Can you plan ahead?

First things first, you need to consider where you are now. As a sports coach, for example, I would test athletes against benchmarks in technical, tactical, physical and mental attributes. These benchmarks would consider where the athlete sits in relation to his or her peers, where the athlete sits in relation to athletes at the level they wish to attain and how much they have progressed over the previous year. This data would allow us to ask questions around whether they have met previous targets and if not, why not, it would also allow us to set realistic goals. Business is no different, you have to understand where you are now, how much have you progressed since your last assessment and how do you compare to those you wish to match in order to set realistic goals. A good way of doing this is through a business assessment tool, there is a quick, free, easy to use one here.

The key is to identify elements from the assessment that you can work on now regardless of what will happen in the future. For example, if the assessment tool comes back and suggests there is a lack of governance you could start putting into place the governance suggested, returning from lockdown will not change the need for governance. Equally, if an assessment suggests a need for cashflow now might be the perfect time to apply for credit and get credit on good terms before the potential recession. You could get a bounce-back loan, for example, you're unlikely to get a better deal later on. 

The key for me is to get a good picture of where you are now and build on this, try not to think about the tactics you might use to get business or improve profit right now, instead think more about an overall strategy based upon removing any known weaknesses. For example, the assessment identifies that you need to improve your marketing. Firstly understand why -  maybe it is something you do because your company isn't big enough to warrant staff and you're not an expert, in fact, you've been winging it for years!.  You can improve these things now. You can take a short marketing course on udemy, you can get free education on Facebook marketing for example. There's even a whole host of free webinars available on all sort of topics. What is for sure, is whatever happens when business gets back to normal, your weaknesses from before will still be the same unless you make changes.