Collaborate. Cooperate. Love each other, damn it.
Gregg Vigliotti for the New York Times
One hour each day, I’m glued to the television. For a strategy consultant like me, NY Governor Cuomo’s press conferences are like watching The Hunger Games.
I’m riveted by the way he explains complicated math concepts - the curve! the apex! the projections! the models! - in terms everyone can understand. I’m on the edge of my seat as he unveils the agonizing tradeoffs between public health and economic concerns. Most of all, I am fascinated by the way this crisis is drawing out both the good and the bad in human nature. Every day, I’m rooting for the triumph of the good.
When I’m not Cuomo-watching, I’m often engaged in a lively game of Pandemic with my family. The prescient board game challenges players to strategize together in order to eradicate a global pandemic. This collaborative game has been a joy to play with my very competitive children - there are no winners and losers, no fights and no tears. We are all in it together.
The real-life version is taking place just outside our windows here in New York City. We’re the hardest hit American city so far, but we may just be the beachhead.
Going first has some disadvantages, including the need to raise an urgent red flag, while everyone else is fearfully squirreling away nuts for the winter.
“Containment becomes realistic only when Americans realize that working together is the only way to protect themselves and their loved ones,” explained Cuomo a few days ago. The logic of his argument failed to sink in. People continued to cluster in the parks. He closed playgrounds. Ventilators on loan from other states did not appear. He continued his appeal.
“We can’t have 50 states competing. We need a coordinated effort.” He called for a Surge Health Force that would share healthcare professionals across states and a rolling deployment of ventilators to meet the needs of the expected sequential apexes in major urban centers across America.
Willingness of other states to collaborate in this way has yet to reveal itself. Day after day, I watch Governor Cuomo beg for help and offer his help in return. It saddens me.
It’s a tough ask. Human nature tends toward survival instincts. We scurry to collect what we need in a crisis. At home, people have stocked up on necessary items like groceries, toilet paper, hand sanitizer, and Clorox wipes. Unfortunately, states and hospitals have done much the same thing, stockpiling masks, PPE, and ventilators. States competing with each other and with the federal government have driven the price of a ventilator up from $20k to $50k. Competition is a survival strategy.
Certainly, the good in human nature has also emerged. Healthcare workers across the country are risking their lives to save others. In NY state 85,000 volunteer healthcare workers have joined the fight, including over 20,000 from out of state. The coronavirus has unleashed unprecedented scientific collaboration and a completely new culture of doing research.
We are also seeing smart people push the limits of their imaginations to generate original ideas in a hurry. Using dorms, nursing homes, and convention centers to house hospital beds. Splitting ventilator tubes and repurposing BIPAP and anesthesia machines. Fabricating protective equipment out of whatever materials are available.
Collaboration and creativity are also important survival strategies.
Outside of the state, Cuomo can only appeal to logic and compassion. Within the state, he has more power. He convened the statewide healthcare system this week, asking hospitals to share staff, transfer patients, and contribute to a central stockpile of supplies to be distributed as needed. He has now signed an Executive Order allowing the state to redistribute ventilators to hospitals in need.
Today Governor Cuomo appealed to our hearts. “We need love now. We need love as a people... It’s about doing the right thing.” Calling for collaboration, community, and love, at the moment, he’s a voice crying in the wilderness. But he’s right.
My fear is if everyone continues competing for resources instead of cooperating, we are all going to lose, because, as in the board game, the enemy is the virus, not each other.
My hope is that we emerge from this hellish scenario, as businesspeople, as public leaders, as humans, with a new take on things. Instead of viewing every situation through our own hyper-individual lens, we will think more broadly about the right way to optimize the outcome for all. We’ll consider how we can contribute to creating value for the community.
This virus is a big old warning sign that if we’re going to continue as a species, we have to stop being so selfish. Hello, climate change? We are all part of one big interconnected ecosystem - economically, socially, and physically, as the virus has pointed out. We have to cooperate, help each other, teach each other, and love each other, in order to survive.
Stay the fuck home. Share your damn ventilators. Get with the program, people.