HEADLINES:
“Crisis management tends to become a strategic area of knowledge for the company.”
“A crisis situation requires time, capabilities and knowledge beyond what is available in the company due to the extraordinary nature of its causes and effects.”
“Interim Management offers a complete solution to crisis situations across their entire spectrum and all possible combinations of scenarios.”
“Interim Management helps to consolidate crisis management on a solid foundation as a strategic area of knowledge for the company, increasing its know-how, competitiveness and market value.”
Crisis management as a strategic knowledge area for the company
Companies are facing, with extraordinary frequency in this exponentially accelerated world, situations that, from the economic and social perspective, we have assimilated to the concept of crisis.
Accelerated by new technologies, artificial intelligence, the globalized market and geopolitical changes, frequent regulatory and normative changes, awareness of climate change and corporate social responsibility, among other factors.
In those terms, we could understand a business crisis as any situation that has a relevant and negative impact, both in the fact of it happening and in the risk of it happening, on the control of ordinary activity, competitiveness, profitability, viability, regulatory compliance, brand reputation or even the continuity of the company.
Given the seriousness of the issues it affects, management faces contingent meetings, emergency cabinets, and even, if the importance is greater, we establish crisis committees for this purpose.
On all occasions, to a greater or lesser extent, it was necessary to divert personnel and time resources to address them, optionally allocating new resources, developing procedures for this, both official and unofficial, with the obvious inconveniences to normal, daily organization.
And if these situations unfortunately occur more frequently, normalizing how we deal with them, that is why Crisis management tends to become a necessary and strategic area of knowledge for the company., as part of their know-how from management and leadership, even providing a differentiating value that can be appreciated by the market and investors.
Uncertainty is known and risk is controllable
There is a well-known expression that says "Reality is stubborn," just as problems often are, in the sense that we can face them, but not control them comfortably and effectively in their causes and effects.
A crisis situation requires time, capabilities and knowledge beyond those available in the company due to the extraordinary nature of said causes and effectsEven in that case, however well-known and proceduralized our crisis management process may be, we may have no alternative but to pick up the phone and say something like, "Houston, we have a problem«
Uncertainty is known, in the sense that the conflict situation can and will certainly occur during the life of the company, several times and with different intensity and impact, although what we do not know is when or how much.
On the other hand, the risk is manageable because, by being aware of its existence, with simple foresight and planning, the solution becomes swift and powerful. That is, it translates into an "if-else" scenario based on a simple question: Does the company have the necessary capacity and knowledge to handle this extraordinary situation?
If I have them, then I put my known and tried-and-tested process into action.
If I don't have them, then I check that I have that emergency phone number for Ground Control.
Restructuring vs. Chaos
The Interim Manager is specially qualified for this, to bring order to chaos. He's on the other end of that emergency phone.
Based on the manager's ability to adapt to the company's work methods, their experience in managing resources, means and people, and their managerial skills honed over many years of dedication in identical and similar situations, they naturally and unequivocally hold that key position in the company in the face of an extraordinary and unforeseen crisis.
In contributing specific skills and knowledge, as well as supplementing the unavailable time of resources in the company.
In situational awareness, in the efficiency of contingent executive action, in advisory support to the structure, in the improvement of the company's internal crisis management processes and procedures, ultimately from the direct executive action of the solution.
Viability, competitiveness and value
The crisis takes on a meaning like Schrödinger's quantum cat, which is both alive and dead at the same time, existing and not existing. That is to say, although it could be discerned through the quantification of its figures, it always contains a subjective aspect that gives it a debatable tone, somewhere between light and serious, structural and contingent, urgent or important, operational or existential, depending on the perspective and the moment.
Supertramp's famous 70s album says it all: Crisis? What crisis?
But at a macro level there is no doubt, Interim Management offers a complete solution to all possible combinations of scenarios.Objective and subjective, in all its broad spectrum, adapting to the circumstances, from serious cases such as the recovery of a subsidiary to less extreme cases such as the internal restructuring of a production area that affects the company's competitiveness in the market.
And beyond its primary executive function, Interim Management contributes to consolidating crisis management on a solid foundation as a strategic knowledge area of the company, increasing know-how, competitiveness and market value.