Welcome to Merge's Monthly Mega Minute - a bite-sized, yet substantial and practical, nugget of information that you can use immediately to enhance your professional and personal success.

The problem with crisis management

The customer that is angry; the internal client with a pressing deadline; the employee that needs coaching.  All things that need to be addressed, and as soon as possible.  Which makes sense – deal with the most critical priorities first.  Crisis management is an important part of your job as a leader.

But what about your customers that aren’t frustrated?  And your internal clients who are patiently waiting for your attention?  And your high-performing employees?  What happens when they realize that the only way to get your attention is to get irate, or to create fake deadlines, or to dumb down their contributions?  Or even worse, what if they choose not to and simply find someone or somewhere else?

Whether they do something so that you notice them, or do nothing and walk, you’ve lost the best parts of your role as a leader.  And eventually, you’ll be left with only the people who are angry, stressed, and disengaged.

The problem with continued crisis management is the eventual outcome.  Which means that what is really critical about crisis management is that you find a way to break the pattern of going from crisis to crisis.  Yes, it may require you to take your attention away from the crisis itself by delegating its management to someone else.  But it’s the only way you’ll be able to focus on getting at the root cause of the issue, and designing a solution. 

Getting off the treadmill of crisis management is not easy.  But I hope you can see that it’s necessary, nay essential.  I’d love to hear about your experiences, and your challenges.   Please share by adding your comment directly on the blog at www.turningmanagersintoleaders.com/blog.

Are you a leader in northern British Columbia?

Merge is pretty darn excited to be speaking at the 10^th Annual Spark Women’s Leadership Conference on May 17-18 in Fort St. John BC.  This premiere event brings together hundreds of women leaders (and the men who work with and support them) from across northern BC for two days of learning and celebration.  This year’s theme is “Rockstar Moves – Step into your greatness” and Merge is thrilled to be presenting both a mainstage keynote and a professional development workshop.  If you live and/or work in northern BC, this event absolutely should be on your radar!  Find out more and register at www.SharingTheSpark.com .

Turning Managers Into Leaders

• Video: Offering to help others IS compassion at work. This is strategy #4 in our continuing video series on quick actionable tips to build more compassion at work
  
• Bouncing back from (or preventing) mental health sick leave. This 2022 study offers some great advice to leaders on how they can help employees who are on a mental health sick leave
• Video: In empathetic workplaces, leaders ask questions, listen to the answers, and then go one step further. And then they go from empathetic workplaces to compassionate workplaces simply by taking action to try and improve the situation
• Giving credit fairly in a collaborative work environment. The question of "I versus We" can be easily answered if you consider your communication objective

That Merge is one of only 58 Canadians to hold the prestigious Certified Speaking Professional credential?

Merge is a proud professional member of both the Canadian Association of Professional Speakers and the Global Speakers Federation, and holds her Certified Speaking Professional (CSP) designation. The CSP designation is an international measure of speaking and platform excellence and is awarded only to those accomplished speakers who meet strict criteria and have a proven record of delivering client satisfaction. Less than 12% of the speakers who belong to the worldwide federation hold this professional designation, and Merge is one of only 58 Canadians to have earned the Certified Speaking Professional credential. You can obtain more information about the CSP designation here.