Knowing when things aren’t working out is an undervalued crisis management skill
William “Bill” Vaughan was an American columnist and author best known for a celebrated collection of insights published in the Kansas City Star’s “Starbeams” column. While his focus wasn’t crisis management at all, he had a clear idea of the way humans work, which helped him deliver the priceless lesson featured in this week’s Crisis Management Quotable:
We learn something every day, and lots of times it’s that what we learned the day before was wrong. — Bill Vaughan
The world is constantly changing, and the sheer number of factors that come into play in any given crisis scenario are immense. While applying past lessons and the knowledge gained from study will often do you well, sometimes what worked before simply doesn’t work in a similar spot. Heck, we’ve seen strategies paying off when we headed to bed one day that were practically working against us by the next morning!
The lesson here? Always be ready to admit you were wrong, or things aren’t going as they should. Confidence in your abilities is good, but there’s no shame in having to alter plans. In fact, it’s a rare case where you won’t need to at all. The truly disgraceful move is to continue ahead when things clearly aren’t working out, especially when it’s to the detriment of your own organization, or your clients’.
Erik Bernstein
Social Media Manager
https://www.bernsteincrisismanagement.com