3 - Leadership Failures - Sylvia C Kearney

Reference: Kapucu, N., & Van Wart, M. (2008). Making Matters Worse: An Anatomy of Leadership Failures in Managing Catastrophic Events. Administration & Society, 40(7), 711-740.

Theme: Problems With Disaster Relief Leadership Exists and the Lack of Integration Between Development and Planning Must Addressed

 Summary: Disasters come in all types and sizes. They can be natural or man made. “Catastrophic disasters require additional leadership capabilities because extreme events overwhelm local capabilities and damage emergency response systems themselves.” (Kapucu, 2008). Another way to look at exceptional leadership is that if something works out well, due to great leadership, not very many people notice, but when there are leaders who strike out and encounter failure, then everyone notices. Leaders must represent competency like:

o   Decisiveness – a leader must act relatively quickly to the task at hand and he/she must be willing to make unilateral decision while remaining calm and collected.

o   Informing – critical information must be shared with the Incident Commander and the media, and it also includes shaping the mood of the public relations function.

o   Problem Solving – includes recognizing, investigating and resolving problems as they appear.

o   Managing – creating, acquiring, transferring knowledge and creating an environment that allows a flow of timely implementation of innovations.

o   Planning – coordinating with personnel and organizing to ensure that competent people are doing the work that is necessary.

o   Decision Making – is one of the traits that should be mentioned as number one since a leader needs to be able to constantly make choices at a moments notice. A leader however, needs to be able to see and understand the whole picture and be able to actively listen to information that he/she receives, in order to be an effective decision-making leader.

Application: Leaders are people that work well with others and can become your motivational speaker and your teacher. In a catastrophic disaster, leadership is often influenced by other’s effectiveness, and networking. The National Incident Command System for example claims that local, tribal, territorial and open government, have a right to information, however, it is important to know just what the local laws are. Leadership in catastrophic disasters is also political, as well as administrative. “They must lead the way in overarching structures, reporting chains of command,  . . .” (Kapucu, 2008). It is important to understand how widespread the leadership has to reach.