How to Bring Teams Together During Crisis

Sep 23, 2016 1 Min Read
Alt

LDR-PDF-download-110x110

Crisis is a journey of transformation. During crisis, you and your organisation may change or die.

Meetings during tough times:

Successful meetings create focus and increase energy.

1. Reconnect with purpose.
Your purpose is bringing value to your customers, not saving the ship. Invite a client you’ve served to the meeting. Listen to their story and reconnect with your purpose. Make it personal, more than informational.

2. Make it hurt. Pull no punches.
What happens to your clients if you fail?

3. Define the crisis.
Embrace the darkness by asking everyone to explain the worst that could happen. Describe how everyone’s life will change if you fail. It’s silly to dance around a burning house.

4. Express realistic optimism.
Let everyone know how important they are, if they grab the rope and pull.

5. Talk more about what you can control than what you can’t.
Crisis has many components you can’t control. Listen to problems, doubts, and fears. Then say, “I hear what we can’t do. What can we do?”

6. Assign responsibilities to everyone in the room, everyone
They shouldn’t be at the table, if they aren’t making it better.

7. Write assignments on the whiteboard along with the name of the responsible person.

8. Cross off assignments as soon as they’re completed, along with the date. Make progress visible.

9. Give new assignments after old ones are completed. Keep the whiteboard list going.

10. Pour energy into those who make positive contributions. Minimise dead weight.

Bonus: Celebrate wins and talk about next steps at the same time.

Leadership language:
1. We need each other, not I need you.
2. It’s not about us. It’s about the people we serve.
3. I’ve seen us rise to challenges in the past. Tell stories of people who faced challenges in the past. Focus on their work and sacrifice more than the win.

Bonus: Use “we” more than “me.”

What suggestions do you have for running meetings during a crisis?

Dan Rockwell is a coach, speaker and is freakishly interested in leadership. He is an author of a world-renowned most socially shared leadership blog, Leadership Freak.

Reposted with permission on www.leaderonomics.com.

Save

Save

Share This

Business

Alt

This article is published by the editors of Leaderonomics.com with the consent of the guest author. 

You May Also Like

Alt

How To Become More Eco and Green Friendly For Commercial Businesses

Businesses must transition to environmental responsibility because it has evolved from optional to mandatory in present-day business operations. Business operations' relationship with sustainability and the environment now receives heightened attention from customers together with investors and employees. When commercial companies implement eco-friendly operational methods, they minimise their environmental impact and simultaneously achieve operational enhancements and better brand perception together with financial benefits. New environmentally conscious operating procedures seem challenging at first, but appropriate strategies enable businesses to integrate this approach as an essential operational element.

Apr 10, 2025 6 Min Read

Change

Change and Disruption: Fight It or Embrace It?

Be prepared for change, make real change, adapt to change because change is a necessity.

Nov 14, 2019 9 Min Video

Be a Leader's Digest Reader