“Cheer up - especially when the water is up to your neck!”
What are crises and how can they be used?
This article is about the definition of crises and the opportunities that a crisis can offer. A crisis though mainly associated with failures or declines, can help us generate energies that can be harnessed to tackle changes. Are you taking advantage of the potential of a crisis or are you letting fear paralyze you?
A crisis is not the downfall!
The derivation of the Greek (crisis = decision, escalation) reveals: It is a situation in which a decision is required, not the downfall (Greek catastrophe). What they have in common is that they need the right choices and more effort, and they can produce positive results. Crises, and the difficult times that accompany them, are just as much a part of everyday life as they are successes – our perception only treats them in a completely different way: we perceive times of crisis as threatening and dominant. They are quite natural and common in our private as well as our professional life. Whether the crisis of personal life, financial crisis or relationship crisis, no matter how you categorize them, they can be overcome. During our adult life many crisess occur. Each of them seems crippling and bad.
And every crisis offers you exactly two options: Either you decide to take no action during the difficult time, or you actively shape the future. Those who use their energy to respond to the crisis with change and to embrace personal development eventually emerge stronger. The competition remains behind.
Crisis uses measures
Crises are like earthquakes – big changes seem to roll over each fate like massive earth plates. This leads to drastic destruction and changes. But it also creates energy, the frictional heat. And with this “heat of battle”, old structures can be thawed. A common model of change management compares the traditional structures with ice. Changes must melt this ice first and implement the necessary changes before the ice freezes again. Many situation and processes, but also our own behaviour are frozen: “We always do it that way”. Many prefer to suffer in suboptimal conditions for a long time, rather than trying to change once and for all.
In change management, one speaks of preservation by defending the old rules, being mentally blocked and seeing a danger in every renewal. In contrast, the change manager is looking for opportunities for optimization; he/she wants to take advantage of opportunities and is mentally open to new ideas. The danger here is the shortsightedness of prioritizing short-term successes over long-term ones. So it is important to find the balance between stagnation and over-hasty change: regular reflection of one’s own methods and the gathering of opinions from outsiders.
Benchmarking instead of Brainstorming
Once the experts in politics or a company sit together in a crisis round, two things are often discussed: where do the current problems come from and what can we do to improve our situation?
However, one question is often overlooked: What have others already successfully accomplished in similar situations or what have others attempted? Nobody should be too proud to adapt successful methods and measures from others even if it is the competition.
Some development teams refrain from too generic and non-binding brainstorming when designing new products, and instead rely on analysing others’ solutions. At the same time, solutions of completely different teams are considered. Even our nature is recognized as an example and imitated. It then determines which aspects of the considered solution are to be applied for one’s own optimization.
So start networking here with like-minded people and other users and learn from each other! There is so much power in it! Get inspiration, new ideas and approaches; hear from others what helped them the most and what could be improved. It is comforting to find out that you are not alone in those situations and that others have successfully emerged triumphant!
Your challenges are then tackled head on, with tremendous energy, because: When the water is up to your neck, and you feel like you are drowing, only one thing helps: head up!
