How does your crisis leadership measure up?

Evaluate yourself with a 15 question self-assessment

We live in troubled times. The uncertainty and constant change require crisis leadership.

Everyone must manage family and personal needs during a crisis. Leaders shoulder the additional responsibilities of providing guidance, vision and reassurance to their team.

Any crisis -small or large – provides a trial by fire to test leaders.

How does your crisis leadership measure up?

Check your own crisis leadership

Download the free guide and 15 question self-assessment that explores your leadership ability during a crisis.

The self-assessment questions relate to the three crisis competencies covered in this article.

Click here to download the free guide and self-assessment.

3 key competencies for leading during a crisis

Throughout my many years of working with leaders, I observed 3 key competencies that determine how effectively someone leads during a crisis.

The 3 key competencies for leading during a crisis are:

Adapt as a leader
Lead with kindness
Communicate

Adapt as a Leader

Use your judgement

Every decision you make during a crisis requires good judgement.

Leadership judgement unfolds over time as a process that involves making decisions using good sense that result in quality outcomes.

Learn more in the article Stop Looking for an EASY Button.

Frame the crisis as a challenge, not a threat

By definition, a crisis creates a high-pressure situation that you can see as either a threat or a challenge.

If you consider it a threat, you experience a biological stress reaction that can lead to panic and poor decisions.

If you frame the situation as a challenge, your body responds more positively and puts you in an optimal mental state to find solutions.

For more, check out the article Managing Performance Under Pressure.

Take it one day at a time

The situation, the work and your team will evolve every day. Be prepared for constant change by staying flexible and alert.

Evaluate the situation and priorities every day and verify that you are still aligned with the broader company goals.

Don’t assume that the priorities from yesterday are the same today.

At some point, the crisis will stabilize and allow your team to return to a normal rhythm and plan further into the future.

For now, focus on the near term.

Evaluate all work

In a crisis, priorities change. You must quickly evaluate your work and the work of your team to determine what should START, STOP and CONTINUE.

You can draw the three categories on a piece of paper and slot every task or project.

Tasks to start are urgent ones that popped up due to the crisis and might be very different than normal tasks. Continue tasks are mandatory ones that must happen (although they might be performed differently).

Most critically, you must STOP unnecessary tasks that are not time-sensitive to both free up time for other work and account for decreased productivity.

Lead with Kindness

Kindness matters

Every person reacts differently to a crisis.

These differences arise from personality traits such as emotional stability and optimism and personal situations such as family and financial security.

As a leader, you probably don’t know everything about your team members. Therefore, approach each interaction with kindness and patience, because you don’t know what they are dealing with.

Empathy helps you slow down and respond appropriately in tense situations.

Some kindness actions include:

Show common courtesy in person or online through greetings and choice of words.
Use a calm and professional tone of voice and avoid tense body language.
Avoid complaining and presume innocence in others if they do something unexpected.
Try not to be judgmental. Remember, you don’t know what is happening with another person.

For more tips on spreading kindness at work, check out the article A Kindness Pandemic.

Be a shock absorber

One way to maintain kindness and empathy is to be a shock absorber instead of a shock amplifier.

In a crisis, a shock absorber reacts calmly, absorbs the problem and spreads calm and kindness to others.

By contrast, a shock amplifier responds with panic and distress and spreads fear to others.

Choose to absorb the problem and avoid spreading fear to others.

For more information about spreading calm, check out Are you a Shock Absorber or a Shock Amplifier?

Be kind to yourself

Kindness extends to you as well.

Take breaks to deal with your own emotions, so you can show poise and calm when in front of others.

Find someone to talk to about your feelings and concerns.

You’ll be moving fast and making hard decisions during a crisis.

Forgive yourself if you are not perfect at everything.

Leadership is not about being perfect, but it is about showing up as your best self.

Communicate

Let your team know what is happening

Stay present and available.

As a leader, you provide the shock absorber function mentioned earlier that helps others stay calm.

Share as much information you can as quickly as you can. When there is a lack of information, people fill the void with conspiracy theories and disaster scenarios.

Sometimes the message you give is that you don’t have any new information. Even that type of message helps people feel in the loop and keeps down panic.

If you do have news, try to be optimistic but also realistic. You work with adults and they can handle tough news.

Create a feedback loop

Communication goes both ways. Spend a lot of your time asking questions and listening.

Provide formal and informal ways for people to provide feedback and input. Those ways could include one-on-one meetings, team brainstorming, surveys, and confidential feedback mechanisms.

Listening to the people doing the work can provide great solutions to task-related problems.

Asking team members how they are doing can help you provide support based on each person’s needs.

Communicate beyond your team

Extend communication beyond your immediate team.

During a crisis, other leaders, teams, companies, and countries could be affected. Reach out to people and ask how they are doing. Swap ideas on crisis planning and activities.

You can help other people, solve problems together and maintain your own network of relationships. Your network provides support and helps you maintain your career over time.

Assess yourself on crisis leadership

Download the free guide and 15 question self-assessment to explore your ability as a leader during a crisis.