Companies trying to survive the worst recession since the 1930s have to realize that the old ways of doing things aren't going to work; they must evolve.

That's the advice in a feature story in the May issue of Entrepreneur Magazine.

Because of the scope and depth of the current recession, just maintaining your current business model "might let you survive a little bit longer, but you're not going to create that competitive advantage necessary for the long term," according to Scott Anthony, president of Innosight, an innovation consulting firm, quoted in the article.

Entrepreneur recommends seven things you must do to survive, and thrive, in the current economic climate: Get comfortable with chaos, reassess your customers' values, understand a good product always sells, think new markets, not just cost cutting, view scarcity as a good thing, stop defending the status quo and serve the customers you hate.

According to the Small Business Administration of the U.S. government, in 2007 there were were 637,100 new businesses launched, 560,300 business closures and 28,322 bankruptcies. Two-thirds of new firms with employees survive past two years, and 44 percent survive at least four years.