Abstract
Always bear in mind that your own resolution to succeed is more important than any other one thing.
Tim Johnson has written a comprehensive guide to crisis management. It is clear that Mr Johnson has the depth of experience to write this book. One of the qualities of this book is that it reads easily and the author has an obvious sense of enthusiasm for the subject. Despite his expertise, Mr Johnson shares with the readers a curiosity that makes the book not only prescriptive for dealing with disasters, it is also informed by successful crisis managers of the past and present from Abraham Lincoln, Winston Churchill, Mahatma Gandhi and Carl Von Clausewitz to General McChrystal and George Bush.
Mr Johnson frames the book logically in a series of competencies (knowledge, skills and abilities) and the book is organized into three sections:
Part 1 focuses on what exactly is a crisis and how to give your organization the best chance to succeed.
Part 2 focuses on creating planning and preparation initiatives and decision making during and after a crisis.
Part 3 focuses on how to prepare crisis leaders.
In every sense, society, organizations and communities are experiencing rapid change. Successful leaders know how to sense emerging issues and create and adapt to unexpected challenges. We live in a volatile, uncertain, complex, and adaptive (VUCA) world and in organizations that thrive; the leadership will need to master this new era. Mr Johnson makes clear that all people can rise to the challenge of a crisis and he explicitly rejects the notion of the Thomas Carlyle’s “Great Man” theory in which a born elite (usually White males) shapes their age by becoming who they are destined to become through engaging crisis. The same skills that leaders use in creating highly performing organizations and communities are the same as leading in a time of transformation mired in complexity. Crisis that involves death and damage to the planet or that threatens the survival of an organization is hyper complex, and the immediate response of a leader prepared for a VUCA event will make better decisions.
Mr Johnson states that far too many organizations have not prepared for the unexpected and when something catastrophic happens, they often dig their heels down in a very reactionary exercise. Throughout the book, Mr Johnson emphasizes that organizations should be constantly preparing for the unexpected. Sometimes leader wonder if they are actually in a crisis or if it is accelerating change. In considering how to respond to a new emerging challenge or situation, he provides this framework:
What is the tempo of the situation?
Is there a critical need for timely decision/s?
How complex is the problem being faced?
What is the severity of these problems?
More than usual, is there a prevailing atmosphere of uncertainty and anxiety?
In preparing for a crisis, Mr Johnson asserts that organizations need to put in place crisis planning initiatives so they can properly respond quickly and effectively. He writes that a plan needs a designated leader who has responsibility in conceptualizing a blueprint plan, advocating for appropriate resources, communicating crisis initiatives, and constantly updating response steps and initiatives so they remain relevant. There are strategic, tactical and operational considerations that connect with all levels of an organization, and Mr Johnson describes how to implement crisis planning at every level.
In an interview with four-star general Stanley McChrystal, he stresses that the key to dealing with crisis is to chunk the response in such a way that small groups can organically form into teams. The role of a leader is to shape the challenge in a way that teams can successfully engage and solve “a problem” instead of detailing a series of tasks for staff to follow—he decentralizes the response to the collective wisdom of his team(s). Related to this, General McChrystal encourages “thinking aloud,” and he avoids sharing his own opinion until his junior officers have an opportunity to share their own. By doing this, he taps into the collective intelligence of the team, and he avoids group thinking by withholding his perspective until the end. General McChrystal emphasizes that it is in the diversity of ideas that provide him the confidence he needs in making decisions; he went on to say in this respect the Army is far ahead in dealing with VUCA than most corporate executives and corporations.
Along similar lines, Mr Johnson interviews Captain Steven Hawkins who is the Chief Training Pilot for British Airways. Captain Hawkins talks about how to engage “human factors” that are not connected to technical issues. The recommendations on how to commence leadership in a time of crisis are as follows:
Learn to interpret a range of information sources constantly;
Find time to assess options;
Don’t centralize power;
Minimize confirmation bias;
Delegate to create strategic capacity;
Use checklists to reduce the cognitive load;
But be flexible and creative;
Be 100 percent clear about who is doing what;
Manage your body language;
Know yourself and your own stress triggers.
An aspect of the book that many approaches to crisis management fail to examine deeply is the role that stress, neuroscience and emotional intelligence play in engaging an intense challenge. He says that while most managers have been trained or educated in ways to not show “panic” in stereotypical ways, in a time of crisis, many decision makers rush to judgement and conclusions. Making fast decisions is thought to provide a sense of control over a crisis. If the crisis is complex, making rash decisions is the last thing a leader should do. On the other end of the spectrum, some leaders become indecisive and experience cognitive paralysis.
Mr Johnson describes the basic structure of the brain (brainstem, prefrontal cortex, and the limbic system). The brainstem controls our breathing and heart rate, the prefrontal cortex manages our executive function, and the limbic system is critical to the “fight or flight” mechanism. The limbic system holds the amygdala. The amygdala is two acorn-shaped bundles of nerves that operate like an emergency button in our brain. It is constantly scanning the environment looking for and sensing threats. For all the good the amygdala does, it has a drawback for leaders in crisis moments that Daniel Goleman calls the “emotional hijack.” Mr Johnson says in fight or flight situations, the prefrontal cortex is overridden and the stress hormone cortisol is released which has an immediate physical and cognitive impact sending adrenaline through our blood stream. Adrenaline quickens our breath and changes our physical composure to prepare us to either run, fight, or even play dead.
Recognizing this is how our brains react under situations of high stress, Mr Johnson spends a full chapter on how to deal with the psychological challenges of crisis leadership. The objective, he says, is for our prefrontal cortex to regain control to better manage the short- and long-term consequences of the issue. Mr Johnson recommends following six steps to regain time and space from which to make decisions:
Resist the urge to do anything immediately.
Use predefined, structured questions for sense-making and diagnostics.
Throw a communication defense around the organization.
Move to mobilization.
Ensure leadership clarity.
Find space to think.
If there is a single prevailing and overarching theme to this useful and highly recommended book, it is about how leaders can and need to prepare for crisis right now. There are important steps that leaders can prepare in advance—plans and responses can be created, teams formed, and responsibilities delineated. Crisis is the test of a leader and one can begin preparing for a true crisis in situations that are far less precarious by examining their own mindsets during stressful but not chaotic episodes. The exact nature of a crisis can never be predicted, but there are multiple ways that leaders in organizations and communities can prepare for the “unexpected” or “VUCA.” Effective leadership requires the ability to make decisions in the present and prepare for unexpected events and possibilities. This book is an essential tool for any institution planning for the what is certain in many highly performing organizations—a crisis.