The authors here discuss the need of leaders in a crisis situation to function in two distinct phases. The first one they discuss is the emergency phase. In this phase “your task is to stabilize the situation and buy time.” The authors use the example of our nation’s leadership in the current financial crisis. The task of leaders in the last several years has been to guide a nation through a financial crisis. As stability is brought to the country’s economy, however, the second phase, called the adaptive phase must be undertaken with just as much effort. The adaptive phase is “when you tackle the underlying causes of the crisis and build the capacity to thrive in a new reality.” This requires a leader to hit the proverbial “reset” button and position an organization for long term effectiveness coming out of a crisis.
The article offers the illustration of a heart-attack victim. The first step of the paramedics is to stabilize the patient. Yet many patients fail in the adaptive phase to make changes conducive to their long-term health. Are leaders in the church guilty of the same negligence? We may want to stabilize a crisis situation without looking for long term changes that need to be made underneath the surface. How many churches will we serve at that are in an emergency? If we look at emergencies as a chance to provide stability, and then make long term changes to help the congregation thrive, we will be more effective for the Kingdom of God.
Preston, I appreciated how at the end of your review you applied the principles of the article to church leadership. I see the two phases of crises management but I wonder if there are more than just two. I don't have any suggestions to offer for other phases but I just wonder if there is more to crises than two phases. And I agree with you that a majority of the time church leaders come into crises situations and they just want to get past the emergency stage and never focus on the adaptive stage. It seems most leaders just look for their churches to survive and not to thrive. But in reading your review I also thought about the leaders who collapse in the emergency phase of crises. In fact, there are some leaders when a crises arises who run away during the emergency phase and leave their congregations hanging out to dry. And what about the leaders who cause the crises for their organizations? Let's face a hard reality some of the crises we face as leaders are our own fault.
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