Technological disasters, crisis management and leadership stress

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Abstract

This paper discusses how psychological stress disturbs decision making during technological crisis and disaster, and how to prevent this from happening. This is exemplified by scientific studies of a Norwegian large scale accident involving hazardous material, and of handling the far-off effects of the nuclear disaster at Chernobyl. The former constitutes an operative level of crisis management, whereas the latter involves crisis management at the strategic and political level. We conclude that stress had a negative effect on decision making in both cases.

Introduction

As a leader I am often under pressure to do what is urgent and what is important. My job is to do what is important” (Colin Powell).

The purpose of this paper is to discuss how psychological stress disturbs decision making during technological crisis and disaster, and how to prevent this from happening. This will be exemplified by scientific studies of a Norwegian large scale accident involving hazardous material, and of handling the far-off effects of the nuclear disaster at Chernobyl. The former constitutes an operative level of crisis management, whereas the latter involves crisis management at the strategic and political level. Our hypothesis is that stress had a negative effect on decision making in both cases. Decision making requires both a receptive use of senses, an ability to think fast and rationally (cognitive function), as well as an ability to act. Every one of these functions can be disturbed by severe stress.

In order to put our two case examples in perspective, we will begin by describing certain aspects of crisis and disaster and the developmental trend in the global picture of disasters.

Section snippets

Natural versus technological crisis and disasters: a blurred distinction

Technology has a dual character. It is able to prevent disasters and to cause disasters. By definition, a human induced disaster is the result of a failure of human hand or in human-made products. These can be categorized as (1) transport systems (air crashes, large scale road accidents, train derailments and collisions, passenger ships and other maritime catastrophes), (2) collapse of man-made constructions, (3) large fires of all sorts, and (4) technological and toxic (nuclear power plant

Perception of disaster

Will man’s changing perceptions of who is responsible or to blame for disasters, have any psychological consequences? In all likelihood it will. The striking difference in response between a new technological threat and a permanent but natural threat is offered by ionising radiation. In the aftermath of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster there was strong public reaction in several countries to the radioactive fallout from the reactor [4]. In contrast to this is the moderate, or even absent,

Crisis management

Management can be described as the ability to achieve a defined goal by optimal use of personnel and materiel resources. Crisis management sensu strictiori involves management at staff level in a situation characterized by a critical period of time, in which leadership decisions will, for better or worse, determine the future of the organization.

Crisis management can be conducted on all levels of decision-making:

  • political level;

  • strategic level (staff level);

  • tactical level;

  • operative level (on

The Norwegian paint plant large scale accident

One night in 1976, the production plant of Norway’s largest paint factory was devestated by a giant explosion. The building collapsed, and as a series of subsequent explosions followed, the fire totally destroyed the production plant and the warehouse. Totally, 30 000 m2 of buildings were engulfed by flames stretching up to a height of 400 m. The fire was fed by millions of liters of chemicals and by 50 million cubic meters of air. A local windstorm was created by the combustion. The threat of

The Chernobyl disaster

On April 26, 1986 at 1:23 a.m. the accident occurred at the fourth unit of the Chernobyl Nuclear Plant which resulted in the destruction of the reactor core and part of the building in which it was housed. As we know today, some of the radioactive products that had accumulated in the core were released onto the atmosphere, producing a radioactive cloud. The amount of radioactivity released was equal to that from all atomic bombs ever tested above ground. For Scandinavia the meteorological

Toxic disasters

In contrast to natural disasters, some of the most powerful toxic disasters like Chernobyl are without a clear “low point” from which “things will gradually get better” [10]. Thus there may be considerable uncertainty as to the damage that such catastrophes may have inflicted. The effects of the uncertainty created by the exposure to radioactive materials bringing about the likelihood of the development, many years later, of a variety of illnesses, have been described by Lifton [11] among the

Managing the information crisis

When toxic threat cannot be perceived by any of man’s senses, he is totally dependant upon others for information. If agencies are unresponsive or seen as concealing facts, people may come to believe that there is a hidden, but serious threat [4], [5], [17]. Those responsible for handling the situation are faced with the task of providing information that is of a calming and reassuring character. There is a fine line, however, between calming and reassuring on the one hand, and belittling and

Conclusion

How stress responses may disturb decision making in technological crisis and disaster have been illustrated by describing two different crisis situations: a critical leakage of hazardous solvent which demanded operative crisis management and secondly the nuclear fallout from Chernobyl and its demand for political and strategic crisis management involving the governmental information strategies on the “silent” danger towards the Norwegian population. The shortfall in both cases has been related

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