On Wednesday we had a Brain Audit sale, a live workshop sign up, and a 5000bc membership drive.
And the server was upgraded the previous night. And a new version of Joomla put in.
I woke up that morning and hmmmm…
There were close to fifty emails saying ‘You're page isn't working.'
Sure enough, no one could buy any of the above because the pages weren't working.
So I went to the administration panel. I find that I've been locked out.
What do you do?
How do you deal with a full-blown crisis?
I deal with it differently from most people. I remember the year that all the data from 5000bc got erased and the site was down for well over 17 days. I was on holiday in the mountains (Fox Glacier to be exact). And I remained pretty calm.
When crisis hits, I whistle.
Or go out for a coffee. And then come back later with a different mind. Of course I see what I can fix before I go out for that coffee, but on average I find it's stupid to react to crisis, because crisis need management, and not reaction.
I know it's not normal.
I remember being on a plane that was bouncing about like it was going to crash, but I thought, “Ah, what the heck, it's the pilot that knows best”, and was cracking bad jokes with the passenger next to me, who probably wanted to throw me out of the plane.
How do you deal with a crisis?
First thing you do is see what can be done.
And how much of the crisis is in your control.
Then you walk away. Remaining jittery doesn't help the crisis.
A Hurricane-Katrina response doesn't help either.
But don't mix up calm with inaction.
Inaction is when you do nothing.
Calm is when you understand what you can control.
And then stepping back, because things will eventually come around.
Freaking out gives you a heart problem.
When in trouble, do what you need to do. Then take the time off.
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