Quite clearly we're in the middle of it now.  People are reporting sales and profit performances down 20, 30, 40 and even 50% against budget over these last couple of months.  Those who haven't seen it yet are bracing themselves for the flow-on effects.

A lot of people feel like they're standing in a hurricane's wreckage.  We haven't seen this kind of slowdown for many years.  In the property sector, some veterans are saying it's never been this bad.

What to do?  

I have a strong personal belief (based on personal experience) that as one door closes, a thousand flowers bloom.  Aside from being both a cliche and a mixed metaphor (no mean feat), this little mantra reminds me that amidst the wreckage, there isn't just one opportunity but dozens, if I'm prepared to look for them.

In this blog, I want to focus on the importance of getting our heads right.  In a subsequent blog I'll talk about some of the opportunities that tough times create for smart businesses.

Our response to adversity is fundamentally a choice.  The adversity might be the same for two different people, but one will rise above it, and the other will be swamped by it.  It isn't the event that causes the different outcomes, it is the different scripts that play in each person's head.  The outcome is determined not by the event but by our response.  Therefore, we do have a choice, albeit one that is difficult to exercise when our scripts are so deeply learned and rehearsed.

The choice you make becomes a self-fulfilling prophesy.  If you believe it's the end of the line, it probably will be, because all you will tend to see is evidence of your belief.  Simply hoping that it's going to be OK is also not enough.  Hope is not a recognised business strategy. 

We have to make two choices, the first of which is not to allow the event to trigger helpless surrender. We've been doing some work with NBCoach members on how we can become more resilient.  There are four key things we have to recognise:

• The situation is real and very serious, but we will prevail in the end (the Stockdale Paradox that Jim Collins talks about in Good to Great).
• Like all adversity, this is temporary.  It may take a while, but, in the words that have given comfort through the ages, this too shall pass.
• It is limited to your business.  There is no reason for it to spill over into the other areas of your life such as your health, relationships, family life and sense of personal worth.
• It's not your fault, so don't take it personally.  I saw a great episode of "House" the other night.  A patient was lying in the hospital bed performing magic tricks, and one of the doctors said to him, "You're dying.  Aren't you worried?" He replied, "I didn't know that worrying was now an approved therapy."

The second choice we have to make is to decide to look actively for the gift in the adversity.  When I've asked people to look for the gift, they never fail to find at least some blessing in the adversity, and often, as they continue to think about it, they begin to see some real opportunities.  It doesn't matter that these opportunities are forced upon us.  Our reluctance is due to our attachment to the familiar and our fear of change. 

Let's face it, there's nothing like a crisis for helping us:

• focus on what really matters
• make the tough choices that we'd rather put off
• drop outdated commitments
• clear the diary
• break the cycle of reinforcement/success (the "if it ain't broke don't fix it, even if it's rusty" approach)  

Question: what's the gift in your adversity?