“Smooth seas do not make skillful sailors.”
It’s an old saying, but anyone who has ever managed a budget or a team during a market crash knows exactly how true it is. Most of the time, leadership feels like steering a ship in clear weather. You have your targets, your team is aligned, and the numbers make sense.
But then the storm hits a major disruption, a financial crisis, or a sudden change in the industry and suddenly, the “playbook” doesn’t work anymore.
The reality is that you don’t find out who a leader is during a record-breaking quarter; you find out when the wheels fall off. When things get messy, your team stops looking at the strategy deck and starts looking at you.
They aren’t looking for a perfect solution right away, but they are looking for composure and honesty.
If you stay silent because you don’t have all the answers, you allow fear to fill the gap. I’ve found that being the “chief truth officer” is the only way through.
It means being brave enough to say what you know, what you don’t know, and exactly what the next step is even if that step is only for the next four hours.
Disruption isn’t a detour from the work; dealing with it is the work. It’s the ultimate stress test for your culture. If your team only functions when things are easy, you don’t have a solid foundation yet.
But if you can lead with a level head and a focus on the next “five feet” in front of you, you’ll come out of the crisis with a team that is much stronger than the one that entered it.
