What I make of the RECESSION

Everybody’s talking about the recession. What needs to be done to survive, who will get killed, how to fire personnel in style and how to focus.

I’ve also been talking to some people who are smarter than me about this during the previous week. There’s been recurrent themes such as:

* FOCUS

* GET TO BREAK EVEN QUICKLY

* GET AS MUCH MONEY FROM INVESTORS AS YOU CAN

* CUT COSTS

Apart from these ones, there’s been a few that I find very interesting and that are interrelated.

The first one is this:

FOLLOW THE MONEY, NOT THE CROWD
This is interesting because most people tend to cut costs everywhere and anywhere. People also tend to try to do what’s popular because they think that’s going to get them through the recession.

What I make of this advice is this: FIND OUT WHAT PART OF YOUR SERVICE PEOPLE ARE WILLING TO PAY FOR AND DO THAT. DON’T ASSUME THAT IF SOMETHING IS POPULAR, PEOPLE WILL PAY FOR IT (see Facebook). EXPERIMENT QUICKLY AND STICK TO WHAT STICKS.

Also, DON’T CUT COSTS THAT ARE REVENUE GENERATING. Cut the company Christmas Party maybe, don’t cut the ads or the sales person that’s actually making you money. Cost-cutting in good, but don’t cut what’s popular to cut. Cut what does not help you survive.

The second one is:

MEDIOCRITY DOES NOT SURVIVE RECESSIONS
This is kind of in your face, but it’s probably the most important piece of advice. If you’re plain excellent, you’ll thrive no matter what. So indeed FOCUS, but focus on what you think you can be the best at and forget the rest.

So out of all the discussions I’ve been following recently about the recession, I’ve taken these two pieces of advice to heart and that’s what I think I’ll act on. The rest is common sense.

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