Companies should ask three critical questions as they shift from cost-cutting to expansion mode. In recession, most companies know what they need to do: cut costs. But in recovery, corporate muscles that have gone unexercised must be flexed anew. In preparation, boards and top managers would do well to ask three basic questions. What is success? In earlier eras, the success of a company was judged by a mixture of measures, including its fundamental economic …showed first 75 words of 840 total…

…showed last 75 words of 840 total…however, only provides ammunition to the rock throwers. Business leaders should demonstrate more confidence in their moral position as creators of wealth, opportunity, and rising living standards and should work proactively to build trust between their organizations and society at large. These three questions ought to be high on management's strategic agendas. By grappling with these issues more thoroughly than happened in the previous cycle of boom and bust, businesses can generate more durable growth.