We have previously identified the 3 phases of this viral economic crisis:
We now have some interesting developments:
With the extension of JobKeeper this means that a number of companies won’t fall off the previously anticipated September cliff - a horrible meeting of significantly depressed sales, with a sudden re-introduction of full wage costs - straight away. It is however reducing from September, and again in the New Year. There is also only one more quarterly PAYG relief payment to go. Similarly a lot of the relaxation of loan and rental terms will start to disappear in the coming months, once again placing businesses under pressure to be 100% on their game with regards to somehow growing sales in a shrinking market, whilst keeping a really tight control on costs and cash flow. We already know that there are some clear “new normals”: (applicable across B2B and B2C)
The last one here is probably the key to being able to take advantage of and/or gain from the other points, and will be the one that sets you apart from the Zombies come the apocalypse. There are some (possibly lucky) businesses that were well run, or well resourced, or both before the pandemic hit, and they have still received PAYG relief, even if their sales haven’t dipped. Anecdotally a number of these companies are currently utilising that extra cash very smartly to commence digital and other business improvements to get them even further ahead once the chaos subsides and some kind of normality returns - their resilience is enabling them to be flexible. Others are quickly shifting their product and/or service offerings to meet changing customer demands - building up resilience by being flexible. Of course even a few Zombies seem to have found some good brains to eat, and are utilising the cash flow and other forms of relief to get their bodies back into shape; shaking off some of their worst Zombie features. They are getting prepared to live on well into the future as the profitable business they were before things wandered off course and they headed over to the dark side. A number of these businesses had been protected by an unprecedented run of economic growth that kept a lot of businesses plugging along for a lot longer than they really warranted / deserved given the lack of care, attention and investment they had received. The smart ones are working that out now, and doing something about it. Then there are the true Zombies….and this is less about a Zombie attack in the sense of them attacking us, rather that Zombies are there to be attacked for the revenue they are currently consuming, that you could be taking over and adding to your revenue, delighting more customers along the way. Time for a good long look in the mirror - which side of the apocalypse are you going to be on, and what are you going to do about it?
0 Comments
|
AuthorMichael Nolan - Principal Consultant at On-Course Business Solutions Archives
November 2020
Categories |