Thought for Today Surviving Recession The first line of defense in any business downturn lies in the company's Will to Compete. If that is strong, the company thrives. If it is weak, the company falters.  A company's Will to Compete is not just the fighting spirit of the CEO, though that is important, nor the sum of the individual managers' commitments to survive. It is the resultant leadership available to the company after all dissonance and misdirection are accounted for. Some people refer to this as the Spirit of the company. But another, more neutral term might be the Operating Dynamicİ.   The Operating Dynamic is in fact the root cause and driver of all corporate performance. As long as this remains invisible, it negatively impacts performance. But once brought into the open it can be changed, improved, put to work strengthening the company. The nice thing about the Operating Dynamic is that it's entirely within the control of management, so improving it costs virtually nothing. And a small improvement there has been shown to cause a huge improvement in both competitiveness and the bottom line. The first step is to measure it.