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Christian Lundblad directs research at the Kenan Institute of Private Enterprise to help business leaders in North Carolina understand the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. He and other experts have partnered to address the challenges of moving the state’s economy forward.

They formed the North Carolina CEO Leadership Forum, a group of senior executives from North Carolina’s leading companies that come together to discuss how the pandemic is impacting their businesses and how they are addressing challenges.

“It’s undeniable that our work environment is not exactly going to go back to the way it was before. We’ve conducted a colossal experiment as a consequence to all of this,” Lundblad said. “But I think it’s important for us then to figure out what are the right investments as firms and as a state that we need to make to try to make this as beneficial to our state and our society as possible.”



Experts from KFBS share insights from research to provide a broad perspective on solutions to help the state move its economy forward.

Lundblad notes that the pandemic has adversely affected working women across the country. While some women have left the labor market, others have stayed in the labor market and are managing the challenges of navigating education for their children from home.

“I think it also has reminded us or unearthed some things that we thought had changed that perhaps hadn’t,” Lundblad said, adding that businesses need to continue to look at this challenge.



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