The question for everyone right now should be "what does it all mean for ME?!" We know that capitalism has not come to an end and there is no longer any excuse to stay stuck like a rabbit in the headlights. It's tough, but in many ways it is still business as usual. If you are running a small to medium sized creative agency, as just one example, it means what you have always known. You need to stay nimble on your feet and be looking for new customers. If you have a balance between public and private sector clients, you may want to alter your focus a bit come the autumn. And if you are entirely focused on the public sector, you should prepare to fight for budget. If you are already suffering through the private sector economic decline, you need to solidify your customer relationships with companies that will do well in recovering economies and try to bag a few of them as clients. Everyone does well on a rising tide, but the plain truth is that, whatever shape this recession turns out to be, we will have to wait a good few years to feel that surge tide floating us all high again with both private and public sector growing. I am afraid there is no escaping the fact that it is going to be a lot of hard work and we are going to see both winners and losers for quite a while to come. If you want to be on the winning side, now is time to think through your strategy and to put in place plans to protect and grow your business. Rose Lewis Pembridge Partners LLP

The economic cycle hasn't been abolished and in the normal course of events we are about due for the next economic slowdown anyway, having hardly recovered from the last one. Is that a 'double dip'? Sounds like an economy inevitably facing a lot of problems as the last recession was caused by the inevitable blow up of the mother of all credit binges, with most of the problems swept under the carpet with a combination of rescues and 'quantitative easing'. That's left the economy with the burden of a large section of 'walking wounded' without the strength to contribute much if any to growth - aka the banks. It will be much the same until the massive overhang of bad debts is allowed to be swept away. Various sequels to 'Lehman I' will be inevitable but with no money left for rescues. Western governments are no more able to stand in the way of economic forces than Canute was able to command the tide or Communist central planners were able to direct their economies despite the draconian powers at their disposal.

Heck of a job there, it absltouley helps me out.