Come 2009 and perhaps for the next few years, the impact of what started off in 2007 as a sub prime mortgage crisis in the US, and which later evolved into a global credit crunch will unfold into a global recession. Companies in most industry sectors are already starting to feel the pinch. Dwindling demand for their products and services sparked by cash flow problems and chokes incredit lines are enough to send company revenues in a downward trend. Even if oil prices are in a downward trend, business cost across the board will take time to deregulate itself to comfortable levels for companies to operate. During these challenging times, top management of companies are compelled to look for innovative ways to keep their businesses afloat. There could be both short and long term solutions. The usual considerations , just to name a few, tend to be such as headcount cuts or freezes, wage cuts, budget cuts, freeze in expenditures of all sorts or even mergers & acquisitions - which should really be actions of last resort. But innovative ways of surviving a downturn reside in business improvements engagements such as Lean implemenation, six sigma, kaizen, etc. How many of us have actually considered business improvements to ride us through an economic recession?
Monday, December 8, 2008
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The housing bubble was and is a major player, but imported oil and the high cost of gasoline caused a shift in how dollars were spend on main street last year. We have to remove the need for import oil..!!
Agree using the lean tools will help us weather the down turn, but the US must level our the playing field on trade if US manufacturing is to continue.
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