From The Former Director Of FEMA, How To Prepare For Challenge, Change, And Potential Disaster

The Wall Street Journal called James Lee Witt the "master of disaster." As the head of FEMA, Witt pioneered a new way of handling crisis and rebuilt America's emergency response system. Instead of waiting for a disaster to hit and cleaning up in its wake, he sought ways to manage a crisis before and during, as well as after, it happens. Heralded by Harvard's Kennedy School of Government and the Harvard Business School for its remarkable results, his approach identifies four window of opportunity for getting a crisis under control – preparation, prevention, response, and recovery – and the demands facing leaders and teams at each stage.

Now, in Stronger in the Broken Places, Witt distills his decades of experience to nine essential lessons. This is the wisdom that has pulled communities and crisis teams through tornadoes, hurricanes, wildfires, earthquakes, bombings, and floods, and can guide individuals and businesses in any industry as they operate in our crisis-filled times:

• Find Your Roots: Know your organization's values and prepare a triage plan based on them.
• Market the Storm: Set up effective communication and early-warning systems.
• A River's Gonna Go Where a River's Gonna Go: Identify a recurring crisis and assess the repercussions of walking away.
• Reconsider the Three Pigs: Change your priorities and projects without triggering a crisis.
• Twine is Stronger than String: Identify synergies with suppliers, clients, stakeholders, and partners also his by crisis.
• Treat the Heart without Losing Your Head: Keep your team confident and productive when things are going wrong.
• Tear Down the Stovepipes: Build emergency teams with customized reporting lines and goals. 
• A Lightning Rod Works Both Ways: Find people who can share leadership duties with you.
• Stronger in the Broken Places: Collect knowledge about failures and successes so you can refine your crisis plans for the future.

To bring the lessons home, Witt shares examples from big and small corporations such as Malden Mills, Swissair, Kmart, Sybase, Lehman Brothers, MBA Polymers, Marriott, Applied Materials, and Polly's Gourmet Coffee. He shows how these companies have overcome crises by applying the nine lessons to their businesses, whether they're responding to a downturn in the economy, a bad earnings announcement, a chemical spill at a plant, the loss of the company's biggest account, or a big new competitor.

Stronger in the Broken Places will inspire leaders at all levels to step forward, help them manage extraordinary pressures, and give them practical tools for triumphing over adversity.

ORDER "Stronger in the broken places" at Amazon.com