The Blessing of Recession
- by Nigel George. First published: 14th February 2009
Most often in the middle of the 'doom and gloom’ we forget that we have all been here before. The world didn’t end last time and it won’t end this time either – so use the lull to your advantage.
Key Points
- This slowdown is not the first and it won’t be the last.
- Slow times allow you to look at what you need to improve and to explore opportunities.
- Now is the time to act on these opportunities, not sit on your hands screaming 'the end is nigh!’.
Been There, Done That
As much as it feels different every time, we have all been here before.
This time, a whole lot of greedy financiers got caught with their pants down inventing money and hanging the responsibility on someone elses neck (yes it’s a simplification, but when it comes down to it, not by much).
One trick I picked up so many years ago now I can’t remember the source is, if you are feeling depressed about the state of the world, go and read the newspaper archives. Now’s the time to pull out headlines from 1987, or maybe 1999 to 2001. I seem to remember that the (financial) world as we know it was ending those years too.
But we’re still here. And we have grown. And prospered.
So greed has had another reality check.
So what?
For the Daily Pragmatist, being able to step back from the daily circus that is running a business is a good thing. You get to address what you are doing wrong and what you can do better.
So a slowdown in not the time to be sticking your head in the sand. It’s time to count your blessings – you did wake up this morning after all – and address some of the things you should have addressed a long time ago.
Taking Action
1. Clear the Air
First step is to get you and your people looking up and looking forward, instead of down at their toes. Each company culture is different, so you will have your own way of doing this – but you need to get your people talking directly about their fears, how they think it affects them and their job and how your particular market is behaving.
There is only one point to this exercise – once the baggage is up and out there you can deal with it.
Sure as the sun will rise tomorrow, there will be a lot of worried people standing around wondering if their neck is on the line. You have to get this out there and be honest about it.
To be brutally honest, I believe that retrenching people in the down times and picking them up again in the boom is one of the dumbest things any business can do. This is a whole subject on it’s own and will be the subject of another article, but for now there are a couple of ideas below that allow you to minimise this pointless cycle.
2. Looking Forward. Looking Back.
OK, so most of us have had a good run of it the last few years. Now is the time to see what you did well, what could be better and what you should stop doing.
- How did you all perform, individually and as an organisation, while things were going well?
- What changes can be made so that you do even better next time the cycle turns up?
- Are there new products/services you would like to build on and were unable to give the time to while things were kicking along?
- Where are your bottlenecks? What processes and rituals are just getting in the way of servicing your customers?
3. Do Something!
You’ve all heard the old sayings about idle hands and idle minds – well now’s the time to follow through on the previous exercise. You have people on reduced workload, or maybe not working at all – assuming you hired right in the first place and want to keep them around, give them a project to keep them busy through this slowdown.
There is no such business that is doing everything right. No process that cannot be improved and no staff member who cannot contribute to making your company better. It just takes a bit of shared vision to see past the gloom.
Get it even half right and by the time the next upturn comes you will be on the ground running long before any of your competitors even realise the clouds have cleared.
