5 Strategies For Leading an Organization Through Uncertain Times
As the world changes more rapidly than ever, it is important to focus on becoming more agile and resilient to lead through uncertainty. In fact, researchers have found that adaptive leadership positively influences team behavior while simultaneously strengthening the organizational system as a whole, empowering growth that lasts and improving company performance.
Some difficult times, like economic recessions, global pandemics, and natural disasters, are faced collectively. Entire communities learn how to navigate unprecedented circumstances and find a path toward normalcy and regrowth. Other shifts are industry-specific, like changing regulations, technological disruptions, or cyberattacks. No matter the cause, adaptable leadership is essential when change or crisis arrives on a company’s doorstep or risk falling behind in a competitive landscape.
Leading change in an organization is no small feat, but great leaders learn to thread the needle successfully. They stay true to their core values while remaining open to new ideas and alternate strategies.
Common Challenges Leaders Face in Turbulent Seasons
Times of turbulence bring a wide array of potential obstacles. Leaders must face challenges pertaining to their organization as a whole and their own personal leadership — and exceptional leaders have learned how to navigate both.
Reduced Profitability
Financial instability is perhaps the biggest challenge facing leaders in uncertain times. Changing regulations can bring costly compliance updates that cut into profitability. Natural disasters and pandemics can cause sales figures to tank, leaving leaders to crunch numbers and get creative to make ends meet. Intense competition can cut into a business’s success, requiring innovative solutions to get back on track. These difficulties, among others, require business leaders to have both a savvy financial mind and a determined spirit.
Dated Systems
Business systems and processes work flawlessly until they don’t. In any industry, technological systems and company processes need an overhaul as they face new realities. Turbulence is a catalyst for rapid change, and great leaders learn how to provide vision for the new direction and implement practices that will help their company arrive at it.
Team Cynicism
Even the best leaders have a hard time rallying teams when difficult seasons arrive. When budget cuts are required, employees can grow cynical about whether or not a corporation has their best interests in mind. And when an old vision no longer works, teams need strong leadership to help them see and accept a new one.
Decision Fatigue
Amid uncertainty, leaders face innumerable decisions. They must assess risk, analyze existing data, make choices with incomplete information, and calculate the actual cost of every decision. This burden can lead to decision fatigue and burnout, so leaders must exercise caution while navigating difficult situations.
Work-Life Balance
In light of the previous challenges, leaders may be tempted to throw themselves entirely into the difficulties at work. In reality, balancing the stressors of business with the joys of life is essential for good leadership that lasts. Devoting time to family, personal habits, and rest can fuel leaders for hard times at work, even when those hard times come to stay for what feels like the long haul. Leading through uncertainty requires turning off work notifications, if only briefly, to remember that life outside of the current stressful moment exists – and is also worth attending to.
5 Strategies to Lead Well in Uncertain Times
1. Build resilience
Leaders must learn how to build resilience in themselves before passing the skill on to their team. Thankfully, resilience can be developed long before crisis knocks on a company’s door. For leaders themselves, cultivating resilience is a mental effort. It looks like building tolerance for uncomfortable situations, focusing on growth when hard seasons arise, embracing constant change, and prioritizing the work-life balance that puts work difficulties in proper perspective. Resilient leaders must then endeavor to build resilient teams.
Leaders at Apex IT believed that resilient teams consist of employees who are perpetually learning. To put this belief into practice, Apex IT leaders implemented flexible training tools designed to accommodate their employees' diverse learning needs and preferences. This effort has overcome the problem of being forced to react in real-time by educating their team in advance, which contributes to positive growth in client retention and revenue.
Employee culture matters a great deal when turbulence hits, and teams who trust one another, understand expectations, communicate clearly, and collaborate effectively are much more likely to achieve goals even in difficult moments.
2. Focus on short- and medium-term goals
In times of economic or technological disruptions, long-term goals can feel difficult to grasp, much less achieve. Great leaders know when it’s time to table the long-term vision in favor of short-term or medium-term goals that span weeks or months rather than years or decades.
Even in uncertainty, future-minded leaders have 34% less anxiety than their counterparts. Future-minded leaders also have higher-performing teams, ones with increased agility (+25%), engagement (+19%) and innovation (+18%).
Ask questions like, “Do any areas have potential for increased profit in the next quarter?” or, “How can we improve our customer satisfaction to compensate for slower production times?” Employees will be more likely to jump on board and meet goals by keeping objectives specific.
3. Communicate honestly and clearly
When leaders try to sugarcoat difficult situations, employees can feel it, creating a culture of mistrust and a suspicion that things are even worse than they seem. And even when leadership is trusted, siloed communication can impede productivity, leaving employees to chase down email threads or sit through countless meetings to get the information they need more. Instead, leaders should address difficult situations with tact and truth and create simple communication workflows that help teams function well, whether in times of crisis or not.
At Lifewater, the important work of providing global access to clean drinking water was being bogged down by constant emails and meetings. They knew they needed a communication solution to help them interface effectively, freeing up more time to address their humanitarian initiatives. By implementing Asana, a work management program, they could seamlessly track big projects, clarify and streamline communication, and collaborate more effectively.
Allie Watts, the Digital Marketing Manager at Lifewater, says that adopting a clear and effective communication system has allowed the organization “to be more efficient and communicate more effectively, which directly results in more children, families, and communities being served with clean water and health every year.”
4. Set the tone
People look to their leaders to learn how to respond to a crisis. Excellent leaders know how to simultaneously hold a realistic and optimistic perspective. They communicate frequently, inspiring team leaders and others to connect with their fellow employees while navigating uncharted waters.
The difference between good and great leaders may seem subtle, but the results show up in the teams they lead. Author and organizational psychologist Adam Grant highlights the differences: “Good leaders build products. Great leaders build cultures. Good leaders deliver results. Great leaders develop people. Good leaders have vision. Great leaders have values. Good leaders are role models at work. Great leaders are role models in life."
A company needs leaders who truly believe that they will weather the storm and, in turn, build for the future even in uncertain moments. Although they may encounter losses along the way, leaders with grit, vision, and authenticity will eventually guide their teams to brighter days.
5. Adopt reasonable expectations
When a crisis hits, key performance indicators and other standard metrics may need to be temporarily abandoned. For example, in a cyberattack, data may not even be accessible. In a natural disaster, shipping could become nearly impossible. During a pandemic, large in-person gatherings are ill-advised, changing the very nature of entire industries. When a primary competitor releases a new product, sales numbers will likely take a temporary dip.
Great leadership considers factors like these and refuses to hold their employees to impossible, unattainable standards. Instead, they set new goals and redefine success based on the current moment, putting their adaptability on display.
In 1998, Netflix was a cutting-edge DVD delivery service that mailed entertainment to homes across America. But as technology continued to evolve, they found themselves in need of a pivot. Foreseeing the streaming trend ahead, Netflix launched one of the first streaming services available in the US. As it gained popularity, they slowly phased out their DVD service entirely, turning them into the streaming giant they’ve become today.
Change and uncertainty are an inevitable part of every business. If you want to be a leader who inspires teams and initiates positive change, furthering your education can empower you for the moment when it arrives.
Grow as a Leader through Marymount’s Online Ed.D.
If you want to build your leadership experience to thrive even in uncertain times, consider earning your Ed.D. in Educational Leadership and Innovation from Marymount University Online. Whether you’re facing a current organizational issue at work or you simply want to prepare yourself for an even brighter future in leadership, this innovative Ed.D. program can help you apply research and theory to solve a problem of practice in your organization or community.
Marymount’s Doctor of Education program will help you learn to implement positive change and foster innovation in any industry. This Ed.D. program is grounded in ethics and equity, inspiring you to learn with purpose, and Marymount’s Dissertation in Practice (DIP) allows you to apply solutions to workplace challenges that matter most to you.
With 100% online coursework and no GRE/GMAT requirement, you can graduate with a doctoral degree in less than 3 years while growing your national network of business leaders. As a College of Distinction in Education and Business, our program is nationally recognized as a degree program designed for change agents in every field.
An online Ed.D. in Educational Leadership and Organizational Innovation at Marymount will empower you as a change agent ready to initiate and inspire. Connect with an advisor today to get started.