Here we go again. Suddenly, people are fleeing the stock market for the safety of muni’s and other low risk investments. The U.S. dollar is strong only because of the weakness of the Euro and other foreign currencies supported by extraordinary deficits.  Emerging markets such as China, India and Singapore are the only ones growing and even China’s forecasts are cooling. Some economists are calling all of this a dreaded double dip.  Is this spasm an overreaction?

I am not here to offer a prediction as much as some perspective. Historically, there have been two elements that have preceded U.S. recessions.  Typically, there has been a scandal such as the Savings and Loan Crisis, Michael Milken, Enron/Worldcom, and most recently the liquidity crises triggered by the likes of Goldman Sachs, AIG, Lehman Bros, and Bear Stearns, where someone has manipulated a market (most recently derivatives and credit default swaps).  Secondly, the recession usually follows a bubble (dot.com, real estate, etc).  In other words, our economy gets fat and happy, investors take advantage, and then the bubble bursts.

We certainly have not seen our economy swell over the last 12 months.  People have been so desperate for good news that we accepted what little there was as signs of a recovery.  The reality is that our economy grows at about 5% in times of prosperity, and 2% in times of stagnation.  Three percent swings us from optimism to pessimism, which reinforces the magnitude of emotions in our decision making. Fear is always the most powerful emotion and motivator, greater than love and all the others.

So how will the next few months play out? I don’t have a concrete answer for that but what I do know is that our reaction to the sound bites from economists and experts is quite personal. Our practice is thriving at the moment (in part due to the acceptance of the book) which is proof positive that the performance of an organization can be driven in part by one’s confidence and sheer will. Certainly, market forces are in play and in some businesses (like construction) you can still hear the giant sucking sound.  In others the business can best be described as mediocre and the entrepreneur must decide how much investment (in sales and marketing for example) is appropriate.  What I have seen from manufacturing clients is that are petrified of expanding their factories out of fear that they will not be able to dial back capacity.

In a universe where most are passive, there is more opportunity for the aggressors.  I read of one recent investor who bought BP and shorted Apple, a counter strategy that clearly made him a lot of money. While I am not dispensing any investment advice, I am suggesting that we all must make individual choices on the level of risk we are willing to accept. In an age when things are uncertain, there is as much evidence that we will continue along a modest recovery path as there is that the bottom will fall out, and I have made the choice to stay on course. If you are not comfortable with the status quo, it may be time to find new product, services, channels or sectors because there does not appear to be a hockey stick coming any time soon.

When I first saw it, I remember thinking that BP’s bright sunburst (green, yellow and white) logo looked really refreshing compared to those of other stodgy oil company brands. BP has positioned itself as the greener energy company. Bet they would like to take a mulligan. Its current stock decline alone has cost BP $25 billion in enterprise value, but where are the hidden costs?

While being interviewed this week by George Stephanopoulos, BP COO Doug Suttles said “What gives me hope is that this won’t be near anything like a catastrophe ultimately; there have been other oil spills in the Gulf of Mexico and those environments seems to recover from those types of things.”  Anything near a catastrophe? I think Mr. Suttles may have sniffed too much gasoline. You don’t have to be a tree hugger to see that BP has a massive environmental problem to fix, and their inability to accept responsibility publicly for the magnitude of it will only create an equally devastating public relations disaster.

BP’s (Beyond Petroleum) Values statement reads: “Responsible-We are committed to the safety and development of our people, and the communities and societies in which we operate. We aim for no accidents, no harm to people, and no damage to the environment”.  Here is the point of my tirade: If you are going to include such claims in your values statement you need to live by them.

It would be unreasonable to think that a company, in the dangerous business of oil exploration could not have any accidents or environmental spills, they are a natural extension of the business. But it has become clear that BP’s engineers made egregious errors in a rush to gain a return on their investment in the costly Deepwater Horizon rig. A region, devastated a few short years ago by Katrina, deserves more.

There is a lesson for all of us, regardless if your company is Fortune 500 or the local pawn shop, you need to find a set of guiding principles and stick to them, come hell or low water.  We all have to take responsibility for our mistakes.  What customers and clients want to hear is, “I made a mistake, I am sorry, here is how I fixed it, and here is how I am going to make it up to you.”

BP is waffling. The company is not accepting complete responsibility and is not stepping up with enough vigor. More troubling, its leadership is not being sincere in their public statements. Calling the current spill anything less than a catastrophe for the fisherman, boat operators, land owners and wildlife is just irresponsible on its face.

In an era where our personal, professional and social interactions become more complex, we need to be better corporate citizens (regardless of our politics regarding the environment).  We might take a moment to take a look at our values statement, and make sure we are living them each and every day.