Posts Tagged ‘Timeliness’

Time Is Not On Your Side

Thursday, June 11th, 2009
Speed Is Of The Essence

Speed Is Of The Essence

In Prepare for the Worst, Plan for the Best: Disaster Preparedness and Recovery for Small Businesses (Wiley, second edition paperback, 2009), I cited a study conducted by the group of certified public accountants concerning the experiences of small businesses in the immediate vicinity of the World Trade Center at the time of the 1993 bombing. They found that of those businesses that could not resume operations within five days, 90% of them were out of business one year later. In other words, small businesses recover quickly or they do not recover at all. You simply cannot recover at a leisurely pace. And cash flow is the life blood of a small business. This lesson appears to have eluded the U.S. Small Business Administration which on June 15 will begin to accept applications for the small business emergency loan program that was authorized by Congress back in February. The adage “Better late than never” simply does not apply to small businesses.