Mindless cost cutting is purely suicidal

You can cut with a butcher's knife .. you can also cut with a surgeon's scalpel. Depends on what you are cutting. 

Critical however to this process is only one thing - cut cost. Do not cut value. Foolish cost cutting is purely suicidal for the cost of rebuilding is double the cost of cutting. Always.

Says Murphy....the true test of effective leadership is not how deeply you cut in response to an immediate financial challenge but how well you prepare your organisation to thrive and be reborn competitively in the new challenge again and again and again ! 

Cost of underinvestment is critical. People mistake investment to be a cost and thereby lose out both ways, by cutting it. Don't be so myopic to erode your long term ability to compete for short-term profit pay-offs.

That is where Wisdom in leadership differentiates itself from knowledge of leadership. Be wise.