Strategic management is extremely important for the business of entrepreneurs, especially in times of crisis, whether financial or pandemic, which we have been witnessing for more than a year. In these emerging, pandemic business conditions, micro and small businesses are extremely vulnerable to market disruptions. In large companies, strategic management is handled by top management, however, in micro and small companies, the owner of the company is often the person who has to review, change and adjust the business in the new situation. Many micro and small enterprises have responded very flexibly to the challenge of the COVID-19 pandemic, but there are also those who have left and/or closed their businesses. The subject of this paper is the strategic reaction of micro and small enterprises to business conditions at the time of the COVID-19 pandemic and the types of strategies that micro and small enterprises have chosen to survive in the market. The paper emphasizes exclusively the external causes of the crisis, which are theoretically described, as well as the importance of creating a timely strategy in crisis conditions, which are a prerequisite for successful crisis management. We would like to highlight the issue of crisis management in micro and small enterprises precisely because of the lack of strategic management or the inability of managers / owners to make decisions in dealing with crisis situations. Research is being conducted on real companies whose economic activities are most affected by the COVID-19 pandemic. Their analysis concludes and confirms the hypothesis that micro and small enterprises are the worst prepared for a sudden crisis and only those companies that implement new strategies and make quick decisions about new ways of working during the crisis can successfully reduce the negative consequences of the crisis and overcome the same.