The Best Leaders in a Crisis Are Those Who Put Others Before Their Egos
Leaders around the world want to know what it is that they can do to lead their organisations, and countries, through this crisis and come out just as strong – if not stronger – on the other end. There have been a few articles in the press and tweets on social media in the last week about whether women make better leaders in a crisis. The journalists look to the countries that seem to be handling the crisis well and note that many of them – Germany and New Zealand for example – are led by women. So is that the answer? Do we all have to become women? No, clearly not. Quite obviously there are some male leaders who are handling this situation very well and some female leaders who are handling it poorly. So what is the unifying feature of those who are handling it well? Humility. The ability to face their helplessness head-on instead of covering it with power-play and aggression. Or better: a lack of ego. And it just happens that this is a trait that many women have been honing for years.
When interviewing business leaders for our book, “Starting a Revolution: What we can learn from female entrepreneurs about the future of business”, we found there to be one fundamental factor when it comes to good leadership, and that is the extent to which leaders allow their ego - that is an unhealthy belief in their own importance and self-centered ambition - to rule their decision making. The leaders who put their purpose – that is in this case, getting the country or their organization safely through the crisis – above their own need for approval or recognition, are great leaders. It is as simple as that. They are great leaders when there is no crisis and they are excellent leaders in a crisis. There are plenty of studies to prove it. For anecdotal evidence, we only have to look at Trump.
We can also look to the UK. Here, watching the Ministers squirm day in and day out at the press conference is becoming excruciating. The number of times the word “unprecedented” has been uttered at those press conferences is, indeed, unprecedented. It is glaringly obvious to everybody that their main concern, during the press conference at least, is making it very clear that any issues are a) not their fault and b) completely under control because they are c) very strong leaders. Despite the fact that the UK deaths are considerably higher than most other European countries and rising, despite the fact that testing levels are still at a fifth of those of Germany and have been for the last few weeks, despite the fact that hospitals are dangerously low on PPE and several healthcare professionals have now died as a result. Ministers still refuse to acknowledge that they are struggling, that they have made mistakes, that they are human.
The “know-it-all” response from a leader, when it is alarmingly clear that they don’t (and can’t) know it all, only serves to raise levels of anxiety, reduce trust and nurture anger, in those who are looking to them for comfort. We know this, believe it or not, because Boris Johnson has proven it to us. Throughout the crisis, Johnson has been the epitome of egotistical leadership – suggesting that he was above scientific advice by claiming that he was still shaking hands with people even as late as early March, steadfastly insisting that we will “win the war”, and handing out instructions and orders, rather than empathy, when he did finally acknowledge the severity of the crisis. He was broadly criticized by media around the globe.
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