningful foundational transformation. Crises tend to trigger changes that present a growth opportunity. In past economic downturns, 14% of business increased their sales growth. 

For Bahtera, our transformation began before the pandemic. This started with a formulation of clearer purpose, vision, and mission to guide our business, which were then translated into a long-term strategic plan. 

The pandemic forced us to reevaluate the plan. We had to rethink our focus areas as industry growth map rapidly shifted toward the end of 2020 with the information and communication, health services, and agriculture sectors recording growth, while the manufacturing sector contracted by 6.49% nationally. Palpable business uncertainty also forced us to delay some of our development initiatives, such as warehouse expansion. More immediately, the lockdown highlighted many needed adjustments to accommodate a socially distant operation.

While posing many challenges, the pandemic also gave us confirmation that we were on the right path. It further cemented the need for a more agile business process, automation through technology, and adaptive human resources as new trends are forming in the industry sector.

There are so many lessons learned from leaders on how to drive such improvement in a post-pandemic world. Data shows that industries with a clear purpose beyond profitability did better in navigating the COVID-19 pandemic. Our experience confirmed this as our new purpose, vision, and mission, which highlight a commitment to industry sustainability through supply chain excellence, gave us a clear framework in prioritizing development in a time of crisis. We have translated this into three focus areas of close partnership, supply chain efficiency, and human resources development. This was driven by the understanding that our goal can only be achieved through alignment with our partners and principals, and the support of our people. 

To achieve this, we need the buy-in of the entire organization. Among the most common mistakes that lead to failed business strategies is lack of coordination and vertical communication. This led to our next steps of disseminating this purpose to all of our employees. We want to make sure this purpose works as the foundation of our business and the way we work, beyond just a fancy jargon. This is done through trainings and regular dialogues between the leadership and the human resources. 

We also put heavy a emphasis on talent management. As the organization grows, so do our talent and alignment needs. Through changes in the organizational structure and talent recruitment, we ensure that we have the right people in the right seats to achieve the necessary transformation. 

Another key step is to break our goal into tangible, measureable initiatives, which is key to successful business strategies. Some of our key initiatives are the development of new industries, search for complementary products, business process improvement, more rigorous human resources development, and market exploration. Taking this a step further, we use balanced scorecards to track the progress of each initiative, involving the relevant employees in their formulation. 

At the same time, we have deployed our long-term digital transformation. With the end goal of a fully functioning digital platform for our entire process, we completed the first leg of this digital transformation by the end of 2020. At this stage, we focus on digitalizing our internal process to align with our management transformation.

This is but the first step in our overall transformation into a purpose-driven company. Through careful planning, intensive monitoring, and constant agility, all of these initiatives are hoped to grow our people, improve our solutions to the customers, enhance the efficiency of our entire supply chain, and at the end of day, allow us to help our partners provide the best products to the public for a better quality of life.