This is the Fourteenth Lesson in “My 21 Lessons in 21 Years” Series

To celebrate 21 years in business, based on what I have learned from working with accountants, bookkeepers and tax advisors over 21 years I am sharing my journey and some of the lessons I learned along the way. I hope you join me on this journey and maybe learn something along the way too.

THE WEEK 150 EVENTS BECAME ZERO

The Phone Call

It was March 11th, 2020. Wednesday afternoon.

I was sitting at my desk when my phone rang. Event venue number one.

“Des, we need to talk about postponing.”

Before I could respond, my other phone buzzed. Event venue number two. Same message.

Then venue three.

Within 90 minutes, I watched 150 events—an entire year’s worth of carefully planned, meticulously scheduled in-person CPD training—vanish.

Just. Like. That.

We weren’t just an events business. The vast majority of OmniPro’s revenue came from outbound consulting. In-person. In their offices. Face-to-face with accounting firms.

All of it required one thing: being physically present.

And on March 13th, 2020, when Ireland went into lockdown, that became impossible.

I sat in my office that Thursday night—our last night in the office for what would turn out to be months—and asked the question that keeps entrepreneurs up at night:

Is this the end?

Not just of the business model. Of the business itself.

But here’s what nobody tells you about existential threats: they force clarity like nothing else.

The Setup: Seven Days of Warning

Here’s the part that saved us.

In January 2020, my Jeff Walker Mastermind had started discussing something happening in China. Some virus. Most people weren’t paying attention yet.

But Jeff’s community included people with connections everywhere. Medical professionals. Scientists. People watching data that hadn’t hit mainstream news.

And they were saying: “This is coming. Get ready.”

So while the rest of Ireland was going about business as usual in late February and early March, we were already preparing.

We’d been discussing contingency plans since January.

On March 6th—seven days before the official lockdown—we made the call.

Sent the entire team home. Shut down the office. Set up remote operations.

Not because the government told us to. Because we’d been in rooms with people who could see what was coming.

That’s the power of mastermind. That’s the power of being in rooms with people further ahead.

Seven days of preparation. It doesn’t sound like much.

But it was the difference between drowning and swimming. Between reacting and responding. Between panic and strategy.

The Turning Point: We Pivoted Hard

March 13th. Official lockdown. The country stopped.

But we couldn’t stop. Because our clients—accounting firms across Ireland—needed us more than ever.

They were terrified. Their clients were terrified. Nobody knew what was happening with government supports, tax deadlines, employment subsidies, cash flow. Revenue wasn’t giving clear guidance. The Big Four weren’t publishing fast enough.

And their clients were ringing them asking: “What do I do? How do I survive this?”

Our clients needed answers. And we realized: we could provide them.

So we made a decision.

We weren’t going to wait for the world to return to normal. We were going to build a new normal.

OmniPro Education & Training became CPD Store. Our in-person events became webinars. Our consulting became virtual strategy sessions. Our training became online courses.

We bought lighting. Set up home studios. Learned streaming technology. Figured out Facebook Live. Built webinar systems.

And we did it in 48 hours.

Not perfectly. Not elegantly. But fast.

Because our community needed us NOW, not when we’d perfected everything.

The Outcome: Leading Through the Chaos

Within two weeks, we were running daily COVID briefings for accounting firms.

Explaining the Temporary Wage Subsidy Scheme. Breaking down the implications. Translating government announcements into actual tactical guidance.

We created the COVID-19 Business Support Guide. Comprehensive. Practical. Clear.

And here’s what happened: The Big Four firms started using our guide. Hundreds of accounting firms were distributing it to their clients. It became THE resource.

Not because we were the biggest. Not because we had the most resources.

But because we moved first. We served our community when they needed us most. We didn’t wait for perfect clarity—we created clarity for them.

Our events revenue went to zero. Yes.

But our membership revenue? It exploded.

Firms that had never considered online learning suddenly realized: “Wait, this actually works. This might be better than in-person.”

The business model we’d been slowly building for years—recurring revenue, online education, virtual consulting—became essential overnight.

And the seven-day head start we got from being in mastermind? That made all the difference.

The Uncomfortable Truth

Here’s what COVID taught me that I’ll never forget:

When everything you’ve built gets wiped out overnight, you discover what you’re actually building.

Are you building a business model? Or are you building the capacity to serve?

Because the business model can disappear. Markets change. Pandemics happen. Technology disrupts. Competitors emerge.

But if you’ve built the capacity to genuinely serve your community—if you’ve built relationships, trust, expertise, and the willingness to show up when it’s hard—that survives anything.

We didn’t save the business by clinging to what used to work.

We saved it by asking: “What does our community need right now? And how can we deliver it in a way that actually serves them?”

The answer wasn’t what we’d been doing. The answer was something new.

And that terrified us. But we did it anyway.

Because the alternative was quitting. And we don’t quit.

The other thing COVID revealed: We’d been building infrastructure for this moment without knowing it.

Years of investing in Jeff Walker’s mastermind. Exposure to people running online businesses. Learning from Stu McLaren about membership models. Building recurring revenue systems. Creating digital products alongside our in-person events.

None of that felt urgent before COVID. It felt like “nice to have.” Like “someday” strategy.

Turns out, it was survival infrastructure.

The crisis didn’t create our capacity to pivot. It revealed capacity we’d been building for years.

The Lesson for You

This connects to Strategy (knowing when to pivot), Leverage & Scale (digital transformation), and Business Development (serving your community in changing conditions) in the ProfitPro 6-Step Success Path.

Here’s the uncomfortable question for every firm owner reading this:

If your primary delivery model disappeared tomorrow, could you still serve your clients?

Not in six months. Not after you figured everything out. Tomorrow.

Because here’s the truth: It might not be a pandemic next time. It might be technology. It might be regulation. It might be market disruption. It might be AI making your current service obsolete.

The question isn’t IF your business model will need to change. It’s WHEN. And whether you’ll be ready.

COVID forced us to build infrastructure we should have built anyway. Home studios. Digital delivery. Online community. Virtual consulting capabilities. Recurring revenue models.

We got lucky. We had seven days warning. Most firms had zero.

But here’s what that taught me:

Don’t wait for the crisis to build crisis infrastructure.

You need:

• Multiple revenue streams (not just one model)
• Digital delivery capabilities (even if you prefer in-person)
• Recurring revenue (not just project-based)
• Systems that work remotely (even if you’re in an office)
• Community you’ve built in good times (so it’s there in bad times)

Not because a pandemic might happen again. But because YOUR industry-specific disruption is coming. And you won’t get seven days warning.

The firms that thrived during COVID weren’t lucky. They’d been preparing without knowing they were preparing.

They’d invested in community. Built digital capabilities. Created recurring revenue. Developed trust with their clients. Cultivated relationships with other firms. Joined masterminds. Stayed current.

The firms that struggled? They’d built businesses that only worked in one very specific set of conditions. And when those conditions changed, they had no capacity to adapt.

Your Turn

Be brutally honest: If your primary business model disappeared tomorrow, how long would you survive?

What infrastructure are you NOT building right now because it feels optional—but might actually be essential?

And here’s the harder question: What are you investing in today that will give you capacity to pivot when the next disruption comes?

I’m curious: Have you ever had to completely reinvent your business model under pressure? What did you learn about what you’re actually building?

Let me know what you think. You can connect with me on social or directly via my linktree – https://linktr.ee/desoneill

Tomorrow: Letter 15—”Love Me or Hate Me, There’s No Money in the Middle” (The Polarization Principle)

When Stu McLaren told me this, I thought he was crazy. Then I tested it. And everything changed.