The 2 Reasons We Fail In a Crisis

A senior leader I coach at one of North America’s professional sports team is, understandingly, facing a crisis this morning: he found out late last night that his team and league are suspending their season (note: suspension does not mean canceling, at least not yet).

In our discussion yesterday, before the big announcement came last night, he had feared that, as a league, they might make the decision to move to a ‘no fan’ option, meaning they would play games but without spectators in the stands. This would cause a challenge in itself as television revenue only accounts for about 30% of their overall revenue. He and his team were doing scenario planning for this and more drastic options. And then last night the more drastic option occurred: an NBA player tested positive for Covid-19 and the league felt it had no choice but to temporarily suspend its season. This was a shocking announcement and has brought with it much greater challenges: no games, no revenue and a public in panic.

What to do in a Crisis?

Simply put, for this leader and for you out there facing a different reality today: this is a time to lead. This is a time to bring out your best because your team and organization and family need you to. The place to start, however, is not with your team or others, it is with yourself. This might seem a contradiction, given we are talking about leadership, but it most surely is not.

Having worked with multiple organizations and leader’s across many crisis, including 9/11 and the global financial crisis, I have witnessed many leaders falling into a common trap, which is the first reason we fail in a crisis: thinking that if they go into overdrive and just keep working hard, they will be able to help get their organizations out of the mess they are facing. It is certainly a good intention. But it is limited in its impact.

Why? When you think of it, as leaders, especially during a crisis, our job is to make a few very important decisions and to set the tone and influence the norms for our culture so that others can do their best work. The problem is that when we are under pressure and not at our best, we struggle. In fact, our research has found that as a decision (or conversation) gets more difficult and more pressure filled, when there is more on the line and things get emotional, we hit the second reason many fail in a crisis: we either get paralyzed and avoid the more difficult decisions we need to make or we handle it in a way that has a negative impact on other people – in other words, we make a mess of it. These more difficult parts of a decision or conversation, are what we call the Last 8%.

Emotions: Why We Avoid Or Make a Mess 

At the heart of what causes people to avoid or make a mess of their Last 8% situations, decisions, or conversations are emotions. Strong emotions, such as fear and anxiety, naturally arise when we engage in, or even think about, Last 8% situations. The emotional part of our brain, the Amygdala, is wired to react to any perceived threats. When the emotional brain feels triggered by a Last 8% situation, it moves us to our fight or flight response – this is why it can feel ‘overwhelming’, like we are ‘drowning’, causing us to avoid or make a mess of the situation. 

I will never forget working with a bank on Wall Street in 2008, when an executive, facing the unraveling of his company during the global financial crisis, wouldn’t leave his office to address his team. For hours. And then, days. People were perplexed. They didn’t know what to do. This might be an extreme example of avoidance, but it was very real for his team that week. And it set the tone for not only his team, but the entire organization.

What we are facing today with the Covid-19 crisis is the same and requires us to be on our game. Whether you are an executive of an NBA team that has had its season suspended, or a leader of an airlines who has just lost the ability to fly from Europe to the US or you are an individual contributor on a team that is facing uncertainty about what is going to happen next, being aware of your emotions and understanding how it can drive our behavior is the essential skill required for navigation.

The Cost of Avoiding Last 8%

When we avoid something that we know we really shouldn’t it has two significant consequences. First to our external reputation: when others see us avoiding or making a mess of Last 8% situations, decisions or conversations, they start to lose confidence in our abilities and are not sure we are up to the task. They stop following us. That is what happened to our bank executive in 2008. But there is also damage to a far greater resource: our internal reputation. When we avoid the difficult, we know we didn’t do the more difficult thing we needed to do and not only do we feel regret, but we lose confidence in ourselves and become even more gun shy the next time we need to a make big decision.

What To Do

First and foremost, you need to build up your resources. Working at all times of the day with no rest will not give you what you need to build your internal resources. When we are tired and overextended or we become isolated (another common occurrence during these events), we are not as skillful in managing our emotions. And managing your emotions, the key to finding a way to neither avoid nor make a mess of Last 8% situations, is the most important thing you need to do right now as a leader.

As Peter Drucker said, just before he died:

“I no longer think that learning how to manage people, especially subordinates, is the most important for executives to learn. I am teaching above all else, how to manage oneself.”

How do we best learn to manage our emotions?

First of all, don’t forget you already have a great deal of Emotional Intelligence (EI) at your disposal. You wouldn’t have gotten to where you are without a certain amount of EI. But you need to build on that. How?

The best way to learn EI is with and through others. EI is, itself, a social/emotional skill that is best learned with others, not in isolation. I realize this has become infinitely more difficult today given the need for social distance with Covid-19, however, it is definitely possible. For years we have been delivering our world class Emotional Intelligence training for our clients virtually with a live facilitator - and today with all that is going on, it is proving especially beneficial to have this delivery mechanism available for people. From your home you can learn how to increase EI during 3 two-hour sessions over the course of a week without the need to travel. With the advent of break-out rooms and other technology, our clients find it every bit as powerful as our in-person course because it integrates the important ingredient of learning with others.

Our executive at the NBA team is facing the biggest challenge of his career: how to manage the unprecedented shut-down of his league while at same time, managing his people who are also, understandingly, feeling strong emotions themselves. How will he deal with it? Hopefully, by managing the first reason we fail in a crisis: making sure he doesn’t deplete his internal resources by going non-stop and believing 'when it is all over, then I can rest'. And by managing the second reason we fail: finding a way to neither avoid nor make a mess of the big Last 8% decisions he is going to face. This will take all of the Emotional Intelligence he has built up over the past few years. He is ready. Are you?

To learn more about or sign up for an upcoming Live Online EI Training Program, go to: https://www.ihhp.com/liveonline/