Last year, we went away on our inaugural Needmore partner summit, now a yearly December event at the Grand Lodge, and came away with the unanticipated goal of not growing the business at all over the year. Instead, we decided to focus on a small number of projects we were passionate about and focus on each opportunity to create a remarkable website. Must have been something in the water!

Without the pressure to produce more, we were focused and inspired throughout the year and even carved out time to head overseas and soak in design inspiration. Funny thing happened over the year, though – while we were focusing on staying lean and creative, we actually did end up growing the business more than we had originally anticipated. This growth happened organically and was easier to absorb into our routine.

This year, with our December summit just around the corner, we are again talking about the benefit of not growing the business over the course of next year. We’ve noticed the benefit to the quality of our sites and to our personal work/life balance as positives in this focus.

Yet another benefit of this plan became clear today while reading Beancounter Blog (my favorite read for timely business financial advice). Today, Beancounter posted a list of ways your small business can survive a recession. Along with important advice on cash flow – such as keeping around cash, collecting debts, cutting expenses, and not buying ahead in bulk – Beancounter also talks about not focusing on growth over the next year.

Why, from an economic standpoint, would you ever not want to focus on growing your business? This is the time, he notes, “to hunker down and just wait out the storm. This will put you in the perfect position to make strategic growth decisions after the crisis is over.”

Whether it is for quality of your work, a good work/life balance, or for time to stock up on cash reserves and wait out the months ahead, we’ll be spending the next year focusing on quality over of quantity.