Jim White, Ph.D,, Author at Global Trade Magazine

COVID-19 has disrupted the business world, and the “normal” of a few months ago may never return. In this new landscape, how business leaders process and react to new challenges will be crucial.

Using critical thinking skills to make sound business decisions in a complicated, constantly changing world has never been more important, says Dr. Jim White, founder and president of JL White International and bestselling author of Opportunity Investing: How to Revitalize Urban and Rural Communities with Opportunity Funds (www.opportunityinvesting.com).

“Critical thinking in the COVID-19 era will separate effective leaders from the pack,” Dr. White says.

“Before, many of us relied on linear thinking – that is, solving problems in a step-by-step fashion. When life proceeds in an orderly way, we can draw conclusions based on probabilities: this is what happened before; therefore, it will happen again. Or, we use contingency statements: if THIS is true, THAT is true.

“But COVID-19 changed those premises. Now, there are too many unknowns to rely on lazy thinking. The volatile economy is one example: we don’t know how or when the markets will recover. What will the business community look like post-COVID? Will people continue to work remotely, and which companies will thrive and which will crumble? Will entire industries – like cruising – buckle under the strain? How will communities deal with their struggling populations, vacant real estate, and shuttered businesses?

“Now is the time for non-linear (lateral) thinking, characterized by expansion in multiple directions rather than in a straight line. The concept has multiple starting points from which we can apply logic to a problem.”

Dr. White offers the following advice to developing non-linear critical thinking:

Step out of your comfort zone. “Critical thinking requires that we see and interpret information from a different perspective,” Dr. White says. “In our old comfort zones we weren’t necessarily required to make difficult decisions. But navigating COVID requires taking steps to adapt to new circumstances. For companies, it means being nimble, finding opportunities and ways to innovate. It may mean drastically reducing a brick-and-mortar footprint in favor of a digital presence. It may mean dumping obsolete inventory at a discount. Or it may mean lay-offs.”

Dr. White thinks many people have closed minds and don’t adapt well to change. “In military training, one is taught to pivot, to escape and adapt, since there is no such thing as a perfect set of circumstances,” he says. “The species that is capable of adapting well is the species that survives.”

Don’t jump to conclusions. “When jumping out of your comfort zone,” Dr. White says, “be careful not to jump to conclusions as well. Instead, ask questions, and organize and evaluate information. For instance, business owners should be asking, is now the right time to be re-opening? Who says the pandemic is over? Who is cautioning against reopening? What will reopening look like? Coming to a valid conclusion requires studying the available data: what is happening in other parts of the world, the country, or the industry?

“One criterion we rely on is, what do experts say? What are the credentials of these experts? Carefully evaluating data has never been more crucial than during this pandemic.”

Separate truth from belief. “People often have trouble separating what is valid from what is true because of ingrained beliefs, which we all have. This ‘belief bias’ interferes with our ability to think logically,” Dr. White says. “Critical thinking means making decisions based only on data. For business leaders that means putting aside what worked in the past and being completely open to new practices and protocols.”

“In the age of COVID-19, we must embrace challenges and make solid decisions based on critical-thinking principles.”

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Jim White, PhD, author of Opportunity Investing: How To Revitalize Urban and Rural Communities with Opportunity Funds (www.opportunityinvesting.com), is founder and president of JL White International. He also is chairman and CEO of Post Harvest Technologies, Inc. and Growers Ice Company, Inc., and founder and CEO of PHT Opportunity Fund LP. Throughout his career, he has bought, expanded, and sold 23 companies, operating in 44 countries. He holds a B.S. in Civil Engineering, an MBA, and a PhD in Psychology and Organizational Behavior.

The COVID-19 shutdown has created financial setbacks for millions of Americans and their communities, but economic troubles – whether caused by the pandemic or otherwise – don’t hit everyone equally.

“Unfortunately, there are many rural and urban areas across our great nation that have become distressed due to a variety of circumstances and factors – and that was true for these areas even before COVID-19,” says Jim White, founder and president of JL White International and author of Opportunity Investing: How To Revitalize Urban and Rural Communities with Opportunity Funds (www.opportunityinvesting.com).

“These areas cover the entire breadth of our nation and their populations are diverse. Poverty is a condition that does not discriminate, impacting people of every race, creed, color, gender, and age group, though it does strike minorities with far greater severity.”

But despite the problems, White says, those distressed communities have the potential to provide one path back both for the economy and for investors seeking to diversify with alternatives other than the stock market.

How so? Through the Qualified Opportunity Zone program, which Congress created in 2017 to encourage economic growth in underserved communities. The 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Acts provided tax benefits to investors who invest eligible capital in these opportunity zones to create retail, multifamily housing, manufacturing or other improvements. To qualify, the areas must meet certain specifications related to such factors as the poverty rate and the median family income. There are more than 8,000 opportunity zones nationwide.

“I believe, as we move forward to reinvigorate the economy, investing in our poorest communities is going to be the right avenue to take,” White says.

White says a few reasons opportunity zones could be an important and effective part of the recovery include:

Improvements to distressed communities will build on themselves. If businesses in the zones thrive, the communities will have more jobs and better salaries to offer. “More people will want to relocate to these areas, which will increase real estate values and breathe new life into local shops and stores,” White says. When residents and business owners are doing well, they spend more money on beautifying their homes, storefronts, public buildings, streets, parks, and monuments. Their infrastructure will improve, crime will decrease, and better health care will be available for residents.

Investors can make money as well as save on taxes. Those who invest can benefit from more than just the initiative’s capital gains tax breaks, White says. They also can see a significant return off their investments.

Investors also can help improve people’s lives. The zones give investors who want to do more than just make money a chance to have a positive impact on low-income urban and rural communities, and the lives of millions of people. “Investments have already worked miracles in several American communities and we are only at the early stages of experiencing their capabilities,” White says.

“These opportunity zones can simultaneously channel economic help to distressed communities, and create an outsized return for investors,” White says. “Both these things will be critically important as we try to bring back jobs and restore the economy coming out of the pandemic. If nothing else, the coronavirus is teaching us that we are all in this together, and that all of us, across the country and globally, must be responsible for one another.”

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Jim White, Ph.D, author of Opportunity Investing: How To Revitalize Urban and Rural Communities with Opportunity Funds (www.opportunityinvesting.com), is founder and president of JL White International. He also is Chairman and CEO of Post Harvest Technologies, Inc. and Growers Ice Company, Inc., Founder and CEO of PHT Opportunity Fund LPX. Throughout his career, he has bought, expanded, and sold 23 companies, operating in 44 countries. He holds a B.S. in Civil Engineering, an MBA, and a PhD in Psychology and Organizational Behavior.

Afraid to Step Out of Your Comfort Zone? Then You Can’t Lead in the Age of COVID.

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