Are you addicted to working in crisis mode?

Most companies are. From a systemic perspective, working in crisis mode may be the only way the company can deliver on a timely basis. Culturally, there may be people that are unwillingly driven to create a crisis and then rescue work at the last minute with "heroic" work that is often rewarded.

So, how do you spot if your environment suffers from this addiction? And how do you get fix this?

3 signs that your environment is addicted to crisis mode

• There is always some type of crisis happening.
  Your company shouldn't feel like the setting of your favourite hospital TV series.

• There is always some expedited work in progress.
  Expediting work means that work business process can not handle the work. This should be a very rare event. If you use your expedited lane, this means that you have no work process to speak of.

• People are regularly having to task-switch to respond to the latest high-priority work.
  Task-switching and multi-tasking are some of the worst practices in a knowledge-work environment. They simply destroy our ability to focus and deliver.

Unfortunately, in many companies creating a crisis, whether real or not, is the only way to ensure a reliable and timely delivery of work.

2 strategies to overcome crisis mode

• Focus on the age of work.
  Prioritise the work that has been worked on for the longest time. Finish work as soon as possible. Don't let it stagnate in your system.

• Balance the amount of work you have on the go.
  Don't have more work than what you can handle. Use flow metrics to measure your workload capacity and stick to it.