Ingredients of Confident Leadership in a Crisis—and Ordinary Times

Successfully leading a team or company through a severe and sudden crisis is not something that only so-called “born leaders” can do. More typically, it is accomplished by people willing to undergo a deliberate disciplined process, based on five principles.

So says Kevin Sweeney, a retired Air National Guard pilot and subsequent business leader who, with his crew, landed a catastrophically damaged air refueling tanker in Saudi Arabia at the outset of Operation Desert Storm. Today Sweeney coaches business owners, human resource executives and anyone else interested in how to develop what he calls “pressure cooker confidence” (also the title of a book he has written) to lead “when the heat is on.”

Sweeney's reflection upon his remarkable personal experiences and success led him to identify five “principles for peak performance under pressure:” preparation, passion, focus, team and confidence. Read more about this here