When crisis strikes, leaders are often called upon to guide their teams through the rough waters. But what’s the secret to being successful as a leader during a crisis?
Leaders who are effective during crises must be decisive, transparent, and able to inspire and motivate their teams. They must also be able to switch between directive and participative leadership, plan ahead, and delegate tasks. Team members need support during difficult times, so leaders must stay calm under pressure.
Whether you’re managing a small team or leading a large organization, the following principles will help you become the leader your team needs in times of crisis. Let’s take a closer look.
What Leadership Style Is Best in a Crisis?
During the first phase of the crisis, the leader needs to use a directive leadership style, decisive, fast acting and focused on minimizing damage. In the second and slower-paced phase, participative and flexible leadership will be more effective when rebuilding and improving the business.
Let’s look at what this means more practically, so you can implement it in your preparations and risk management plan.
Here’s how the different leadership styles play together in making an effective leader during an emergency.
Directive Leadership
In a crisis, it’s essential to have a clear and decisive leader who can make quick and informed decisions. This type of leadership is known as directive leadership, and it’s necessary for guiding a team through a crisis (link).
In a crisis, it’s essential to have a clear and decisive leader who can make quick and informed decisions.
For example, if a natural disaster strikes and the team needs to evacuate the office, a directive leader would decide to do so and communicate the plan to the team.
Directive leadership is focused on giving orders and avoiding discussions that will slow down their Progress. This is what most people think when they hear military leadership.
Participative Leadership
Having a leader who can listen to and empower their team members is also useful. This type of leadership, known as participative leadership, allows team members to have a say in the decision-making process and helps to build trust and buy-in.
This type of leadership shouldn’t play a big part in the initial phase of the emergency since it tends to slow down and hinder fast decision-making.
In the second phase of the crisis, team members need to add their perspectives on the situation, so everyone understands what’s happening and what needs to be done.
It is common for different people in the same situation to view what has happened very differently. This can cause confusion and significantly impact how fast the team is able to bounce back after a crisis.
Flexible Leadership
The most effective leaders in times of crisis are those who can adapt and be flexible in their leadership style. This means shifting between directive and participative leadership as the situation requires.
For example, if a crisis involves a particularly complex problem that requires input from all team members, a flexible leader would shift to a participative style to gather ideas and insights rather than just dictating what needs to happen.
Flexibility can also be utilized in the first phase of the emergency if the leader realizes they are without enough information to make a decent decision.
A flexible leader doesn’t get emotionally attached to a plan. Instead, they create a new plan when needed.
8 Characteristics of an Excellent Leader During Emergency Management!
Participate, directive, and flexible leadership are the three most important leadership styles in times of crisis. An effective leader needs to transition between the three when needed.
But what is more important than the styles’ names are the characteristics they have in common.
Here are a few of the commonalities often shared by leaders who have successfully managed crises:
1. Accessibility and Approachability
The leader needs to be accessible and approachable. This means listening to team members, addressing their concerns, and being open to new ideas and perspectives.
If you’re running a small team, this is pretty simple since you can get to know every individual on the team. But this is really difficult and time-consuming if you are on a larger team of up to 30 people.
A way to counter this is to divide the large team into sections of six and give every section a representative. The sections talk to their representatives, and the representative talks to the team leader.
This allows for each section to build trust in their representative and for that representative to build trust with the team leader. This link of trust cannot be broken if you want to have a truly open climate on your team.
2. Transparency and Honesty
Once established, it’s time to honor approachability by being transparent and honest; lying or hiding information is the quickest way to lose trust with your team (link).
A good leader must be transparent and honest with their team during a crisis. This means keeping team members informed of any developments or changes and being open about any challenges or setbacks the group may face rather than trying to hide or minimize them.
Transparency, honesty, and approachability lay the foundation for excellent communication:
3. Clear Communication
Another critical aspect of effective crisis leadership is communicating with precision. This means conveying expectations and goals to the team, providing regular updates, and keeping team members informed of changes or developments.
And most importantly, communicate this in a way they understand, not the way you like the best. Use all the tools in the box, body language, removing physical barriers, and listening actively; this will give you a sense of whether or not the message has been accepted (link).
And most importantly communicate this in a way they understand, not the way you like to cummunicate.
In a crisis, team members must clearly understand what’s expected of them and how they can contribute to the overall goal. This keeps everyone motivated and invested in the solutions you’re working toward.
The most important factor to communicate is the aim and purpose of the task, this allows team members to understand the end goal and choose the best way even if the communications channel fails.
4. Staying Calm Under Pressure
One of the essential characteristics is the ability to remain calm under pressure.
In a crisis, it’s easy to get caught up in chaos and panic, but a good leader can stay composed and level-headed. This can be especially important when dealing with team members who may be anxious or stressed.
Most people agree and understand the principle of staying calm, but during my training as an officer candidate, few actually have this ability innately.
My experience with training thousands of recruits in the military is that staying calm under pressure needs to be practiced. But the training doesn’t need to be complex or expensive.
One of my favorite suggestions for people wanting to improve stress resistance is to start practicing Brazilian jiu-jujitsu!
Having another person trying to choke you out but knowing you can stop at any time is a great way for you to push the limits of your comfort zone. The interesting thing is that the brain doesn’t understand the difference between stress from practice scenarios and stress from real danger.
Brazilian jiu-jujitsu can simulate the internal aspects of a crisis but with minimal risk of you getting hurt; this is the golden standard for effective stress resistance training, as near to real world as possible but without harm to the student.
When you are ready to make your team work comfortably and efficiently during stressful times, I invite you to reach out to us at Sancus Leadership for a free consultation.
5. Thinking Strategically and Planning Ahead
Another key characteristic is the ability to think strategically and plan ahead. This means anticipating potential challenges and developing contingency plans to address them.
For many companies, especially small businesses, this is a new way of thinking, and few have a plan that would actually work in a stressful and high-paced environment, Maybe even yours.
Look at your emergency or risk management plan and ask the following questions;
- Have we ever physically practiced decision-making with low on time and low on information?
- Have we ever practiced working under acute stress with high stakes?
- Are the instructions so exceptionally clear and detailed that I can make my people understand what to do before it’s too late?
- What do you do if you cannot reach senior leadership, but a decision needs to be made?
I highly suggest your business and your team have a contingency plan in place to handle stressful situations; maybe you think you don’t have the time for this type of training; well, consider the following.
Studies clearly indicate that team-building exercises are essentially useless when trying building trust in a team. What actually produces a trusting and high-performing team is confidence in each other's abilities to perform our duties (link to study). Have you trained properly for yours?
Instead of this year’s session of awkward team-building events, do something worthwhile, and forge unbreakable trust.
6. Adaptability
Adaptability is an essential characteristic for leaders during a crisis. As the situation changes and evolves, leaders need to be able to adapt and adjust their approach accordingly.
This might mean changing course mid-way through a project or pivoting to a new strategy if the original plan is no longer feasible.
You have probably seen leaders who cling to their strategy like it was their favorite child; this is called the sunken cost fallacy; we have invested too much into something, so we must see it through. It really doesn’t make much sense when you think about it.
We have already paid the cost; the question is, do we want to pay even more for the same results or invest in something different with the potential of different outcomes?
We have already paid the cost, the question is; do we want to pay even more for the same results or invest in something different with the potential of different outcomes?
If you are interested in learning more about the sunken cost fallacy and the cognitive errors we as leaders make, check this book out; Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman.
A great leader is never emotionally attached to a plan or an idea; instead, they asses the situation as free of biases as humanly possible and act accordingly.
7. Empathy
Empathy is crucial. Leaders who can understand and relate to the emotions and experiences of their team members are better able to provide the support and guidance they need.
“Leader with higher empathy appear to be more effective”
The Impact of Empathy on Leadership Effectiveness
among Business Leaders in the United States and Malaysia
Often, this involves offering extra support to team members struggling with stress or anxiety or simply listening and offering a compassionate ear when it is needed the most.
Empathy isn’t a skill to develop; rather, it is the result of genuinely caring for your people; if you really want what’s best for them, you start listening, you try to understand them, and they will see you in a completely new light.
Trust will start to develop, and your job as manager will suddenly be ten times as easy.
8. Inspiration and Motivation
Finally, a good leader during a crisis can inspire and motivate their team. Part of the motivation comes from communicating a clear vision and purpose and rallying the team around a common tangible goal.
In combat, when bullets are flying, soldiers don’t think about the geopolitical situation they are in; they think about how to survive the situation and fight for their teammates, not a flag.
When things get tough, the same happens at the office (albeit with other risks); people don’t care about company revenue or the ten-year plan; they “keep fighting” to solve the task because of the person next to them, their team.
If you as a leader haven't forged unbreakable trust before the emergency happens, it's highly likely your people won't fully engage in the "fight."
Now that you understand why people are willing to put up with challenging situations, you can start using that to strengthen your team.
In times of uncertainty and stress, it’s crucial for team members to feel like they’re part of something bigger and that their work has meaning and purpose.
Final Thoughts
In conclusion, effective crisis leadership requires a unique set of skills and characteristics that aren’t always easy to come by. But, it’s essential to initially make quick and informed decisions while later also being open to the perspectives and ideas of team members.
Good crisis leaders are adaptable and can shift between directive and participative leadership as the situation requires. They’re also transparent and honest with their team, able to think strategically, plan, and delegate tasks effectively.
Most importantly, they can remain calm under pressure and inspire and motivate their team through difficult times.
If you want to develop your crisis leadership skills, consider the Forging Unbreakable Trust Program, seeking feedback from team members, and regularly practicing decision-making and problem-solving skills. By doing so, you can become the effective crisis leader your team needs.
