At some point, your team will face long hours of work leading up to a high-pressure deadline. As a manager, how should you handle yourself during these “crunch times” so you and your team do not burn out?
Harvard Business Review offers three strategies:
- Set aggressive but achievable goals. Think about something exciting but reachable based on your team’s level of performance and maturity, and evaluate the risks before assigning a goal. Learn from your team’s failures, and provide feedback to address development gaps.
- Recognize the costs of your decisions. Sometimes leaders do not know exactly what they are asking of their teams during these stressful times. Pay attention and try to share the burden and contribute to the team’s sacrifice.
- Keep lines of communication open. Your availability during this time may be affected, so ensure team members have a way to share key information with you, such as when they are being pushed too hard or things are not working as they should.
