The Productive Pessimist

  It's fair to say there's been quite a few crises doing the rounds recently. What many people may not consider when the next crisis hits the news, and the discourse centres the people impacted by  the crisis, are the people trying to lead through  the crisis, and bring it under control. Recent years have shown a rising trend of anti-leadership rhetoric, especially on social media, with the attitude being that no one actually needs  leadership, people are completely  capable of solving every problem they could ever encounter independently, business leaders don't actually do any work, but just take money from hard working people, and deliberately make life harder for people who are already struggling more than enough.  This attitude is driven by concepts such as the wisdom of crowds, which are increasingly being not so much debunked, but placed back in their original contexts - for example, that it is not that any crowd  will have greater 'wisdom' than ...

1. Know what you don't know Barney down the pub, Jan at slimming group, and Kayleigh, your 13yr old, may think it's "obvious" how to resolve a particular crisis, but the age and treachery which will overcome youth and inexperience knows that, the more 'obvious' the problem seems, the more aspects of it you have underestimated, ignored, or simply never been aware of. 2. Accept your limitations You cannot solve the crisis. YOU. CANNOT. SOLVE. THE. CRISIS. Loud enough for you?  You can't solve the crisis. Your team can't solve the crisis. Your organisation can't solve the crisis. What you can do - what you have  to do - is to realise that every 'crisis' is simply a series of smaller problems. You can solve problems. Your team can solve problems. Your business can solve problems. You can't solve the crisis.  You can  solve the problems that comprise it. 3. Don't micromanage crisis Crises are frightening. They upset people. People get tr...