Leadership is a powerful tool during normal times, but it’s even more critical in crisis. A crisis elevates the need for action, and effective leaders know that hesitation can be costly.
Crisis leadership requires a few key skills, including decisiveness and adaptability. Learn how to hone these leadership skills to create resilience in your organization during crisis.
1. Situational Awareness
The ability to observe one’s surroundings, comprehend the situation, and predict possible risks or hazards enables effective response. This level of situational awareness can save lives, minimize damage, and reduce resource costs.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, for example, many people relied on information from media outlets to learn how close the coronavirus was to their homes, hear the latest guidance from government and health officials, and decide whether it was safe to go out or not. This is an example of a situation where effective communication led to a positive outcome.
A crisis can be unpredictable, but leadership must act quickly to set priorities and make decisions. This requires decisiveness, which can be honed by regularly practicing making decisions under pressure. For instance, a leader could be tested by a colleague in an imaginary scenario in which they have to choose which patient should get immediate medical attention. To make the right choice, they need to analyze available data and consult with their colleagues before making a call. If they are unable to do so, the impact of their decision could be severe.
2. Decision-Making
Making decisions is an integral part of leadership, but it becomes especially challenging during a crisis. Leaders must be able to make quick decisions with incomplete information and adapt as the situation changes. This requires cognitive flexibility, which can be cultivated through perspective-taking exercises and visualization techniques. Surprise layoffs can be a major disruption to an organization, making it even more important for leaders to exhibit strong decision-making. When such situations arise, a leader’s ability to manage the crisis with transparency and care can help mitigate the negative effects on morale and trust.
Effective decision-making involves recognizing the problem, identifying potential solutions, and selecting the best solution. It also involves assessing risks and benefits of each option to make informed choices. In addition, leaders must be able to communicate clearly and transparently with stakeholders about their decision-making process so they can understand and accept the decisions.
Unprecedented crises demand unprecedented actions. Empowered leaders should be encouraged to find their inner Churchill and take bold and rapid actions that would feel risky in normal times. This type of decision-making is essential to ensuring that the organization doesn’t fall behind its competitors or lose ground in the public eye. It’s also crucial to remember that it’s okay to make a mistake. In fact, it may be more risky to over-analyze the situation and remain paralyzed.
3. Communication
Communication is an important leadership skill in any situation, but it becomes even more critical during a crisis. In a crisis, leaders must be able to process information quickly with limited data and make decisions that have far-reaching consequences. They also need to communicate clearly and compassionately with their teams, fostering trust and unity.
This requires a level of calmness that may not be easily learned. It’s vital for managers and PR teams to be able to keep a clear head while managing the stress of a crisis, as well as support their employees through open and respectful feedback channels and a commitment to a positive learning culture.
The ability to think on your feet is an essential component of crisis leadership, particularly in novel events that are nearly impossible to anticipate ahead of time (like a terrorist attack or a global pandemic). This requires strong critical thinking skills and the ability to gather counsel from colleagues with different thinking preferences, assess varying perspectives, and ultimately create better ideas than one person can alone.
4. Empathy
The ability to genuinely connect with stakeholders and understand their emotions can make the difference in whether a crisis spirals out of control. During a crisis, it’s easy to become overwhelmed with the need to get facts and figures out quickly and communicate them effectively. But before crafting messaging, take the time to put yourself in your employees’ shoes and think about what they’re experiencing — and how you would feel in their place.
A hallmark of effective leadership is the ability to calmly assess a situation and act decisively. Effective crisis leaders exhibit this quality by maintaining composure and displaying genuine empathy when communicating with internal and external stakeholders.
To build this skill, it’s important to step out of the executive bubble and engage with frontline staff, regular customers and even the sandwich slinger at your local deli. This will give you a better understanding of what it’s like to live and work in different communities and cultures, which is helpful when communicating with others.
5. Influence
Leaders rely on influence to get things done, particularly during a crisis. Influence involves the art of communicating with others to persuade them to do what you want. It’s one of 4 core leadership skills that every role needs to master.
The most important factor in crisis leadership is establishing credibility. A clear, straightforward communication style that is compassionate and empowering empowers stakeholders to trust your plan. It’s also necessary to remain flexible in a crisis by quickly adapting to evolving circumstances. This allows you to leverage your problem-solving strengths while welcoming other thinking preferences.
Decision-making during a crisis is unlike daily management and leadership decision-making because of the high degree of uncertainty. You must consider how your decisions will impact other areas of the business in addition to what’s at stake personally for your team members and customers. A large part of your success relies on the right people around you, whether in the form of an advisory board or a team of crisis managers. Choosing the best advisers for a given situation and then giving them authority to act is critical.
6. Delegation
Delegating tasks to team members is essential to a leader’s success. However, many leaders struggle with this skill because they have a hard time relinquishing control to others. In the case of a crisis, it is even more difficult to step back from the situation and assign responsibilities.
The first step in delegation is determining which tasks are important and urgent and which can be handed off to others. This allows managers to prioritize and categorize their work load. The next step is to find the right people for each task. Managers must carefully consider their team’s strengths, capabilities and interests when assigning responsibilities. It is also important to ensure that the assigned tasks do not conflict with other mission-critical projects.
Lastly, it is critical to establish a system of accountability for all delegations. This ensures that responsibilities are completed and that any issues can be resolved quickly. In addition, it helps to develop an open, supportive culture that upholds transparency and accountability. This is especially helpful in crisis environments.
7. Adaptability
A crisis is a perfect time to learn how to adapt. It’s a time to hone your leadership skills and learn how to navigate changes on the fly. A strong leader can assess the situation, consult with others, and make a decision quickly. Leaders must also communicate with their teams throughout a crisis to share information, updates, and support.
Adaptability is a soft skill that can be learned through training and coaching. It’s often considered to be more important than technical knowledge because it helps you solve problems when the going gets tough. It’s a crucial skill to have, especially for leaders because change is inevitable.
Adaptability involves learning to shift your priorities, work style and approach as needed to navigate personal and professional challenges. It can include adjusting your communication style to fit different audiences or cultures, staying calm and problem-solving during unexpected crises, and shifting business strategies to stay competitive. Adaptability can be practiced in many ways, such as by regularly engaging in decision-making exercises, practicing mindfulness and self-care during stressful moments, and keeping an open mind to new experiences.
8. Self-Awareness
During crises, it’s important for leaders to be self-aware. This involves understanding one’s own emotions, how they may be affecting others, and their impact on the organization. It’s also about knowing how to communicate openly and transparently in times of crisis.
This is because leaders need to be able to stay calm and think clearly under pressure, filter through opinions and data, and collaborate with teams of different thinking preferences to create more ideas than they could on their own. They also need to be able to understand and support people’s feelings in order to build trust and reduce tensions.
Leaders who are self-aware can develop their skills through regular practice. For example, they can hone their decision-making by regularly challenging themselves to make quick decisions with limited information. They can also improve their self-awareness by tracking how they feel throughout the day, and reflecting on these emotions. This can help them gain insights about their strengths, weaknesses, and how they can grow. To learn more, watch Leadership in a Crisis, a documentary following 12 senior leaders as they make decisions in real-time during the coronavirus pandemic.