Sandy’s Leadership Lessons

Like most large weather events these days, the hype for Hurricane Sandy had been building for days. When she actually made her now notorious left turn and headed for New Jersey and New York City you could sense excitement in the newscasters’ voices.  Sandy didn’t deliver on the predicted rainfall but successfully pounded the area with record storm surge and persistent wind. The aftermath of Sandy’s wrath will likely be felt for years to come.

Leaders are expected to step up during a crisis. Many times they fail to understand the importance of their roles and the results can be deadly. Without decisive action, communicated with clarity, the best plans will be poorly executed. So what leadership lessons might a crisis like Sandy’s arrival and aftermath have to teach us?

First, disaster planning is mostly about logistics and few leaders have the vision or proclivity to actually translate warnings into workable action plans. How can a wealthy and sophisticated city ignore the threat of flood-triggered electrical and transportation nightmares when the vast majority of such infrastructure is underground? In spite of adequate lead time, how can a federal agency still fail to pre-stage water, food, and blankets to meet the most basic human needs of storm victims?

Second, leaders are too often focused on rebuilding what was destroyed instead of asking what might we do differently to minimize future destruction. In some cases that may mean no longer allowing residential and commercial construction in flood-prone areas or along the most vulnerable coastlines. In other situations it could involve more creative public-private partnerships. A business that can open its doors soon after a disaster strikes (because it had a plan) won’t benefit if employees can’t get to work or customers are living in communities that have been disrupted.

Finally, leaders must resist the temptation to offer quick-fix assessments or to minimize the hard work and difficult challenges a crisis usually brings. It’s nice to show up and offer hugs and encouraging words, but these same leaders must have plans in place to follow-through or this goodwill gesture will actually harm their long-term credibility. Hope must be tempered by realism.

Sandy’s most potent leadership lesson should be that we are not as prepared for disaster and crisis as we might imagine. It’s not enough for leaders to focus only on what is wrong and how to fix it. Dealing effectively with any crisis requires thinking differently about the future and how to reduce the risks. It will mean courageously prioritizing resources and educating the public. If we fail to learn from Sandy’s leadership lessons the next disaster will only bring more of the same death, destruction, and misery.