10 mistakes in a recession
Recessions cause the economy to contract and make it harder for people to do business. What we are experiencing right now has people responding in a similar way, reacting to the economic contraction with more contraction. While it may be a normal reaction to contract at this point, it only guarantees that you’ll be smaller when this is all over.
These are the biggest mistakes people and businesses can make right now: 1) People focus on the problem and not the solution. You don’t want to run away from problems, you want to identify and solve them. Problems are opportunities.
2) Respond with contraction by contracting. You will only get smaller because of your actions, not because of the economy. Now is the time to expand in amounts proportional to what your industry has contracted.
3) Underestimating the level of activity required. The amount of effort required now is and will be much greater to get things done, so prepare and empower your organization to take more action and be more persistent.
4) Lower prices. Lowering the price at this time is wrong. Do the math; less volume at a lower price is suicide. Now is the time to train your people on how to create value, not lower prices.
5) Relying on old strategies to handle the new environment. The old strategies will not work in this new economy. It will be ‘unusual business’ for some time.
6) Agree with the masses. Look at what the masses of people are saying and doing and then do the opposite. The masses almost always do the ‘wrong’ thing.
7) Overqualified customers. Treat every opportunity like a buyer right now. With money and credit harder to come by, vendors tend to overrate their customers’ ability to do business.
8) Surround yourself with others who are problem-focused. The media is full of bad news all the time, but especially right now and then friends, family, and associates spread bad news like the flu.
9) Be reasonable: This is not a time to be reasonable but unreasonable, to operate without logic regarding every action you take. If you try to make sense of things now, you won’t even want to show up for work. Let your competition be reasonable while you are not!
10) Lack of training -Now more than ever you and your people have to know how to operate, function and persist. Now is the time to train and prepare for when the good times return. Just getting past this will require great attitudes, ridiculous persistence, and better sales skills to successfully penetrate the market. Training more than any other investment will focus your people on what they can do rather than what they can’t do.
No matter what industry you’re in, now is the time to EXPAND, not contract! Let others get lost in the bad news and opt to get smaller. Now is your time to expand and gain market share by disagreeing with the answers of those you compete with. Your competitors are weak and broken, most aren’t ready or willing to do what it takes to get the job done, and most of them do little more than complain and respond to the economic downturn by hiring. Train your people now to expand and conquer the market by taking advantage of the mistakes your competitors are making.
Grant Cardone, Author and Creator of Virtual Sales Training
