Peter Bregman recently posted on Harvard Business blog about
“Why Small Companies Will Win in This Economy”.

It’s a great post, full of common-sense-optimism, that makes a change from the doom-and-gloom we’ve all seen of late. He talks about why decision makers are moving away form bigger companies as their service provider to smaller, more flexible companies. He argues that ultimately this comes down to trust between people, not brands:

Small is the new big. Sustainable is the new growth.
Trust is the new competitive advantage.

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I had lunch with Eoghan and Paul from Contrast earlier today. We had some nice burgers in Bóbó’s — I’m still full. As we were leaving myself and Paul weighed up the pros and cons of tech companies offering that little bit more in recessionary times, and we concluded that companies that do so are likely to fare better in the months ahead. In a recession people expect a bit more value for their money.

OK, so this isn’t rocket science — it’s just a little bit of common sense, and it doesn’t apply solely to the web or tech industry, nor tough economic times for that matter. I think any company that doesn’t try to go that extra mile for their customers are failing to sufficiently differentiate themselves from the competition, and sooner or later that will hurt.
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Since opening a few months ago, we’ve been faced with the recession. One thing we noticed and found important so far (and something we have been telling and helping our customers with) is that in times of recession it is important to innovate and come up with new ideas.

For instance small companies are confronted and struggling to get users at this time of the year (Not only in the tech and IT industry) but in all industries, and what we have been doing for a few months when companies come to us is quite simple, take what’s working, take what’s not working, flip it in all sides, find a new way and easier way of accomplishing the tasks you want done and go with it. There’s a term I heard from one of the lead developers from a VoIP company that I thought was well worded for the current economic situation: “Grow a pair and do it“.

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