Posted on Feb 27, 2013

The Value of Realism in Leadership

The value of realism means concerned with just the facts; favoring practicality and literal truth.

Leadership Questions:

When time is of the essence, what one question obtains the most relevant facts?
What are your criteria to determine the truth?
When resolving conflicts, how do you separate the facts from the fluff?
What’s the best way to preserve some optimism while being realistic with an immediate issue or crisis?
What would happen if you combined a little sensitivity for the feelings of others with the value of realism?

The Reason for Realism

In an automobile accident or a house fire, time can be of the essence. Lives may depend on the speed of rescue and getting to a hospital. This is when the value of realism can play a critical role.

Some of the questions you’ll hear from emergency and rescue workers when they first arrive on the scene are:

“Are you ok?” or “Are you hurt anywhere?” or “Is anyone else hurt?”
“Is anyone else still inside?” or “Has everyone been accounted for?”
“Is there anything we should know before we go inside?”

Determining the cause of an accident or fire can be done later. In the middle of a disaster, assessing fault or blame should always be the last thing on anyone’s to-do list.

The reason for realism is to help manage priorities. It’s a leadership issue.

In a crisis, the order of importance should be:

Ensuring the welfare of people, including rescue.
Securing the surrounding environment (because it impacts other people).
Cleanup, which may include some investigation for cause.
The detailed assessment of what happened, by whom, where, when, and how.
The determination of costs, and who owes who money.

Yes, sometimes a few of these items happen simultaneously (e.g. rescuing people while containing a fire). But it’s the focus on facts that drive all decisions that ultimately lead to the best outcome.