Surviving the Business Storm Cycle: Book Review

Surviving the Business Storm Cycle: Book Review

Things get so busy you can barely keep up (dodgeball), then things slow down (baseball), and you wonder what you did wrong. There were many nice summaries of the business cycle, very clearly stated and with examples. Mr. Hopson describes this cycle as the Tornado, where you have Traction, followed by an Avalanche where things slow down and you have to clean up and you enter the Consolidation phase.

He has some very nice comparisons to the life cycle of a caterpillar, adoption of new technologies, and a few others. In each case, there’s a rhythm, an expected cycle. In business, he believes it’s important for a company to know what phase it is in at any point, and take action appropriate to that phase.

I really enjoyed how much time he spent talking about the opportunities built into the slower part of the cycle; the importance of bringing staff along, including training, and acknowledging the resistance to change; and finally, how technology needs to be the third part of the triangle – People, Process, and Technology.

The constant pitching of his services as an outside consultant was a little irritating. I agree that IT gets too-little attention and most companies want the ‘magic bullet’ and balk at investing in training, so the point is still valid. The key ideas and reminders are worth the effort; it’s a fast read! – CMW