As I mentioned in my earlier post, if your business is growing in a growing market, it’s often hard to tell whether it’s “you” or the “market” that accounts for most of your success.  It’s only during the recessions that we can really, truly tell the “execution excellence” from the “market excellence.” (see my earlier blog post for details).

And, given that, it leads to what I think is an important point.  Recessions are the time when you can tell whether you and your team are effective.

And, because you can tell, this is the right time to do something about it. To plan.  To build.  To optimize.  Of course, you want to do this with an eye to the bottom line.  The lights need to stay on; the doors need to continue to open.

One big area of “instant improvement” is to work through how you manage projects and communications in your business.  Crisp deliverables.  Short meetings.  Instant chats.  All these things create a massive increase in productivity for most businesses.

This is where Web 2.0 comes to the rescue.

Today’s technology offers several ways to do manage projects and keep yourself organized.  And, on the whole, these are free for businesses to use.  These office collaboration applications give you easy ways to share files, milestones and to-do-lists. And, what’s also cool about these types of tools is that they can be used anywhere—in the office, and at home or on the road.  And, they can be used to manage projects that aren’t just in your company, your business partners and clients/customers can be included in the mix.

There are a number of these tools out there, one of my clients actually makes one.  So obviously, I’m biased.  But, I really think their tool is the right mix of technologies to move businesses forward. We use it to manage many of our projects, both internal and others.

Here’s a private link.  Check it out, and I’d love to know what you think!

http://www.remindo.com/?invitation=WEF

And, when you do start using these types of tools, I think you’ll find out that they expose your business to a completely different culture.  One that will, over time become more aggressive, fun, and fruitful.  And, isn’t that what we need to get out of the current doldrums?