Bala Sir on Academic Leadership-65

Leaders and Crisis Management

It is said that we are in a fast and “quick-fix” society. We want things to happen immediately and we attend to many things simultaneously. Clash of interests, the inadequacy of attention, unrealistic time limits, imaginary targets, and the urge to win in everything have become the order of the day. Often the success of a person is defined in terms of his ability to multi-process things and info. In all such endeavors, one frequently lands in situations that we term as “Crisis”.

If there are insufficient funds for an individual; he is in a “financial crisis”. If there is a misunderstanding among the members of the family; it is a “family crisis”. If someone is threatening to unseat you from a position; it is a “power crisis”. Crisis takes many shapes and forms depending on the situation and circumstances. It is again a relative term. What is a crisis to one, is just an event to another. It is our response level to any external stimuli that defines what a crisis is.?

Defining the common features of a crisis, Idalene Kesner in her article “Effective Crisis Management” lists the following characteristics:

Therefore, the leader of an organization should be competent enough to

An effective leader should know how to prevent the crisis rather than wait and meet the crisis squarely. A leader should put in place mechanisms that would identify and diffuse the crisis before it lands. Some people who are overconfident and rest on their abilities of crisis management often understand in a post-mortem that they could have easily prevented the crisis, had they taken a little more effort.

Normally a linear dissection of the crisis would indicate three stages:

1. Pre-crisis stage
2. Crisis periods
3. Post-crisis stage

Elaborating on the above stages Kesner lists the following:

Crisis Management is a critical skill in any leadership process. Whatever the type of leadership, one comes across crises of one kind or the other.

Sometimes we become victims of pseudo-crises. What is a small problem appears as a major crisis to us because of our inability to keep pace with the problem, understand and appreciate the cause of the problem, our expectations of the desired result, our intolerance to the quantum and quality of rewards to our work and such things.

A crisis could be to an individual, a group of individuals, an organization, to a society. Most often the crises enlarge due to miscommunication, poor understanding of the holistic nature of the problem and lack of congruence in thoughts and actions. In most cases, crises can be diffused by developing a shared vision and enhancing the level of synergy.?

Here are a few situations in a school system which I had witnessed. Examine how you would meet such situations:

1. You are holding a performance in an auditorium in the evening. There is a power failure due to a transformer breakdown. An alternate system like a generator does not come into play. You have an audience to face.?
2. You are conducting a school function. There is a reported fire due to short-circuit
3. You are conducting a sports function. You find a participant falls due to a cardiac problem.
4. There is mob violence in the city. The mob approaches the school. You have to take some quick and intelligent decisions

There may be many such situations. Do you have an action plan with you or do you wait for things to happen and face it as and when required?

Do check:

·??????Where are your intelligence forces?

·??????What are your option management schemes?

·??????Do you have a competent force ready to act fast?

·??????What are the communication levels and systems?

Well, no one wants to face a crisis. But they do come. A good leader anticipates crises in advance and puts in a plan for prevention rather than reconstruction.

Bala Sir is the Chair of the Advisory Council at CLLE. A thought leader in education, he was the former Director (Academics) of CBSE, Delhi. He is a passionate teacher, curriculum designer, and mentor for various educational institutions and leaders across the world. He brings his extensive experience and wisdom to propel various learning partnerships and initiatives at CLLE.