Every recession reshuffles the same deck.
Manufacturing contracts.
Capital spending slows.
Consumers defer.
Projects get postponed.
And yet, some businesses remain remarkably stable.
Why?
Because they are not discretionary.
They are necessary.
Historically, discretionary industries absorb the sharpest impact during economic contractions.
Non-discretionary services – food distribution, medical services, pharmaceuticals, electrification, infrastructure, utilities – tend to hold far more stable ground.
The difference is not luck.
It is position.
Discretionary businesses depend on:
Non-discretionary businesses depend on:
The question leaders should be asking now is simple:
If pressure increases, will customers view what we provide as optional – or essential?
ITR Economics has warned that the road ahead will be uneven, with volatility increasing toward the next decade.
Revenue may grow in the short term.
But when cycles turn, customers triage.
They eliminate what they can delay.
They preserve what they cannot operate without.
If your value is framed as enhancement rather than necessity, margin protection becomes exponentially harder.
You do not need to change industries to become more resilient.
You may need to change how your value is defined.
Organizations that reposition successfully typically:
Instead of selling:
They anchor value in:
They move from “improvement” to “indispensable.”
Discretionary models often carry:
These increase fragility.
Resilient organizations clarify:
Clarity stabilizes margin.
Becoming non-discretionary requires trust.
Trust requires structure.
That means:
When expectations are explicit and performance is visible, customers depend on you differently.
You are no longer an option.
You are infrastructure.
When customers view your work as essential:
Margin protection becomes proactive rather than reactive.
This is not about raising prices aggressively.
It’s about designing your business so pricing reflects necessity.
Before the next downturn accelerates:
If the answer is unclear, growth alone will not protect you.
Position will.
In Part 5, we’ll explore the final lever leaders must confront:
Why hiring more people rarely solves margin pressure – and how adding capacity without redesigning leadership systems accelerates profitless prosperity.
📅 [Schedule a Strategy Alignment Session]
Let’s determine whether your business is positioned as essential – or treated as optional.