The last few years have been extremely tough for us here at Coachio Group. Covid nearly killed us, literally in some cases, but metaphorically in respect of our business operations. In any business, but in particular as a small business such as ours, it’s always really difficult to survive without good cashflow and when the pandemic hit, there was no cashflow!
Therefore, 2023 was going to be the year that we recovered from that period, we would put all that horrible stressful stuff behind us and move forward with renewed focus and energy and get back on track.
In our industry, January is always a quiet month, because nothing much happens, due to everyone being on holiday! As a team, we tend to use this time for planning and then in February everything ramps back up and gets back to normal. Not this year!
As we all know, January was the wettest on record for Central Auckland, passing the previous record set in 1869, causing major flooding across the city which took many months to recover from. February saw Cyclone Gabrielle inflict devastation across the Country, but in particular, on the Gisborne and Hawkes Bay regions, leading to a number of deaths and damage that will take years to recover from. There were 11 locations in New Zealand that experienced over a years’ worth of rain in the first six months of 2023!
So, our ‘year of recovery’ certainly didn’t go as planned, after starting with the first quarter being almost completely written off, for obvious and understandable reasons. We would now also need to recover from this year!
However, despite the volume of work being cancelled causing some significant stress and pressure for us as a team, in the context of what was happening to the people and businesses in those worst hit areas, we knew our problems were insignificant. It’s all about perspective and what happens in business, doesn’t touch what happens to people in those situations.
It’s easy to say to someone ‘there’s always someone worse off than you’, and although that’s not always easy to hear when you’re deep in it and someone reminds you of this, it is true. Whilst our problems can seem humungous and often insurmountable to us, this is because they are our problems, and we feel them more because they are happening to us. If we can try and look at the stressors in our lives, from a different perspective and in a much wider context, it can be hugely helpful. Doing so can not only help reduce or alleviate our levels of stress, which is important for good health, but as a result we are also not quite so impeded by the effects of stress, which means we are in a much stronger position to be able to think and work our way through things, or simply just learn to cope with things if they are seemingly beyond our control.
Over the last few years, and strangely this year in particular, I think maybe as a culmination of what’s happened since 2020, we have been through so much as a team, but it has been a great learning opportunity along the way. Consequently, we are now more resilient; we know how to focus on the things we can control and not so much on the things we cannot; whilst we must learn from the past, we know that we shouldn’t ‘live’ there; if we focus on the ‘right here and now’, what we do today can bring a positive change for tomorrow; and, as much as things can get us down, we know that nothing lasts forever, this too will pass, and good things are just around the corner.
As things have slowly started to return to ‘normal’, for us as a team and as a nation, hit by one disaster after another, we are extremely grateful for what we do have, each other as well as fantastic customers who we value immensely, and appreciate for supporting us during this period. Without them we would not be here now!
To demonstrate our gratitude, and let’s be honest, to also help us get back on track, we’d like to incentivise further support of our small business by offering you and your organisation a 25% discount on all training booked and paid for in December (excludes 3rd party products). If you have a budget you want to maximise, please see our offer in our December newsletter or get in touch directly and let’s have a chat about how we can help each other in 2024. Maybe we can make it a year to remember for lots of good reasons!
Have a great Christmas break and a Happy New Year, and we will look forward to working with you all in 2024.
Thank you.