5 Steps For Turning Your Next Business Crisis Into a Leadership Moment

Don't try to solve the problem or build a plan alone, especially if you have no relevant experience. Look for a mentor, or expert in this area, and ask for their advice.

You need to understand potential misconceptions and ferret out any rumors which complicate the situation and lead to the wrong conclusion.

When you sense a crisis, you need to communicate and listen carefully with urgency, transparency, and empathy. A tone of urgency encourages people to mitigate impact, and transparency builds trust in you as a leader. Showing empathy fosters resilience in facing the challenges directly and acting.

A key challenge with communication in a crisis is to get ahead of the issue. Don't wait until a media inquiry or a government agency puts you on the defensive, and makes all of your efforts look like too little, too late. Daily updates on a crisis are often appropriate.

Whether the impending crisis was caused by your mistake, your team, or was a fluke accident, you win trust by accepting responsibility for how it has affected customers and apologize.

Conversely, the quickest and surest way to lose all trust is by blaming others entirely for the situation.