Leading through uncertain times

Leading through uncertain times

These are unsettling times we’re living through. Your teams may be feeling a heightened level of anxiety. And as somebody responsible for leading in uncertain times, it’s important that you reflect on your own behaviour.

Are you as a leader contributing to the anxiety felt by your teams?

Or are you helping to provide a productive and supportive environment where individuals feel secure and can contribute successfully?

In our current challenging climate, you need to instil a sense of security in your people. This way, you can inspire a positive attitude to maintain a resilient and productive workforce.

This new terrain can be difficult to navigate. How do you know what you can do to support your team when you’re leading in uncertain times?

Here are some practical actions you can take.

Show empathy

Many of our reactions during crisis are influenced by our bodies’ innate fight-or-flight response.

Hormones, including noradrenaline and cortisol, impair our brain function, and make it difficult to think clearly.  This can seriously limit our ability to generate solutions and make decisions.

When designing solutions or preparing your messaging, it is vital to show empathy.

Be human and authentic by openly sharing personal challenges or experiences.

Acknowledge this is an unprecedented and unpleasant situation, but that everyone is in it together.

As the person who is leading in uncertain times, you can help to create a feeling of psychological safety.

Yes, it is important to communicate the procedural information associated with safety, such as washing hands, maintaining a safe distance and wearing a face covering. But this in itself is not enough to support the emotional concerns and needs of your staff.

Empathic leaders need to listen carefully to fears and concerns, address them in whatever productive way they can, and make sure that people are heard and supported. 

Ensure to spend time on a 1-1 with each of your team members listening to them and offering them the support they need.  This is even more important if you’re working virtually.

Be flexible

Showing empathy is not just about saying the right thing. It’s also making decisions and taking actions that support the emotional needs of your team members.

Recognising that individuals may have responsibilities in the home and flexing working practices or hours to fit in with this will demonstrate that you are truly empathetic.

Think about ways to help the team to connect with each other through, group chats and more regular meetings.

Generate creative ways to connect socially as a team, as you might, if you were able to work face to face.

Create clarity

People do not like high levels of uncertainty.  It can put them in the fight or flight response, especially when they feel that they have no control over the situation.

And let’s face it, not many of us feel that we have much control over our lives right now in the midst of a pandemic.

Look for ways that you can provide more certainty for your team. 

Be clear about roles and responsibilities, set clear objectives with timescales.

You may not have all the answers yourself about the future of the organisation or job security. But consider the known factors that you can communicate and tell your people when you will update them. See the SCARF model for more details about the need to create certainty in the workplace.

This will provide with more certainty and can help to alleviate some of the feelings of stress.

Research shows that feeling that we have control can be a determining factor in being able to cope with stressful situations.

Identify ways in which you can give your staff more control. 

What decisions can you allow them to make? Even simple things like the hours they work, the projects they are involved with and how they arrange their working day, can help an individual to feel more in control.  See the SCARF model for more details about the need to create autonomy in the workplace.

Give your staff more control, and you’ll find leading in uncertain times becomes easier.

Trust team members

It can be hard to trust team members when you cannot physically see them working.

However, research conducted since lock down began suggests that in many industries, productivity has increased.

However, for this to happen, it’s important that responsibilities are crystal clear, with well-defined objectives and timeframes.

Make work visible across all team members as well as the leadership team. 

This will help to create clarity and trust across the team.

Remain visible and accessible

Visibility as a leader is always important. But it becomes even more so when uncertainty is in the air.

As your people search for clarity and stability, you may be the only person who can provide them with the answers or information they need.

Find ways to touch base with individuals and teams regularly through different forums or mediums. This is particularly important if your team are working virtually.

Schedule in regular contact sessions with them. When working virtually the opportunity to have spontaneous corridor conversations does not exist so you will need to create them.

This means that you will need to be more planful around the contact points you have with your team.

Ensure to adapt your meetings to a virtual environment; you cannot simply replicate an in-person session virtually.

Provide practical support

Ensure your team have the equipment and technology to work efficiently and comfortably from home.

Carry out an audit of each team member’s home working environment and needs and ensure that they have what is needed to perform their role well. 

Recognise that not everybody will have a separate home office and team members may be required to share space with other household members.

How can you support your team members to navigate around this?

Leading in uncertain times can feel quite the challenge.  But, if you show up for your team in the ways outlined above, you’ll help them to feel secure and improve their ability to show up for you.