While "managing by crisis" is one of Alec MacKenzie's top time wasters, it is still necessary to know how to manage a crisis. The knowledge reduces the time it would otherwise take to respond to the crisis.

What constitutes a crisis? It is a problem that needs immediate resolution. Under ordinary conditions (that is, when time is not the critical resource), there are many processes that may be used to solve the problem. However, all of these processes consume considerable amounts of time and may not be suitable during crises.

A crisis is disruptive because it upsets the planned and expected order of operations and actions. There is a tendency to freeze up and shut down. The strategy to managing crises is to have a well-defined process for addressing unexpected problems, that is, to have a good problem-solving methodology.

I put forth two different processes for solving problems.

The first is the "standard" process to use under ideal conditions. This process takes time but finds...