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PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to outline a range of short‐ to medium‐term recession‐specific strategies designed to drive growth and ensure that a company survives this downturn and emerges from it competitively advantaged.Design/methodology/approachThe paper examines recession‐specific strategies designed to drive growth and ensure that a company survives.FindingsEven after the eventual economic recovery, heightened uncertainty and volatility will remain permanent features of the business environment. As a result, resilience – the ongoing ability to anticipate and adapt to critical strategic shifts – will become an increasingly important driver of future competitive advantage. Given the likelihood that the strategic environment will remain uncertain even after the recovery, the company must institutionalize the lessons learned during the downturn. And go further to adjust the customer offering and business practices (new services, new features, new pricing models, enter or exit markets, band with other businesses in cooperative relationships).Practical implicationsThe consensus is growing among economists, business leaders, and governments that the world is in the midst of a prolonged slowdown of unpredictable duration and that even when the upturn comes, the post‐crisis strategic and operating environment will almost certainly be quite different.Originality/valueThe authors warn that some of the classic strategies for gaining competitive advantage – for instance, focusing on scale – have been losing their power. Senior managers need to heed these warnings when they review their growth and survival plans.

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