In 2018, fashion designer Helen Cody was diagnosed with breast cancer. She underwent eight intense months of treatment, including a double mastectomy. "Once you are hit with a terrifying diagnosis," she says now, "you re told all these frightening things, in a quite clinical setting: What will happen to you, what your treatment will be. You re in this awful place where your brain starts to go completely bonkers.
SmartCompany
The Little Oak Company managing director Elke Pascoe and her family.
This year has seen small businesses and startups close their doors for good, brace for gangbusters growth, and everything in between.
Notably, those that have seen success in the face of the pandemic have one thing in common. Put simply, it is resilience, and the ability to be nimble and pivot in the face of adversity.
Here’s what 2020 has taught these 12 entrepreneurs about surviving and thriving in a crisis.
Elke Pascoe
In and amongst all the discussions of pandemics and dire times, it will come as little surprise that my biggest takeaway from 2020 is that adversity has an uncanny way of prioritising the things in your life.