Leading in Challenging Times

Current times remind me of a metaphor I have not used for about 15 years. Leading is like captaining a ship or if you lead multiple units a fleet of ships. In challenging times like today we need to see our ships as manoeuvring through narrow and quite dangerous straits. Our attention has to be on looking only a small distance ahead and getting through, avoiding among other things perilous rocks. Certainly, we can dream about where we are eventually going but our focus is very definitely short-term. When the ship or your fleet starts to emerge into wider waters you can once again plot a course, set direction that is expansive and take advantage of the environment you are in. You know that the open seas are not peril free but you have a wider range of options.

If you are leading a fleet of ships (multiple units) you need to be aware where they are. Are they still in the narrow and dangerous straits or have some emerged to the open seas? Management of multiple units in these times needs to be highly attuned to where the units are. Blanket policies that imply that either everyone is in the same condition rarely work as different markets enter and emerge from recessions at different speeds.