The other day I ran across a quote I had forgotten all about from Thomas Carlyle, “No pressure, no diamonds.”

If there was a way to sum up 2009, I think this quote would be it. ’09 was the year of make it or break it. Time Magazine has referred to the first decade in the 21^st century as “The Decade from Hell”. While it definitely wasn’t the most prosperous period in recent history, I think we would fare much better from taking it as a learning experience rather than damning the past 10 years. Take a look back at your business, look over what did and didn’t work. It’s easy to shine when things are going well, but real character shows when the pressure is on.

Necessity, after all, is the mother of all invention. This past year, many businesses were more open to thinking in new ways about improvements to their work processes. Some ideas worked, some didn’t; but what’s more important than the failure is focusing on how those ideas can act as a spring board into 2010.

We’re all ready to leave 2009 behind us, but before we cast it off into the land of the forgotten don’t forget to take a look back to examine the lessons learned.