Crisis-ready Leadership

9 Overcoming Stress to Optimize Performance

Chapter 8 covered the psychological and physiological effects of stress and how they impact decision-making. One central phenomenon is the brain and central nervous system’s response to acute stress, which results in stifling the logical thinking functions while inducing hormone changes that prepare for physical stress causing emotional and physical dominance. This cortical inhibition and fight or flight response affects a leader’s ability to think, process, synthesize, and evaluate information in order to make good decisions. This chapter will explore strategies for preparing crisis leaders for stressful situations so that they can prevent and overcome the effects of stress and optimize their decision-making and leadership performance.

Table 9.1 lists specific strategies for preventing and overcoming specific effects of stress identified in Chapter 8. Additionally, we will explore broad strategies for optimizing performance such as planning, organization, use of equipment, technology, and decision-support tools, training, and exercises.

Table 9.1  Strategies for Preventing and Overcoming the Effects of Stress.

Effects of Stress on Decision-making	Strategies for Preventing and Overcoming Effects of Stress
Decreased vigilance Decreased working memory Decreased cue sampling Premature closing of alternatives Task shedding Increased risk taking Shift from logical thinking to an emotional state Changes in problem-solving patterns ...