Overcoming The “Crisis Leadership” Cycle

Recently I came across this quote attributed to the Navy Seals, “Under pressure, you don’t rise to the occasion, you sink to the level of your training.”

I strongly believe this is true.

A quick note, before I dive into the article -- in honor of my birthday this week -- a couple of offers: 1) I dropped the price of the paperback version of my book on Amazon for anyone thinking of giving The Middle Matters: A Toolkit for Middle Managers as a gift to their team ... and 2) On Nov 8th 12-1pm I'll be doing a free webinar on Nov. 8th, 12-1pm ET on "The Goal of Leadership"

Which all begs a really interesting question - what happens when there was never any training to begin with?

Let’s consider for a minute the military or sports or music or theater. In those worlds, there is constant coaching, training, rehearsal, repetition. No, it’s not because people didn’t “get it the first time.” Elite soldiers, athletes, musicians, and actors still practice, all the time.

Rather, drills are all about ensuring, in the heat of the moment when the pressure to act is unfathomable, you can draw on an instinctive understanding of the situation in order to make the right choices.

To use another analogy, constant training builds a toolkit full of tools that give you options for whatever unexpected situation arises.

In a hockey rink, training and drilling might be the difference between scoring a goal or smashing into the boards.

In life or death situations, the ability to fall back on your training rather than “rise to the occasion,” is often what makes the difference between tragedy and survival.

So to answer my question, when there’s no training or practice, what happens is confusion, calamity, and chaos.

And yet, when it comes to leadership, we just put people into roles and expect them to succeed. No training, no practice, no coaching. Why?

Here’s a few of the excuses that seem to come up:

• Myth 1: “People just ought to know how to lead” - Right. Maybe people ought to just know how to play the violin too. But they don’t. Managing up, leading, and influencing others are complex capabilities developed by learning, practicing, and continuously reinforcing defined skills.
• Myth 2: “You learn leadership from watching others.” - Sort of like how I’ve learned how to be an actor by watching movies? This concept is based on two logical fallacies: 1)The idea that what you are seeing on the surface as you watch a good leader is all that’s going on (like the proverbial swan that appears to glide on the water), 2) The idea that the leaders available to learn from are good role models (chances are they weren’t trained either).
• Myth 3: “Some people just aren’t cut out for leadership.” - I never quite know how I feel about this one. We put people in leadership roles, don’t train them, and then we decide they have no talent when they fall flat on their face. I have a sneaking suspicion those Olympic figure skaters we all love had more than their fair share of graceless falls on their way to excellence even with coaching … but, sure, let’s expect people to figure out leading teams, navigating politics, managing through a business challenges the first time out on the ice.
• Myth 4: “There’s no time for training. They just need to figure it out.” This one borders on infuriating. Lack of training, coaching, and developing leaders leads to all sorts of unintended consequences. The worst of these is that the organization descends into a state of constant urgency and chaos. The only solution to this chaos is to help the leaders to be more intentional and effective by adding new tools to their toolkit. (See the Navy Seal quote above if you don’t want to take my word for it.)

One thing’s for sure, if there’s no time for training now, there will never be time for training in the future. Chaos breeds chaos. Crisis breeds crisis. A constant firefight ensues where you are just barely keeping the fires at bay, or worse where the fires slowly but surely consume the business until there’s nothing left to burn.

So what’s the remedy?

1. Set an organizational goal to end the cycle of chaotic “crisis leadership” rather than continuing to jump from one fire to the next
2. Make learning, training, personal and leadership development a priority right now - yes, during the current crisis - before the next crisis grows out of control.
3. Recognize the need to train all middle leaders, not just the “high potential” ones, because the whole middle layer functions as an interconnected team.

Ultimately, the decision to get out of the "crisis leadership" cycle rests on the people at the top intentionally working to overcome the lack of leadership training that caused the crisis cycle in the first place.

Cross posted on my website and here on LinkedIn. Connect with me to get more news, posts, and articles. Learn more about my book here at JeffSigel.com or on Amazon (The Middle Matters: A Toolkit for Middle Managers,)

Join me live for a webinar on Nov. 8th, 12-1pm ET on "The Goal of Leadership"

And if you’re interested in support for getting your organization out of “crisis leadership” mode, training for your middle leaders, or coaching for yourself , reach out to me directly on LinkedIn or by email at [email protected]