Coming into the 2022 offseason, the Boston Bruins’ entire success rides on future hall of fame center Patrice Bergeron resigning with the team for one last run.  Why is this?  Well, that’s because the front office did not adequately prepare for Bergeron’s retirement and have no one to slide into his role when he goes.

As a business owner, you must do the opposite of the Bruins and prepare for the good times to end (or at least for tougher times).  That’s right, you need to prepare for a recession.  I’m not going to tell you to go absolutely crazy with cutting costs.  Rather, to look at a recession as an opportunity to dominate your market and shred the competition.

Here is a list of steps to take to prepare for a recession:

1. Prepare A Roster Of Employees: List them for most valuable to least valuable.  If a recession occurs, you can use this list to see who goes first.  The key here is that you made the list beforehand in a clear state of mind. 
2. Cut Costs: Prepare a list of costs you would cut should recession occur.  Again, better to do this now with a clear state of mind.
3. Sell Off Assets: What assets could you sell to generate cash?  Any old vehicles or equipment that you don’t use anymore would be a great place to start.
4. Create More Value: Create more value in your products or services by bundling, cross-selling, upselling, and downselling.
5. Joint Venture Partners: Find joint venture partners to get more referrals and add to your income.
6. Don’t Cut Marketing and Advertising: Instead, spend those dollars to create a market dominating position.  A market dominating position is identifying the problem the customer has and doesn’t want.  After that, the market dominating position offers the solution to the problem that the customer can’t find.  Once you have this, you educate customers about your solution and create a compelling offer.  All of these components make up what I call the “Conversion Equation.”

Obviously, we are not in a recession and I’m not saying we are heading into one.  But, it is always a good idea to prepare.