1. Responding to the Crisis
How Leaders Overcome Adversity
Engage others in shared meaning. Find your distinct and compelling voice. Put your integrity and values into practice. Grasp the context of the crisis. Tap into your hardiness.
Determination. Persistence. Calm. We need these qualities in our wartime leaders because they must act decisively and with conviction, mobilizing those around them to work together under conditions of great uncertainty while avoiding panic.
The leader who never breaks glass runs the risk of missing out on narrow windows of opportunity and being overtaken by fast-moving threats. Sensing when to break glass and learning how to do so with the right amount of force are essential leadership skills.
Compasses and Weathervanes (30 Questions for Leaders)
The question isn't "What kind of leader should I be?" but rather "What kind of leadership is called for at this moment--and am I capable of summoning it?"
2. Supporting Others
Talking with Colleagues About Suffering
A theme in my practice is the leader who's aware or senses that a colleague is suffering and would like to offer support but is unsure how to broach the topic. If you're in this situation, here are some suggestions.
Viktor Frankl on the Meaning of Suffering
Frankl is not denying the grief and rage that spring from suffering and tragedy. He's not "making the best of things." He's not blithely suggesting that "everything happens for a reason." He is encouraging us to acknowledge our grief and rage, and also to see our suffering as an experience in which it is possible to find meaning.
There's a difference between mourning and grief. Mourning ends, because we have to return to the world, but grief need not, and we can return to our grieving to honor our feeling and our memories of the person we lost at any time.
3. Managing Yourself
How to Fight a Fire (Self-Coaching in a Crisis)
Some situations truly test a leader’s ability to self-coach, to manage themselves effectively while also guiding others. Here are four factors that have helped clients who’ve had to surmount a crisis.
Taking the Leap (Dealing with Risk and Uncertainty)
Rather than minimizing risk and avoiding uncertainty, we’re better served by more effectively managing the emotions that these qualities trigger. To be clear, managing emotions doesn’t mean suppressing them. Efforts to ignore our feelings or pretend that they don’t exist aren’t sustainable over time (and may even exacerbate the very emotions that are causing us difficulty).
The Importance of Slowing Down
The impulse to hurry should often be interpreted as a signal to slow down.
4. On Coping
Even--and especially--as we feel a loss of control in the world at large, we can strive to create "pockets of agency," smaller settings within our lives in which we can "cause or control the movement."
Aggression, Panic, Paralysis, Denial
Some people are moving assertively to win competitions or bolster their status. Some people are overwhelmed by fear. Some people are unable to take necessary action. Some people are acting as though everything will be "back to normal" soon.
Tumbling Down Maslow's Hierarchy
Why does this matter? Because many people aren't moving up the ladder, they're moving down.
People are failing to grieve their losses. In some cases this may simply be a form of denial, but in many others I suspect that people believe that their losses are somehow illegitimate because they are lesser, and that grieving their losses would be unseemly or inappropriate when so many have suffered far worse.
5. Learning from a Crisis
Some Crises Build Character. Others Reveal It.
Something bad happened, and there was a crisis. There are still many risks, and the situation could yet turn worse, but at the moment, catastrophe has been averted. If approached correctly, this can be a fruitful learning experience for you and the people around you. It may seem too early to learn from the crisis, but don't wait too long.
Double-loop learning occurs when we expand the analytical frame to explicitly identify and then challenge any underlying assumptions that support our stated goals, values and strategies.
6. Other Resources I Recommend
Ten Things To Keep In Mind During A Crisis (Anamaria Nino-Murcia, 2022)
Trauma Stewardship: An Everyday Guide to Caring for Self While Caring for Others (Laura van Dernoot Lipsky with Connie Burk, 2009)
Waking the Tiger: Healing Trauma (Peter Levine with Ann Frederick, 1997)
In An Unspoken Voice: How the Body Releases Trauma and Restores Goodness (Peter Levine, 2010)
Photo by AppleDave.
