The coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic is testing the leaders of companies and organizations with new set of challenges, generating some level of concern among business leaders with decline in revenues, expansion plans and investments. A similar trend has been observed on our CEO Influencer Platform where ‘COVID-19’ has emerged as the most discussed topic on Twitter in the first quarter (Q1) of 2020, according to GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company.

An analysis of GlobalData’s CEO Influencer Platform, which tracks more than 250 CEOs from several industries and their discussions pertaining to the emerging trends, insights and overviews, new fields of innovation and technology, and other popular areas on Twitter, revealed ‘economy’ as the most trending discussion among leading CEOs on COVID-19 as more CEOs believe the economy will worsen due to disruptions caused by virus in supply chain, employment, funds and human health during Q1 2020.

Prashant Saxena, Influencer Expert at GlobalData says: “In this time of crisis characterized by uncertainty, CEOs are facing competing challenges as they continue to navigate the financial, human and business impacts of COVID-19 pandemic. The ripple effect can now be felt by all businesses with decreasing revenues, investment cuts, downsizing workforce and declining expansion plans.”

The discussions on ‘healthcare’ among CEOs were led by the support from business leaders with funds and medical supplies to hospitals and healthcare workers who are risking their lives to fight against the virus and for creating COVID-19 vaccine.

Technology is another area of discussion among CEOs. The conversations were led by support efforts from technology companies like Cisco, SAP and Salesforce to provide their technologies to help those in need. Cybersecurity is another area of discussion among CEOs as this pandemic poses great risk of increased cyberattacks with organisations’ heightened dependency on digital infrastructure.  

Saxena concludes: “As the impact of the COVID-19 continues to escalate, leaders have adopted new necessary measures to minimise business disruption such as remote working for employees, regular communication to keep employees aligned and informed, investment in new technology and new health and safety procedures.”