How can you manage crises successfully? One approach is to focus on calmness, clarify and concrete results. Let’s explore how you can follow these steps in your own way.

1) You can focus on calmness.

Calmness is crucial - whether you are arriving at the scene of an accident, solving a customer problem, counselling a distressed person or whatever. It is vital to ‘buy time’. You need to get an overview of the situation, clarify the key challenges and focus on the result you want to achieve. Sometimes you may also need to transmit calmness to other people. How can you apply this approach in your own way? Start by thinking of a challenging situation that you may face in the future. You may suffer a setback at work, face a difficult illness, experience a crisis in a relationship or whatever. How can you stay composed? How can you buy time? How can you see things in perspective? Try completing the following sentence.

The specific things I can do to stay
calm in the challenging situation are:

*

*

*

2) You can focus on clarity.

Clarity is vital is two areas – the ‘What’ and the ‘How’. You need to clarify what you aim to achieve and how you aim to achieve it. Let’s explore these two stages.

a) Clarify the ‘What’.

Whilst you may need to act quickly, your actions must - as far as possible - fit in with the longer-term goal. So begin by asking yourself: “What are the real results I want to achieve? What is the picture of perfection?”

Imagine you are a doctor arriving at the scene of a motorway accident. Certainly you may need to act quickly to save lives - but you must also bear in mind the long-term effects. Pulling a person clear may release them quickly, but it may also cause other damage. You want them to regain their health and be able to walk again. What is the real result you want to achieve – both long-term and short-term? Let’s consider another situation. Imagine you are having an argument with your partner. What is the real goal you want to achieve? Do you want to win the present argument or build a long-term ‘win-win’ relationship?

Establishing the real ‘What’ will influence ‘How’ you tackle the situation. You may, of course, have a mixture of short, medium and long-term goals. If so, brainstorm all the things you want to achieve, list these in order of priority – then focus on tackling them from the top down. Looking at the critical situation you may face in the future, try completing the following sentence.

The specific things I can do to clarify the ‘What’ – the real
results I want to achieve - in the challenging situation are:

*

*

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b) Clarify the ‘How’.

Let’s move onto the ‘How’ – the strategy for achieving the goals. Bearing in mind the results you want to achieve, begin by exploring the potential solutions. You can do this by going through three stages.

* Clarify the ‘controllables’.

People like to feel in charge. So begin by asking yourself: “What are the things I can control in the situation? What are the things I can’t control? How can I build on what I can control and manage what I can’t.”

* Clarify the ‘choices, consequences and creative solutions’.

Ask yourself: “What are the choices – the various options – in this situation? What are the consequences – the pluses and minuses - of each option? What are the potential creative solutions? For example, what are the best parts of each option? Can I put these together to create another solution? Are there any other imaginative solutions?”

* Clarify the ‘conclusions’.

Make a decision. Looking at all the possible options, ask yourself: “Which route do I want to take? How can I build on the pluses and minimise the minuses?” Choose your way forward. (Sometimes, of course, you may try several parallel strategies.) Looking at a critical situation you may face in the future, try completing the following sentence.

The specific things I can do to clarify the ‘How’ – the strategy
for moving forward in the challenging situation - are:

*

*

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3) You can focus on concrete results.

Commit to your chosen strategy. Work hard, concentrate fully and, if appropriate, get some early wins. Encourage yourself and other people. Keep going until you deliver the required concrete results. Looking ahead to the possible critical situation you may face in the future, try completing the following sentence.

The specific things I can do to work hard to deliver
concrete results in the challenging situation are:

*

*

*

Good crisis managers then look beyond the present. After solving the problem, they take learn lessons and identify areas for improvement. Ask yourself: “What can I learn from the crisis? How can I prevent the problem happening again in the future? If it does occur again, however, how can I manage similar situations better in the future?” Clarify your conclusions – then put your action plans in place. Good crisis management can be the trigger for improving your quality of life in the future.

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