How Not to Waste a Crisis

Crises are inevitable, but your response to them can shape your legacy.

In a world where crises seem to be the new normal, leadership that adapts is more vital than ever. In his new book How Not to Waste a Crisis bestselling Tod Bolsinger offers a refreshing perspective on turning chaos into opportunity. Unlike a typical leadership book, How Not to Waste a Crisis is an invitation to rethink and redefine your approach to leadership in times of upheaval. What sets How Not to Waste a Crisis apart is its vibrant storytelling, engaging illustrations, and practical exercises. Each chapter brings to life real-world examples and transforms complex concepts into digestible insights.

Whether you're leading a church, nonprofit, or any mission-driven organization, How Not to Waste a Crisis provides:



- Wisdom for Navigating Crises: Learn to lead with adaptability, not sheer effort.

- Practical Advice: Enjoy insights from bestselling leadership author Tod Bolsinger.

- Engaging and Digestible Chapters: Experience storytelling at its best.

- Exercises and Case Studies: Apply what you learn immediately with team exercises and real-life examples.Discover how to turn challenges into opportunities for growth. Don't just read about leadership—experience transformation through the pages of How Not to Waste a Crisis.



Mark Demel brings ideas to life through pictures and creative communication. He has spent more than a decade using his artistic skills in the non-profit sector.



Tod Bolsinger is the founder and principal at AE Sloan Leadership Inc., the executive director of the DePree Center Church Leadership Institute, and associate professor of leadership formation at Fuller Seminary. He is the author of Canoeing the Mountains and Tempered Resilience. Tod and his wife, Beth, split their time between Pasadena, California, and Ketchum, Idaho.



Marty Linsky is a professor at the Harvard University Kennedy School of Government and a co-founder with Ronald A. Heifetz of Cambridge Leadership Associates. He has published extensively on leadership, management, politics, and education.

Foreword by Marty Linsky


About the Practicing Change Series


Introduction: Humbling Lessons for Experienced Leaders


1. A Leadership Story: Superhero Leaders in a Crashing World


2. Old Mindset: Don't Just Stand There—Do Something!


3. New Skillset Part 1: See the Shift Before Solving the Problem


4. New Skillset Part 2: Seek Out Diverse Perspectives


5. New Skillset Part 3: Formulate Questions for Learning


6. Adaptive Reset: Don't Predict. Prototype.


7. The Story Continues: Giving the Work Back to the People


Acknowledgments


Discussion Guide: Take Your Team to the Balcony


Notes

"The Practicing Change Series is compelling and immediately applicable. Each book weaves us through story, illustration, and discussion to contextualize paradigm-shifting frameworks for thinking. Your leadership, but more importantly the impact through your leadership, will experience a trajectory change through the words penned. Tod is a master storyteller, carefully threading points, principles, and processes with ease and nuance. Today's era of leadership calls for continual, on-the-go growth, and this series offers solutions to today's demands. For the leader whose time is limited and responsibilities toward self and service are complex, these books are for you."



"Here's a scary truth: regardless of where you work or what you do for a living, a crisis is coming. In fact multiple crises lie ahead for you because our world is now changing at an unprecedented rate, and those changes will render you and your organization obsolete if you can't find a way to continuously adapt to these coming crises. Leading through these changes will require leaders who aren't afraid to slay some sacred cows, challenge conventional wisdom, and even live outside their own leadership comfort zones. Adaptation will be the single most critical survival skill of the twenty-first century. Tod Bolsinger's four short books in the Practicing Change Series are the 'emergency preparedness drill' that you will be grateful to have read when the next 'tsunami' hits your organization. Read them now before the next wave hits your shore."



"I couldn't stop highlighting! This book is essential reading for pastors, coaches, and anyone else who has ever felt the pressure to swoop in and save the day. Tod Bolsinger illustrates how old approaches and stale mindsets won't work to solve tough twenty-first-century challenges. He gives us easy to use tools for engaging more people to solve tough challenges. This and the other three books in the Practicing Change Series are a road map for anyone who wants to build a culture where everyone leads."



"The Practicing Change Series is like having Tod Bolsinger as a personal coach. He offers practical and powerful wisdom for anyone who is wrestling with the complex challenges of ministry leadership today."



"Tod Bolsinger is a prophetic voice to leaders in both the nonprofit and for-profit environments. We are facing a world that doesn't trust leadership, but in this book Tod provides us with a leadership masterclass on how to reframe our thinking and learn critical lessons as we respond to present challenges."



"Like a coach who speaks to you from the coaches' box above the playing field, Tod Bolsinger offers wise and practical insights for anyone leading through crisis. I wish someone had introduced me to Tod Bolsinger when I started pastoring a church years ago. I would have avoided many of the common mistakes he warns against in How Not to Waste a Crisis. If you aren't sure how to respond in crisis—be it a leadership, organizational, financial, or personal crisis—do yourself a favor and learn from Tod's insights. You will not only benefit, but your team will thank you as well!"



"Ministry is tough, but the challenges of ministry can shake us out of complacency or mediocrity. These encounters can wake us up to see and even embrace new ministry opportunities. Tod Bolsinger's book is an accessible guide that helps us to embrace the crises that come our way and to see them not as obstacles but as catalysts for something new. This book does not offer quick fixes, nor does it call us just to work harder or more efficiently. Rather, we are encouraged to slow down, see more clearly, break old habits, face the loss, and wait on the Lord in preparation for the next season of ministry. This book is an excellent resource for ministry leaders and ministry boards. I highly recommend it."



"This series is required reading for anyone who wants to lead change. In the very best way, reading these books was like sitting down with a mentor who has done the hard work of leading change himself and wants to help us work through the mistakes, challenges, and dynamics we can't see by ourselves."



"Leaders who know organizational change is needed but don't know how to go about it will find accessible, practical, and wise guidance in Tod Bolsinger's Practicing Change Series. I've found the concepts of adaptive leadership incredibly helpful in thinking through organizational challenges. Bolsinger helps us apply and practice these concepts in a way that will transform our organizations and ourselves as leaders."



"This is one of the best real application leadership books I have read given the constant changing environment we all are leading, managing, and living through. As a leader in the midst of constant change this book brings simplicity and a step-by-step practical process to incorporate into the fiber of problem solving. How Not to Waste a Crisis will live on my desk as a consistent reference. I have purchased this book for my executive team and will do so with Tod's others in his Practicing Change Series. Thank you, Tod, for sharing your wisdom on how to lead in a transformational manner through times of great challenges."



"How Not to Waste a Crisis is vintage Tod Bolsinger: clear, profound, practical, and actionable. Tod offers helpful ideas and practices drawn from the real world of organizational leadership in the complex times we're living through. This concise guide to adaptive leadership is precisely the kind of tool that can help faith leaders thrive in leading real, deep, and lasting change."



"Our typical response to a crisis is to panic or power up. We batten down the hatches, hoping to weather the storm, but who would have ever considered a crisis as something not to be wasted? Only Tod Bolsinger. In this incredible work, he calls us to three new skills that will help any leader adapt to a changing landscape and learn in and through every crisis."



"Leadership is a lot like twirling a baton: it looks easy until you try it! If you are involved in leadership at any level I would highly recommend Tod Bolsinger's Practicing Change Series. It invites those of us in leadership to reflect on and rethink what it means to be a leader and to build a 'in what really makes a difference—transformation.'"



"As much as we hate it, crises are inevitable in leadership. Tod Bolsinger brings a refreshingly new perspective on how to lead through crisis, and it's not what you think. But it's exactly what heroic leaders who love to jump in, fix things, and rise to the challenge need to do."



"Tod Bolsinger has a gift. He has an amazing gift of taking relatable life experiences and connecting leadership principles in ways that help lead to learning and transformation. We have worked with Tod at Chapelwood, and he has helped us learn how to craft experiments to help us learn. How Not to Waste a Crisis is a very accessible resource that can help any leader who is guiding through change. Allow Tod to invite you and your people up to the balcony to see that you can figure out change together!"



"There are no roadmaps for navigating the uncharted and unpredictable territories of crises, change, transition, and transformation. Yet Tod has provided us with a survival kit. It's full of skills we can learn and practice to help us lead through the most disruptive and unprecedented seasons. How Not to Waste a Crisis will resonate deeply with anyone in leadership. There will be moments when you think, I wish I had this book when . . . Tod has distilled the wisdom, study, and experience of years into a reader-friendly leadership manual, which is more than a book. It's an immensely practical and helpful coaching session. Adaptive leadership is a journey and I encourage you to embark on it. There are three more titles in Tod's Practicing Change Series to help us on our way. Personally, I can't wait to get stuck into all of them."



"The best books are the ones you read with a journal and a friend. Tod's books are like that—they spark insights and ideas that make you want to think about what he has written and then talk about it with someone else. This book added to my understanding of adaptive leadership but then lingered in my mind long after I read it and continues to challenge and inspire me as a leader." weniger anzeigen expand_less