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Emergency Planning College Short Guide

Crisis Leadership Part 1 Key Concepts

The Insight Team Emergency Planning College

September 2019

The Insight Team Key author: Mark Leigh Editing and graphics design: Helen Jubb

Acknowledgements

The author would like to acknowledge and thank the following colleagues for reviewing various parts of Crisis Leadership Parts 1-4 and making very useful recommendations:

Helen Hinds Beverley Griffiths Alan Bravey Tom Knox

The aim of this series of short guides is to explain our basic approach to developing and equipping people for the challenge of crisis leadership. This is something we have been doing for many years, most notably through:• Domestic and international variants of our strategic crisis management course; • Publications and events in our Insight Programme;• Authorship contributions to key doctrine, guidance and standards.

We are aiming to provide short guides (mostly in graphic form with short explanatory notes) which will:• Tell the resilience community how we go about this work;• Inform practitioners who are looking to develop their own skills and confidence;• Give practitioners a useful and usable guide to key concepts and the right tools;• Contribute generally to good practice guidance.

The target audience is senior managers who are not resilience specialists, but whose main role carries with it a liability for serving as a crisis manager – perhaps on a duty roster or as and when there is an activation. They will be experienced professionals with highly developed managerial and leadership skills, but possibly new to managing in crises. We do suggest that you read the notes pages and the graphic slides.

The Short Guide comes in 4 parts:• This is Part 1: Key Concepts;• Part 2: Core Functions;• Part 3: Useful Tools;• Part 4: Staying Effective.

To some extent the selection of content is subjective; it represents themes and issues that we see as recurring, persistent and worthy of inclusion. They are not exhaustive or comprehensive –the literature on this topic is vast and specialised. Instead, they aim to be a quick, informative and practical aide-memoire. The clue is in the name – they are short guides!

1(c) Emergency Planning College

© Emergency Planning College

Part 1 Key Concepts

Mark Leigh

Crisis Leadership

We shall focus on the what and the how. For more detail and a wider discussion around these issues, and an explanation of why we do things this way, we recommend the following:

• Leigh, M. MacFarlane, R. and Williams, D. (2013) Leadership in Multi-Agency Emergency Co-ordination Groups: A Functional Approach. Emergency Planning College Occasional Papers New Series Number 7. Easingwold: EPC https://www.epcresilience.com/EPC/media/MediaLibrary/Knowledge%20Hub%20Documents/J%20Thinkpieces/PP04-Leadership-FEB-2016.pdfM

• MacFarlane, R. (2015) Decision-Support Tools for Risk, Emergency and Crisis Management. Emergency Planning College Position Paper Number 1. Easingwold: EPChttps://www.epcresilience.com/EPC/media/MediaLibrary/Knowledge%20Hub%20Documents/J%20Thinkpieces/PP01-Decision-Making-Sep-2015.pdf

• MacFarlane, R and Leigh, M. (2014) Information Management and Shared Situational Awareness Emergency Planning College Occasional Paper Number 12. Easingwold:EPChttps://www.epcresilience.com/EPC/media/Images/Knowledge%20Centre/Occasionals/Occ12-Paper.pdf

• Leigh, M (2016) Critical Thinking in Crisis Management Occasional Paper 15 Easingwold:EPChttps://www.epcresilience.com/EPC/media/Images/Knowledge%20Centre/Occasionals/Occ15-Paper-AUG-2016.pdf

• JESIP Joint Doctrinehttps://www.jesip.org.uk/joint-doctrine

• The ACPO Guidance 2009 Emergency Procedures, especially pp 20-22. ACPO no longer exists, but this guidance is still useful and availablehttps://www.effectivecommand.org/Content/docs/UK/NPIA%20ACPO%20Guidance%20on%20Emergency-Procedures%20(2009).pdf

• British Standard 11200:2014 Crisis Management: Guidance and good practice

• Emergency Response and Recovery, Ch 4. Cabinet Office 2013https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/253488/Emergency_Response_and_Recovery_5th_edition_October_2013.pdf

• National resilience Standards 10 & 11, available from https://collaborate.resilience.gov.uk/RDService/home/147567/National-Resilience-Standards

1

The tablets identify 9 ways in which crises generically differ from incidents. Some could argue that one or two of these might also apply to incidents in some circumstances or cases. That would miss the point. The point is that all 9 will almost always apply to a crisis.

The essential truth here is that crises are different. They do not sit at the ‘bit harder’ end of a spectrum with incidents of varying severity. Because they are different, it stands to reason that the capability built to handle incidents will probably not be suitable for managing crises. If your organisation’s arrangements don’t reflect this understanding – you should enquire further.

It isn’t the purpose of this document to rehearse the argument, but if you are not quite clear about the distinction between incidents and crises (or why it’s important , we suggest that you read BS11200:2014 – the British Standard on crisis management.

Alternatively, read the much shorter document referred to in the graphic above. It is available from the ‘Tools and Templates’ section of the EPC website. Click here:

https://www.epcresilience.com/EPC/media/Images/Knowledge%20Centre/Tools%20and%20Templates/Templete-Incidents-and-Crises.pdf

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Always strategic

Ill-structured and complex

Less foreseeable

Volatile, with few ‘win-win’

outcomes

Critically dependent on

communications (perception is

all)

Critical to reputation and

survival

Characterised by dilemmas

Qualitatively different, not just ‘bigger incidents’

Run by the top layer of

management

Key Concept 1: Crises Are Different

Read this: Characteristics of Incidents and Crises

Compared

EPC Tools and Templates

This is a way of looking at incidents and crises that doesn’t use the conventional language of civil protection, emergency management or business continuity. This is associated with Professor Keith Grint, who coined the concept of ‘tame’ versus ‘wicked’ problems.

It might be a new way of looking at the subject, but practitioners seem to find it useful and informative. It’s the difference between the two that really matters.

For our purposes a ‘tame’ problem is similar to an incident. It might be very tricky, but is usually amenable to recognised and usually foreseeable responses. This is because (for example):• The cause-and-effect links are clear and visible. You can easily ‘model’ what a given action or

choice might lead to;• It can, generally, be planned for to a fairly high degree of confidence and accuracy;• Tame problems are not necessarily easy to resolve. You could say that a tame problem can

be complicated, but is not usually complex.

Wicked problems tend to be multiply complex and create situations that are volatile, uncertain, ambiguous and difficult to understand. They don’t have the sense of recognisable ‘structure’ that a tame problem has, or the tame problem’s relatively visible chains of cause-and-effect In fact, scholars refer to crises as ‘ill-structured’ for this reason. Also, they are probably not amenable to ‘win-win’ solutions and each possible response could be a dilemma; the best available choice may be your ‘least worst’ option. There will not be enough time or material resource to do all that is needed, let alone all that is desirable.

Why is this important? It’s about giving strategic leaders a realistic expectation of the crisis leadership, as well as the tools and ideas to do it with. The crisis leader has to be comfortable, effective and decisive in uncertainty and in situations where there is no play-book. They are unlikely to be able to rely on standard procedures, rules, existing plans, rehearsed actions or on people “just knowing what to do”. Stepping into this world may need a bit of cultural and professional re-calibration.



What are they?

Why is this important?

Key Concept 2: Tame and Wicked Problems

The ‘people’ in this context means focusing (perhaps exclusively in the early stages of the crisis) on what you are doing for those that are affected.

We suggest that one of the success stories of recent years in UK crisis management has been the ‘humanising’ of public communications in crises. Several recent cases show a marked improvement and a move away from the stilted archetype of the ‘company spokesman’ type. The result is a more down-to-earth ‘feel’, which puts a humanitarian focus in place.

Nevertheless, there is still truth in the argument that public communication is seen by some as a minefield and a threat, wherein one is vulnerable to being ‘exposed’ by a hostile and unforgiving media. This can lead to being on the defensive in language, style and tone. There is a self-fulfilling argument there, of course.

There is also the internal communications piece. From the crisis manager’s point-of-view a dominant and urgent early question will be “who should I call, in what order and what should I report?” That, at least, is amenable to some forward planning.

In both types of communication ‘honesty, empathy and the people’ will take you a long way. Now reflect on your own experience; you may be able to bring to mind examples of crisis communications that are good, less good and – possibly – downright awful! Chances are, the good ones will impress you with their honesty, their empathy and their focus on the people affected.

But what do you do if a situation is so chaotic that it defies all attempts to deal with it according to any rational plan? The answer is, we suggest, simply start doing what seems to do the most good for the most needy people. So honesty, empathy and the people is both a principle and (in extremis) a guide to action.



Instead - use it deliberately to shape the public’s perception, using the usual watchwords: honesty, empathy and the people

The result is often stilted, defensive, cliché-ridden and evasive

So the opportunity to communicate is seen as a threat

Too much crisis communications practice is negative and focusses on how to ‘stay out of trouble’ and knowing what not to say

Key Concept 3: Honesty, Empathy and the People

It’s an adage that crisis managers who are out of their depth tend to delve down to the level of tactical and even operational issues. They do this when over-faced by the crisis and the magnitude and complexity of the job. It helps them to find problems that they can understand and can do ‘something’ about, even though they may not be the things they should be doing.

Crisis management and staying at the strategic level of action needs a certain amount of ‘critical distance’ from the front line and the detail of what is happening now – although that has to be understood.

‘Critical distance’ is a concept used by Patrick Lagadec (1993); it simply means staying out of the operational and tactical levels of detail and focusing on the big picture without distraction. Metaphorically, your job is to map the forest, not count the trees.

Finally, make sure there is absolute clarity – in your mind and others’ – about who is actually in charge and of what.



…the issue, the strategic implications & the risks for organisations and communities

Understand

…on the strategic dimensions and issuesFocus

…the strategy, resource the tacticsControl

…quickly and confidently, make decisions rigorously and defensibly

Act

…on people, reputation, brand, communications (internal and external), media, key stakeholder management, higher-level liaison, mutual aid & continuity of key services

Focus

Key Concept 4: Stay in Role

Training crisis managers involves helping them feel as comfortable and as confident as possible in that ‘zone of greatest uncertainty’ – and able to operate at the pace of the crisis or ahead of it.

What can you do to lower the demand curve and raise the availability curve?

The practical answers are to (respectively):• Get used to working with what you have, accept uncertainty as a natural part of crisis

management and record all decisions so that they are defensible in terms of what was known at the time the decision had to be made;

• Make sure that information management is as effective as possible, making best use of what is available – and situational awareness is accurate and up-to-date.

Sometimes it is right to delay. But more often a decision will be needed quickly. Remember: More data does not equal more information.

Delaying a decision does make it likely that more data will be available. But it offers no guarantee that this data will equal more information that is usable information. In fact, because it will also generate ‘noise’ (unwanted data) it may be counter-productive and make the eventual decision more difficult to make! Crisis management is fraught with unintended consequences.

In fact, If you come from a professional domain wherein people tend to delay decisions until all the ‘essential’ information is available to them, then you must be aware of one important point -that approach will not work in crisis management! Crisis Leaders must be aware that they will be working ‘beyond BAU’. This need not be alarming, but it will be uncomfortable if you are not properly prepared and equipped for it.



Key Concept 5: Be Comfortable in UncertaintyS

up

ply

& D

em

and

of

Info

rma

tio

n

Time

'Zone of greatest uncertainty'

where most early critical decisions have to be made

You can’t always get what you want… Jagger, M. & Richards, K. (1967)

‘Cognitive biases’ is the posh name for decision traps.

They are natural, innate, persistent and also quite useful. We have evolved with them because they help us to think and react quickly. The trouble is that they are useful most (but not all) of the time. Sometimes they can lead people seriously astray and into flawed decision-making.

There is a vast literature on this subject. For our purposes here, we focus on just four biases (from the dozens that have been identified).• Confirmation bias: Selecting and disregarding information (evidence) in such a way as to

support the conclusion you have already made.• Availability bias: When you think back to recall details of an analogous situation, the easier it

is to recall, the more likely it is to seem to be correct. – whether it is or isn’t.• Sunk cost bias: Persevering with a failing strategy because, after all, you’ve come this far…

A powerful driver for this bias is your wish to appear in control, decisive and consistent. But remember: it isn’t 'weak leadership' to change your strategy when the situation (or your understanding of it) changes, but it can be weak leadership to be scared of changing when you should.

• Framing: Various ways in which the way information is presented (or ‘encoded’) effects the way it is received, understood and given meaning (example: 5% fat or 95% fat-free).

So what?

These are innate tendencies or pre-dispositions. You can’t get rid of them. Also, you don’t want to – they are mental short-cuts that make life much easier and are beneficial much of the time. But because they aren’t good all the time, you must be aware of their influence and check your thought processes all the time. That is, actually, critical thinking.

There are tools to help you mitigate the influence of these biases: we will cover them in Short Guide 3 Useful Tools.



Confirmation bias

Availability bias

Sunk cost bias Framing

Key Concept 6: Watch for Decision Traps

In answer to the above question:

You search your memory (experience) for a similar situation (an ‘analogue’) that occurred in the past. You ask yourself what you did or didn’t do then and what the results were. If the two events (past and present) are sufficiently similar you are likely to think that the same or a slightly modified response would work in the current situation. OK so far?

Another word for similar is analogous, so the process is called ‘analogous reasoning’. It usually works well; it can also be ‘fast and frugal’ – it needs relatively little external information, being mainly intuitive. It relates to recognition-primed decision-making and depends on pattern-matching. Most of the time it is extremely useful.

But there are the potential issues with it as well. These are things the leader really needs to understand:• Feeling stressed and out-of-control can seriously degrade your ability to pattern-match, and

consequently degrade the reliability of your intuition. This is proven and accepted;• We are, in general, better able to spot the similarities between any two situations than

we are to spot the differences;• If you get this wrong it is the differences that will trip you up. No matter how close the ‘fit’

between your experience and the current situation, they will almost never be exactly the same. And it’s the differences that will matter

• We tend to sub-consciously look for patterns and sometimes see them where they don’t really exist. A mundane example is shapes in clouds. This is called pareidolia.

• We remain at all times vulnerable to natural and evolved cognitive biases (decision traps). We seldom, if ever, think with total objectivity or remember with complete accuracy.

Feeling that you aren’t in control of a situation can have two other well-understood effects:• It drives you to simplify in order to understand better. The danger here is obvious.• It drives you to stereotype – making things fit into a mental framework so that you can

understand more readily. Ditto.



We’ve all got it. Most of us would tend to rely on it more readily in decision-making than on a model that we have been ‘taught’

But when you use your intuition to help you make a judgement, what is the mechanism – how does it actually work?

Understand the value and the limitations of experience as a guide to action

Key Concept 7: Trust Your Intuition… But Carefully

Now relate the possible influence of these tendencies to the earlier discussion of crisis as the domain of complexity, nuance and ambiguity. Anything that makes it easier to navigate that is good, but it comes at a price and bears a risk. This is that the process of simplification may ignore nuances or detail that is critically important.

8

Generally speaking, it is expected that a decision record or log spells out the situation, the problem, the options, the choice and the factors taken into account when choosing it. In other words, there is a coherent rationale for the decision and that is the ‘evidence’ referred to in the slide. Ideally, you should also identify and explain what you didn’t do and why you didn’t do it. It should also be a more-or-less contemporaneous record, made immediately after the decision or as soon as possible afterwards.

This can make decisions ‘defensible’ to an extent. But you still have to ensure that it passes an acid test of critical thinking; is the decision necessary, proportionate and legal? Does it fit with the collective professional instinct of the team and are you sure that you gave the alternative options due consideration?

It will add rigour if you describe the decision support tool(s) you used. This especially applies to the use of the Joint Decision Model. This is covered in Part 3 Useful Tools.



Key Concept 8: Defensible Decisions

The point of including this concept is – make sure you are properly trained, properly equipped, properly practiced and properly supported.

The dimensions explained: • Intellectual: includes guidance, shared concepts, frameworks & the intellectual ability to

analyse, strategize and learn;• Structural: includes structures, processes, procedures and plans;• Human: includes ‘buy in’, skills, confidence, commitment and experience. Having the right

people with the right skills to call on;• Physical: includes resources, equipment and ‘stuff’.

Practitioners have argued that the human elements are the most important. One put it this way to the author … “If you start with the A Team you will be fine, with the B Team you will get by and with the C Team you will struggle”

A system with high capability for crisis management will have these in balance. So, from your perspective as a crisis leader the concern should be “do we have these dimensions equally well developed” and “where are the gaps that could let me down on the day?” Then, consider how robust your systems will need to be if the response lasts, perhaps, five days?



Key Concept 9: Capability has 4 Dimensions

EPC Position Paper 6, 2017

The

Inte

llect

ual

The Structural

The H

um

an

The Physical

The Insight Team

• Key author: Mark Leigh

• Editing and graphics design: Helen Jubb

Acknowledgements

The author would like to acknowledge and thank the following colleagues for reviewing various parts of Crisis Leadership Parts 1-4 and making very useful recommendations:

• Helen Hinds

• Beverley Griffiths

• Alan Bravey

• Tom Knox

11(c) Emergency Planning College


Part 1 Key Concepts

Mark Leigh

Crisis Leadership

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