I Hate the Word Pivot

26 May I Hate the Word Pivot

You know what I’ve really grown to hate over the past few weeks? The word “pivot”.

Pivot: the central point, pin, or shaft on which a mechanism turns or oscillates.

The word pivot used to make me think of my beloved 1991-1992 Chicago Bulls. Those boys pivoted (on the court), and it was exciting to watch. The way the word pivot is being thrown around by huge corporations these days, though, kind of makes me ill. 

Everywhere I look, I see giant companies complaining about how they have to figure out how to pivot due to the current COVID situation, using this as an excuse to take massive stimulus checks from the government while laying off hundreds of employees who have families to feed. If you ask me, that’s pretty revealing. It reveals that these corporations aren’t selling anything that actually matters, or truly helping people, because if they were, they wouldn’t have to change their business model due to a virus.

It makes me happy that we’re a tiny little company that puts people before profits. We’ve always focused on showing up and SERVING our customers as human beings, so we don’t have to “pivot away” from anything in order to navigate the pandemic. Even though we’ve had to change the way we do certain things (like switching to a contactless order pickup system), we’ve continued to serve our customers with pride and heart. 

At MMD, we take all the negative bullshit spewed by big corporations and turn it on its head. Rather than whining about needing to change our business model,  we appreciate that we still have some mobility and choices. After all, there are a lot of things you can do when being forced to operate in a limited way. You can look inward and analyze your strengths and weaknesses. You can give an air hug. You can flip someone the bird (damn, that felt good!). 

Our company has the superpowers of hope, positivity, and laughter. We had them before the pandemic, and we still have them now. Thanks to these superpowers, along with my fiercely loyal savages – oops, I mean staffers!! – we decided that we’re going to get through this. We had no clue then, and we have no clue now, but we are ALIGNED as fuck, and our culture is stronger than ever. 

Thank you, COVID, for the confirmation that we’ve been on the right track this whole time!