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The Year to Come

A short trip on January 6th turned into 17 days on the road as weather moved in and sealed Kaslo off from the outside world. All three roads heading into town were cut off by avalanche for a couple of days, so I decided to keep moving to my next stop. (I'll try to get some pictures of the avalanche sites posted here - they are impressive).

I worked with about 100 people on this trip (one client engagement, one workshop, one three-day seminar) and got lots of first-hand feedback on how firms are fairing in this economy. I was struck by the stories of firms going down. Doors already closed, large layoffs or principals looking for jobs. It's really the first time since all the recession talk that I've felt the impact among your businesses. There are still lots of firms thriving, going full-steam ahead with little regard for the negative news around them, and there is a surprising amount of Obama-based optimism in America, so I'm not left with a sense of doom and gloom, but you annot mistake the sound of doors closing.

On a micro level it's painful to see individuals go through this, on a macro level I believe it's good for the profession. We are over-agencied and it is the strong that will survive. 

David C. Baker and I wrapped up the sixth annual ReCourses New Business Summit in Nashville last week. It's always an interesting mix of firms: the unpositioned, the positioned in language only, and the true specialists. The true specialists are thriving, but there's little consistency of success across the other two groups. Some continue to do great even with a less than ideal positioning, and some are struggling. All were there to learn though, and I think the event was a success once again. I always like hearing the stories of continued improvement afterward.

My sense of the year moving forward into this economic environment is that things will turn around mid-year and we won't reach anything close to worse-case scenario. I have no justification for this, just a sense. Until it turns around however, I expect to see a lot more firms going by the wayside.