As an Executive Director, balancing immediate crises and future plans requires maintaining clear priorities and a steady focus on the organisation's mission. Start by delegating operational tasks effectively to free up mental bandwidth for strategic thinking. 🤝 Regularly revisit the vision to ensure short-term actions align with long-term goals. Embrace adaptability, as crises often reveal opportunities for innovation and growth. 🌱 Finally, communicate transparently with your team to keep everyone motivated and aligned.

While agility, innovation, and delegation are key, one element often overlooked is intentional reflection. In the rush to manage crises and plan for the future, leaders rarely make a pause to assess if they’re solving the right problems. ✅ Make reflection a ritual: whether weekly or monthly. ✅ Ask critical questions: Are our actions aligned with our vision? Are we adapting or just reacting? Reflection isn’t passive; it’s a strategic tool to recalibrate focus and ensure every decision serves the bigger picture. Take advantage of this new year. Start this week. Your future strategy will thank you.

Balancing immediate crises with long-term planning requires adaptability and strategic foresight. One strategy I’ve found effective is establishing crisis playbooks. For example, during a market downturn impacting a key client’s revenue, predefined plans helped stabilize operations and cut costs appropriately while re-aligning strategic priorities with budget constraints. Another approach is scenario planning for strategic initiatives, ensuring flexibility during volatile conditions. For instance, during a merger of two clients, we developed alternative strategies for potential delays, keeping the long-term vision of synergies and efficiency gains on track. These methods ensure crises don’t derail strategic goals.

As an executive, creating a culture of trust and curiosity is imperative. When you start to have rolling crisis as well as intense pressure to steer the vision strategically, it can be tough to be present, mindful, aware. That's before any delegating or alignment of outcomes with reality even starts. To use an example from my youth, imagine you are in a mall during Christmas, and you are HUNGRY. Crowds swirl. Music blares. Hot pretzels waft. What do you do? Remember you're there for a reason. Sure, you might be in a storm of thought but check yourself-- Observe the map kiosk that is always triangular, orient yourself to the food court (or your Q2 financial targets), decide how you navigate (choice, not curse) and act to get it done!