By Declan Noone
Like the majority of you I have been tied to my home for many weeks as a result of government restrictions during this pandemic. Consequently, I have reverted to using more Irish colloquialisms than I normally would.The use of the word ‘muck’ in Ireland refers to rubbish, BS, nothing of value, etc. so when I was reflecting on the key role of positive leaders in a crisis, it’s a term I find best describes key inhibitors to effective leadership in such situations. MUCK describes what you, as a leader, have overcome and as an acronym it captures the 4 key areas you need to address i.e.
Misinformation
Uncertainty
Complexity and the
Knowing mind.
Misinformation
In our highly connected world information is readily accessible. Your workforce can access huge volumes of information on any topic in a matter of seconds. In times of crisis, as you and your leadership team are in fire-fighting mode, you may neglect to communicate with your employees, leading to an information vacuum within your organisation. A crisis generates a sense of anxiety and fear within all of us as well as many other negative emotions. Two core psychological needs we have are: stability and security, and when these are absent, it causes us to seek out information in an attempt to make some sense of what is happening. Unfortunately, misinformation can take hold from poorly researched sources, gossip, innuendo, etc. This fills the information vacuum within the organisation and plays on the fears and anxiety of your employees. It will further magnify negative emotions and catastrophic thinking, and can be detrimental to mental health, organisational citizenship behaviour and ultimately engagement and productivity levels.
The Cure
The answer to Misinformation is detailed analysis by you as the leader and by your leadership team of the ‘real’ factors and potential impacts of those factors on your business. Dealing with data and not relying on anecdotal evidence or hunches. You may have lead teams during the 2008 economic crisis and while that is an important addition to your experiential knowledge, today is the ‘same, same but different’. In other words, there may be similarities, but it is a different situation. So do not let those previous experiences colour your search for insights. Identify the facts, and communicate them to your workforce with clarity, compassion and confidence. Diffuse the misinformation bomb.
Uncertainty
A crisis by its very nature is uncertain. Information available to leaders can initially be fractured and incomplete. The impact of uncertainty can be further magnified by catastrophic thinking or jumping to worst case scenarios which results in leaders and leadership teams regressing into a survival mind-set with ever increasing risk aversion levels.
The Cure
Your role is to, once again, analyse the situation. Enhance your situational awareness, understand the context and identify the most probable scenario/outcome of that crisis. Then identify what areas/factors you can control and those you cannot. Act on those you can control. Once again communicate to your employees the specific context you all face, what you believe to be the most probable scenario, what areas you will be taking action on and why. Keeping your workforce informed is key to helping them manage themselves during times of uncertainty.
Complexity
“Overwhelmed” is a word we hear with greater frequency today, in the context of both personal wellbeing andorganisational capacities and obligations. The role of a positive leader during these times is to appreciate the complexity of factors influencing the probable outcome and then simplify those down to bite size chunks for their employees. Leaders are expected to have the ability, either individually or through their teams, to analyse complex problems, identify the solution, and then simplify it all down to a message and tasks that can be readily understood by others.
The Cure
Grappling with complexity requires enhanced levels of self-awareness and self-care in order to ensure that you do not get overwhelmed. You must understand the factors that are influencing your behavioural decision-making process, and endeavour to communicate with clarity, compassion and confidence not only the solution but the individual tasks and responsibilities of others needed to achieve a positive outcome.
Knowing Mind
In a crisis, with our natural inclination as humans to lean towards the negative, leaders can adopt a style that become more autocratic in order to ‘get things done’. In uncertain periods we draw on our knowledge and experiences to help guide us. However, in a world of ever-increasing complexity the likelihood of one individual having all the answers to complex problems is highly unlikely.
The Cure
Leaders need to build a collaborative culture within their teams, empowering those who have knowledge and experiences in areas which the leader does not. We must provide them with the opportunity to voice those opinions without talking over them or being prescriptive about how things are done. I am very fond of the Albert Einstein quote “We can’t solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them”. So suspend your knowledge for a bit, empower others to take ownership and feed into the decision making process, guide the process along, and then make an informed decision.
So in a crisis the role of the positive leader is to handle the M.U.C.K. Understand their impact on the individual, the team and the organisation. Remove them as obstacles or constraints. Communicate with clarity, compassion and confidence. Then take action and move forward.
