Romanian companies are reacting in emergency mode in the current context, with one in three reporting a severe economic impact, investments postponed and decisions suspended, according to an internal study conducted in July by a market research company among private sector employees.

Thus, 89% of companies are feeling a negative impact: 33% describe the situation as “very strong”, and 56% talk about a moderate but constant impact, which affects their plans and consumes their internal resources. Only 11% say they are relatively unaffected – especially smaller companies or managers who do not directly manage financial pressures.

“Faced with an unpredictable economic context, private companies are reacting promptly – but tactically rather than strategically. The most frequent responses indicate an accelerated repositioning in the area of efficiency, not growth: cost optimization, adjusting the commercial strategy and renegotiating contracts become immediate priorities”, reveals the study conducted by Reveal Marketing Research, quoted by Agerpres.

The most frequent measures reported are: 67% focused more on operational efficiency; 48% rethinked the sales and marketing strategy; 39% reduced fixed costs or renegotiated contracts; 18% reoriented towards lower-cost products and services; 16% suspended growth plans. Only 12% stated that they did not change their initial directions.

“The alarm signal is clear: only 1 in 10 companies says it has not changed anything, the rest are already in an adjustment process – but without a long-term vision. Brands feel enormous pressure to be relevant “here and now”, not necessarily sustainable over time”, draw the attention of the authors of the paper.

In their opinion, investments are the first to be cut, in conditions where “you survive, not build”.

In the current climate of uncertainty, companies in the private sector are conserving their resources and avoiding any move that does not guarantee an immediate return. Thus, 30% have postponed investments in equipment or infrastructure, 18% have suspended plans to expand into new markets, 14% have put digitalization or IT projects on hold.

Perhaps the most serious signal comes from the human resources area, given that 52% of companies have postponed hiring or team expansion – a figure that suggests not only caution, but a severe brake on development.

“We no longer invest in anything that does not bring immediate returns,” said an operational manager, FMCG sector, participating in the study.

This reactive approach confirms the general tendency to “live from one month to the next”, without an appetite for risk or strategic construction, warn the study’s authors.

According to the cited source, in an economic context dominated by uncertainty, companies choose efficiency instead of innovation, adaptation instead of expansion and empathetic communication instead of ambitious promises. From the answers provided, a preservation instinct clearly emerges: to deliver what is required, to clearly state what we can do, to keep the team motivated.

Practically, 66% of companies rely on the rapid adaptation of offers to market demand, 45% emphasize transparent communication with customers and partners (in an unstable climate, honesty becomes a competitive asset), 44% invest in motivating and training the team. Although hiring is blocked in 52% of companies, those who remain must be supported. In the absence of external resources, human capital becomes the main driver of adaptation.

Also, despite the difficult climate, only 16% of companies explicitly mention the need for financial solutions (credits, leasing, factoring), not because they do not need support, but because the priority is no longer rescue, but “lucid navigation”.

In contrast, 59% rely on networking and strategic partnerships, signaling that the way out of the crisis can no longer be individual, but collaborative, and 45% request market information and sector studies, in the hope that they will be able to make correct decisions, based on reality, not on instinct.

The study also shows that priorities differ significantly depending on the role and size of the company. Thus, the CEO wants action (only 21% of CEOs mention the need for market intelligence, but almost half – 47% – demand quick and firm decisions); middle management wants benchmarks (62% of department managers demand access to external insights to better understand the context); small companies seek connections (84% of companies with fewer than 50 employees say that networking and strategic partnerships are the most important resource at the moment), and large companies seek control (55% of large companies demand market intelligence, and 33% want technological support for efficiency and increased visibility).

Article distributed with the support of  Schneider Electric