As a citizen worker try to create a co-op, if very lucky force our way into completely taking over the factory. Also try to establish ties to or build up from the ground a crime syndicate. Basically think Baath party members creating their own crime networks in Iraq post-invasion to try and preserve the cadres. Then wait out the storm and try to expand the business. In other words a version of Mondragon but with an armed wing protecting its assets and mandatory ideological indoctrination for all members. Pretty bleak but the only thing that has any chance of autonomy in Yeltsin's and Putin's Russia.

As the General Secretary: a massive purge combined with populism dialled up to 11 and eventually hard technocratic reforms (as opposed to market based reforms).

The whole system was almost terminally calcified and rotten and apathic so high chances that maybe nothing could have helped. The timing would have been crucial. If we are talking 88-89 then probably completely hopeless, beyond either outright inviting the Chinese Communist Party to take over (could spark civil war or at least the breaking away of some republics and majority of the Warsaw Pact allies) or doing the Yeltsin thing and spearheading the transition to full blown market economy in the hopes that you can at least turn it into something akin to the current Czech Republic/Estonia/Lithuania (will probably get assassinated). If we are talking 84/85 then salvation is still possible. If we are talking 82 - still problematic but chances not that bad anymore.

A lot depends on how many allies within the system you can still count on.

The primary objective would be to create a power block that can quickly amputate the metastasizing parts of the party (and especially the armed state orgs). A new CheKa of sorts. This would be accompanied by promoting the younger talented officers (whose careers are getting stalled by the elderly plutocrats) to senior positions in both the military, the KGB and the police.

At the same time establish as much direct contact to the populace as possible - Chavez style Q&A TV and radio programmes, frequent appearances among the masses and Fidel like speeches outlining a clear path and roadmap for the immediate future. This should be quickly followed by promoting more democratic participation and self-organisation of many aspects of society. The commanding heights should remain untouchable but a lot of low level organising of society should transition to a bottom-up and not top-down way of doing things. In terms of propaganda promote usership instead of ownership, in terms of operations promote entrepreneurship on a small scale (think artisans and such).

Once a certain baseline of stability and loyalty has been secured the highest priority should be the implementation of OGAS and holonic restructuring of industry. (Re)introduction of Tektology/Systems Theory thinking into all socio-organisational decisions. The importance of this is even bigger than the Soviet A-bomb and the space programme combined. Over time this will ensure that private entrepreneurship will not lead to a runaway effect but allow people to be freely creative and enterprising while being tightly integrated into the overall economy. The goal here is economic planning and control by the state but private innovation (the fruits of which are mandatorily shared). A huge windfall and support can be expected (as was the case when Gorbachev just took power) from the enterprising individuals in factories, R&D centres, the arts etc. who have been growing increasingly frustrated and resentful of all of their initiatives getting bogged down by the overreaching bureaucracy by massively easing up of nonsense censorship and self-sabotaging secrecy, where many inventions/optimisations were either outright rejected or filed away never to see the light of day again. Basically promote interdisciplinary and interdepartmental cooperation to the max. This includes declassifying of all but the most sensitive materials, creating an open source library of all engineering and scientific developments completely accessible by all (possibly with a certain minimal threshold in terms of credentials) and finally integrating all of the reliable socialist partner countries (Warsaw pact, DPRK, Cuba & Vietnam, Yemen and Afghanistan) into this network as well. On top of this (probably once OGAS comes online) establishing a prestige system - a sort of a social credit system but chiefly for expertise and prior industrial/operational success. This prestige system will serve as a basis for managerial promotion thus eliminating or at the the very least curtailing the re-appearance of corruption.

In concert with this there would be a need for radical military and foreign aid reforms. The military needs to be downsized and made more efficient, the armament focus should go to strategic ABC forces as well as SpecOps and away from conventional ones. Mandatory service should be reduced to one year (it was 2 in the 80s) and restructured as to provide the recruits with proven specialised practical skills instead of being a cheap manpower fix. Women should probably do military service as well. An important part of the military service would be instilling a sense of civic duty to the society, initiative taking and the will to militancy at the appearance of subversion. This way if there is an attempted coup or such, the citizenry can be relied upon to stop it in its tracks. At the same time re-asses relations with other "socialist" states. The reliable ones should be integrated much more closely with the USSR in order to, in time, fuse to an international decision making body that will not be USSR and RSFSR dominated any more - think the EU but socialist. The less reliable ones - those who waved a red cloth to get those tasty investments - should either take unilateral steps to prove that they are actually moving in the right direction or be defunded, so the actual socialist countries can profit from the trade instead of sinking scarce resources into a bottomless pit. At the same time a large standing military that doesn't pay for itself is a huge waste. Since the already available hardware cannot just be quickly converted back into cash or industrial tools or raw materials they need to be used. As such foreign policy needs to become both more focused and more aggressive. Military operations that have a high chance of success should be carried out decisively, military aid to hopeless actors should be folded. The prioritising of the ABC strategic forces plays a major role in such aggressive policy as a blackmailing tool. If the Soviet Union can reliably erase from the face of the Earth its enemies then the enemies will rather give in than get liquidated, their imperialist ambitions notwithstanding. One such theatre of operations is Afghanistan and neighbouring Pakistan. An ultimatum can be issued to Pakistan, if ultimatum is not adhered to nukes it is. Similarly a decisive massed operation in coordination with the native South African insurgency can be executed to topple the South African Apartheid regime. If all enough resources and skill are present (and this is something one would know only as a general secretary) then Nicaragua-Ecuador-Guatemala-El Salvador could also be ripe for the taking.

Re-establishment of ties with China. Infiltration and integration of Yugoslavia post Tito. Integration of Albania post Hoxha.

Once things are running smoothly a "Chinese gambit" can be undertaken. Limited opening up of special economic zones for Western investment and relocation of Western factories. IMF and World Bank loans. After say 10 years expropriation of said factories and default on the loans - a big fat fuck you. What are they gonna do, start war and get nuked in return? Lmao. At the same time taking over of criminal organisations in the West and use hem to siphon off Western resources, sabotage Western economies and threaten/eliminate influential individuals under the guise of unrelated criminal activity.

Push for a greater automation of industry.