If - Thomas Jardine and Co

If you kept your focus when all about you

Were losing theirs and blaming it on COVID,

If you pivoted when others doubted change,

But made allowance for their doubting too;

If you’re waiting for normal and not tired by waiting,

You are a business in our new world

A ‘sticker’ who held a steady course and never wavered

Or an ‘innovator’ who pivoted in weeks

Or one of the ‘undecided’ who are waiting to stick or pivot

If you can plan—and not make the plans your master

If you can pause – and not make the pause your life

If you have met with Triumph and Disaster

And treated those two impostors just the same;

If you can keep your focus on the business

When everything is pushing you to work in the business

And have watched the things you gave your life to, broken,

And are now building them back with a furloughed team

If you are making one heap of all your reserves

To risk it on a pivot to a new future,

Knowing you may lose, and have to start again

And never breathe a word of your fears to those about you;

If you have forced your heart and nerve and soul

To serve your business long after you are done,

And are holding on when there is nothing in you

Except the voice which says to you: ‘Hold on!’

If you can talk with customers and keep their attention,

Or work with suppliers—to keep your supply chain alive,

If neither competitors nor loving friends can hurt you,

If all people count with you, but none too much;

If you can still fill the unforgiving minute

With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,

Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,

And—which is more—you are a business leader my friend.

Inspired by Rudyard Kipling , Be the Business and our fellow Guilders at the Guild Carlisle

If