How You Can Emerge as a Strong Leader During the COVID-19 Crisis
Moving complex projects forward is a challenge at any time, but can shift to the realm of impossibility during a disruption such as the current COVID-19 pandemic.
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How You Can Emerge as a Strong Leader During the COVID-19 Crisis
Moving complex projects forward is a challenge at any time, but can shift to the realm of impossibility during a disruption such as the current COVID-19 pandemic. Strong leaders may emerge during this type of upheaval, while others in a leadership position may find themselves feeling inadequate to the task at hand. There is no single leadership style that is best, but there are some strategies that you can employ to help ensure that your teams are focused on the future instead of on any immediate bumps in the road.
Maintain Clear and Consistent Priorities
It’s all too easy to become more scattered as the wealth of information bombards you and your team from all directions. Continual newscasts that are outside the norm, questions about personal health and those of our loved ones — all of these distractions can overcome even the most organized of teams. As a leader, your role is to maintain clear and consistent priorities without allowing yourself and your team to become preoccupied with secondary tasks. While some minor level of distraction is inevitable, effective leaders will be able to relinquish some measure of autonomy to their staff regarding how to perform specific tasks. Don’t allow this time when your team may be physically apart to second-guess top performers. Trust that your team is focused on the clear priorities that you are setting, but always verify the results.
Amplify the Heroic Stories That You Hear
Your customers and business professionals are likely putting additional pressure on your IT and operations staff, which can cause tempers to fray unexpectedly. With all the added stress, now is the time to shift the limelight to showcase the wonderful acts of the few! Take the time to capture details about great feats of customer service or technical prowess and amplify those messages throughout your team — and the organization. This focus on the positive will encourage staff members to remember why they’re there: to help customers and improve the long-term success of the business. The network engineer who stayed up 20+ hours to ensure that your remote sales meeting could continue deserves a virtual round of applause, don’t you think?
Consider Creative Options Problem-Solving
Are you feeling stuck in a do it/don’t do it conundrum? There’s no need to feel that there are only two answers when it comes to solving difficult business and technology problems. If your team is debating whether to move forward with a new project with only half of your staff in the office, why not look for small solutions that you can implement now and leave the broader project for the future? Biting off smaller tasks from a larger operation can help your teams stay in a positive mode of forward progress instead of becoming mired in negativity. Even if it’s not realistic to expect that you can launch the big software update that you’ve been prepping for, this might be the ideal time to tackle a smaller issue that has been holding back the productivity of your teams.
Empowering leaders requires having alignment between people, processes and technology — a difficult task even in the best of times. When you’re faced with ever-changing conditions such as with the recent coronavirus crisis, even exceptional leaders can stumble without the tools needed to be successful. The experts at SSE are ready to step in to help develop mature business practices that will support the evolving needs of your organization.
Contact our team of project management, IT leadership and technical professionals at 314-439-4700 or via email to info@sseinc.com to schedule your complimentary consultation.