If you’re a C-Level executive, or for that matter anyone in a senior management position, the coronavirus quarantine has been a sobering wakeup call underscoring just how important all things video are now and increasingly will be to the survival—yes survival—of your business. For many of us the reality of the new normal is just starting to sink in:
Yes … for the foreseeable future all of your meetings and events will be teleconferenced or livestreamed.
Yes … your marketing team will probably need to retool much of your social and paid media content as to not appear tone-deaf.
Yes … your top managers will need to be coached up on how they can best present themselves and instill confidence remotely.
Yes … your timelines for delivering these solutions will be insane and will require external resources that you currently don’t have but will need to onboard rapidly.
And no … you are probably not considering the one organizational move that could ensure the fast and focused outcomes your company desperately needs.
That one thing is recognizing that starting now, you need a CVO. A Chief Video Officer.
Preposterous? Unnecessary? Silly?
Perhaps? But consider this:
Prior to the pandemic, most companies relegated video to a marketing support function. On the org chart, internal video communications and video content responsibilities typically fell somewhere between the COO and CMO, and that was working out just fine. Even suggesting the idea of appointing a Chief Video Officer would have probably gotten you laughed out of the room.
But that was then. Today, in the world you live in now, failure to recognize the critical importance video solutions will have across your entire enterprise just doesn’t cut it.
Video is the new vernacular. Waning attention spans are rendering long-form text communications increasingly impotent. While quarantine is in effect, video is the way you will communicate with EVERYONE moving forward. And don’t kid yourself. The video strategies and best practices you’ll adopt to weather the COVID-19 crisis will stay with your organization long after the pandemic has passed.
Quickly marshaling everything from the low-level support functions of internal video communications, all the way to the strategic outbound opportunities video affords marketing, public relations, HR, and investor outreach is a big job. A very big job.
The position requires vast technical knowledge of a multitude of emerging platforms and production tools. It requires the training experience necessary to educate and align the entire organization. It requires the creative sensibilities necessary to integrate your branding through both existing and emerging channels. And arguably, the most important core competency of a CVO in today’s world is the management experience necessary to quickly assemble the right team, consisting of both internal staff and outside vendors, to meet your organization’s rapidly unfolding needs.
Your CVO is not the CEO’s nephew who just graduated. It’s not the in-house copywriter who is learning how to edit. Your CVO needs the pedigree of a seasoned business professional with a vision for how this exploding and expanding technology can improve productivity, enhance brand engagement, reduce operational expenses and, ultimately, provide your organization a competitive communications advantage as we move forward in these unchartered waters.
If you bristle at the notion of creating a C-level video position, call it a Video Czar. Or, call it an Executive Director of Video Technology. In the spirit of Navigating Now, it’s more important that you create the position than what you call it.