The Sunday papers speak of 24 months of hell for small business. There are tough times ahead. I believe we still have an attitudinal choice about what exactly this means for us as entrepreneurs. Many of the companies that read these types of reports will do exactly what they are expected to do - retreat back to a smaller mindset: one of cutting back; one of old habits. Others like you, of course, will adopt an aggressive attitude. We spoke about this in the past two weeks. This week I want to speak of the third element critical to navigating, so called, hard times. That is communication. When a ship is sailing on a flat ocean, there is little contact between the captain and the rest of the crew. But when the ship is in high seas, with cloud storms all about, then the communication is deliberate, often and succinct. This, too, should be your strategy during torrid times. Communicate; communicate; communicate. Everyone should be communicating with one another. The responsibility of communication does not lie with the captain alone, it is also important that the rest of the crew understand that they need to proactively communicate.

Email, meet, phone, chat. Remember to do it with DOS - Deliberately, Often and Succinctly.