From presidents, prime ministers, and heads of state; to CEOs, COOs and CIOs, the reputation built during one’s tenure is largely defined by the longer-term tasks and projects that the leader is able to realize. You can mess-up here and there on the smaller stuff, as long as bigger issues and challenges are tackled and resolved.

The measure of your career ascension and potential for developing a “get-it-done” type reputation stem from the bigger, grander types of projects you complete. You can accomplish nickel and dime tasks all day long, but those quickly fade from memory.

Clarify the Challenges

Sometimes problems await when you first arrive at your post. You might be hired to tackle specific issues; the direction of your course is pre-established. Other times, issues knock loudly at your door and your ability to get things done is based on the course you set, and how you respond.

In August of 1981, some 13,000 of the nearly 17,000 U.S. air traffic controllers went on strike. As you might guess, this caused a near panic throughout the nation’s transportation network. Managers worked overtime to both fill the vacant positions and handle most air traffic control shifts themselves. The airlines took it hard. They were only able to operate at about 70% of capacity.

The Showdown

The air traffic controllers all belonged to the Professional Air Traffic Controllers Association (PATCO). The organization felt reasonably confident that the strike would work — their members would win the concessions they were seeking. They knew that such a strike, if prolonged, would cause a critical blow to the U.S. economy. Also, President Ronald Reagan had been in office for less than eight months and, having been shot and wounded in March of that year, perhaps would be too weary for a confrontation.

By striking, PATCO’s members had defied federal law which prohibited strikes by government employees. Every air traffic controller was required by law to take an oath not to strike when they were first hired. Reagan saw the strike as illegal and coercive. These federal workers were hired to serve a mission. The actions they were taking put the government, the airline industry, and the nation’s transportation buy xanax reviews system under duress.

Sticking to His Guns

Right up front Reagan stated, “There is no right to strike against the public safety by anybody, anywhere, any time.” With the support of the Secretary of Transportation, Reagan gave the controllers 48 hours to return to their posts. The vast majority disobeyed and 48 hours later found themselves unemployed.

One could surmise that the Soviets were watching. Years later, in his memoirs, Reagan said that the decision he made “convinced people, who might have thought otherwise, that I meant what I said.”

Unquestionably, firing the thousands of air traffic controllers was a bold and decisive move. Regan knew that if he gave in to this group, in time, his administration would have to continuously bargain with different groups. Rather than bargain with PATCO leaders, the Administration hired more controllers, increased the overtime of those who were still on-board, and made do with a patchwork effort until the situation calmed down by making do with available resources.

Certainly if there had been a single commercial airline mishap during this interval — and fortunately there wasn’t — his plan might have backfired. If Reagan hadn’t safeguarded the nation’s air transportation system and his administration’s budget while conveying the message that no such tactics would be tolerated, he might have had a tragedy on his hands.

The issue was clear to Reagan. This was a stern and rigorous early test of his administrative capabilities, and he was not going to stand down.

Specificity Matters

The challenges you face are as likely to come in the form of surprises and emergencies as they are based on your own defined objectives. In either case, when you clarify the challenges confronting you and take into consideration both short and long-term ramifications, you’re in a far better position to solve problems.

Henri Poincare, the 19th century French mathematician, devised a four-part strategy for creative problem solving that still has great utility today:

• preparation
• incubation
• illumination
• translation (application).

Poincare said that preparation is the first step, wherein you immerse yourself in a problem and collect all relevant information. Depending on how big the problem and the resources that you are already privy to, preparation could last a few minutes, several hours, several days, or many weeks.

The next step is incubation. After gathering the most relevant data and framing the problem to the best of your ability, you clear your mind through meditation, taking a walk, even taking a bath – whatever works for you. Let the problem simmer. If you skip incubation and immediately try to devise solutions, you might be successful, but sometimes you miss out on more innovative or unique solutions.

The third step is illumination. After having totally immersed yourself in the problem, collected all the relevant information that you can, framed the problem and allowed the situation to simmer for a while, invariably a solution comes to mind. Even the most creative people of Poincare’s day couldn’t say why, but at this point, feasible ideas sprang forth.

Illumination leads directly to step four: translation. Apply your potential solution, make observations, make calculations if applicable, and determine if you have a practical solution. If not, try a second solution, then a third and so forth, until one of them proves to be a true and winning answer.

Tools to Stay in Control

For much of what you wish to accomplish, or for challenges or problems you need to resolve, particularly those that represent longer-term tasks, a variety of leadership and management tools exist which can help guide you every step of the way! The bigger the project, and the more steps, dollars, people, and interplay between players, the greater the need for specification. Plans can always change, contingencies arise, roadblocks emerge, and course alteration may be necessary. Still, as you plot your path at the outset and as you proceed along it, specificity matters.

The tools discussed below are tested and proven. We’ll review them in their most basic forms so that you’ll have a clear understanding as to how to employ them. Each tool is available in analog (a wall chart) or digital (software package). Happily, you probably have some experience with each of them in one form or another. So, the following need not be foreign to you.

Article Insights

• If your time lines are too stringent, any project can quickly become jeopardized. If too lenient, you may lose focus.
• Once you actually take steps towards accomplishing something, you have a clearer idea of how long things will take.
• Stuff happens. Allow for contingencies and some slack in your schedule.