Feature
Uncertainty is our ever-present companion as the post-COVID-19 economy evolves. We feel this in both our personal and professional lives, leaving many of us stressed and apprehensive in the workplace.
HR tech company Humu's 2023 research found that one-third of employees frequently experience anxiety at work. Eighty-nine percent of HR leaders said that their teams had expressed concerns about job security, leadership changes and shifts in organizational structure.
Managers need to help their teams navigate this shaky landscape, since worried employees are apt to stumble at work.
“People who are very anxious are not going to be high performers,” said Liz Fosslien, book author and head of storytelling for Team Anywhere at Atlassian. “There is a lot of research that shows when you feel under pressure, you are more likely to choke, less likely to remember important information and just don't perform at your best.”
What Leaders Can Do to Mitigate Uncertainty
Claremont Graduate University researchers found in 2022 that employees experiencing uncertainty want both “psychological and instrumental support from managers.” In an article in MIT Sloan Management Review, the researchers identified various strategies for managers, but also noted the complexity of the task due to the individual personalities and needs of those on their team. The tips for leaders below can be useful for all employees:
Set the Expectation of Change
Managers can help employees navigate uncertainty by emphasizing that they should expect change. One example comes from NASA, whose teams make “plans from which we will deviate,” as opposed to simply making plans, when mapping out a new project.
Fosslien said the key is, “setting the expectation from the outset that things aren't going to be a linear path and encouraging people to remain flexible.”
She proposes that teams answer the following prompt together: “We are a team learning to ________.” The blank can be filled by anything that emphasizes a shift, such as “pivot to address new goals” or “welcome new team members.”
Related Article: How to Manage Change With Change-Weary Teams
Build Trust at All Times
“Your ability to lead your people through a crisis depends on the trust you’ve built prior to the crisis,” said Jessica Diaz, professor, organizational psychologist and co-author of the 2022 research. “Uncertainty is like wearing a blindfold. Somebody’s holding your hand navigating you through. Your comfort comes down to whether you trust the person holding your hand.”
Leaders can cultivate this trust by ensuring they are soliciting feedback on employees’ needs and wants, and following through on providing support. According to Diaz’s research, employees often want things that managers can’t give them, such as paid leave, help with groceries or assurance of job security. Providing support in such circumstances means listening to and validating employees’ desires, even if you can’t satisfy them.
“Particularly when people need things managers can’t give them, that’s when trust becomes really important,” she said. “The number one thing that managers can do to offer support is to create space to say, ‘Hey, your well-being matters to me. What's bothering you? What are you scared about?’”
Acknowledge the Stress of Your Workers
Informing your employees that you understand — and even anticipate — the stress induced by uncertain circumstances can contribute to fostering trust.
“We often underestimate how effective it is to just say ‘I’m announcing a change. I know this is stressful. Here’s how you can ask questions,’” said Fosslien. Offering this acknowledgment can have a positive impact for employees. It provides a platform to explore how change can facilitate new priorities or lines of work. “Sometimes change also brings opportunities.”
Offer Transparent Communication
Clear and transparent communication about coming changes can be a crucial form of managerial support for employees experiencing uncertainty. Yet managers too often fail to do this, mostly because of what Diaz called a “misunderstanding” — that is, the idea that managers should only share information they know for sure.
“No employee expects their manager to be able to predict the future,” said Diaz. “It’s an absolute game-changer to say, ‘This is what we don’t know, and I know that it’s hard that we don’t know it, but this is what we’re doing to figure it out. And I can assure you that when we know, we’re going to share it.’”
Related Article: Moving Forward With Grit and Growth MindsetPractice ‘Individualized Consideration’
Another trend that Diaz’s research uncovered is that employees’ needs regarding manager behavior diverge from each other’s, often dramatically.
“You would have one employee who would say, ‘I want my manager to be vulnerable and transparent,’ and you'd have another employee who would say, ‘I want my manager to be strong and assertive,” said Diaz. “Or, ‘I want my manager to give me more support with doing my work.’ And then another person would say, ‘I want my manager to leave me alone and let me have more autonomy.’ That was all over our findings. People want really different things.”
To truly help all employees, managers must strive to give each team member what they prefer — a tactic called “individualized consideration.” This should be a management standard no matter how employees are feeling.
“Individualized consideration is always better because people are always going to be individuals,” said Diaz. “But in times of crisis, it becomes really, really important.”
The Stresses of Daily Uncertainty
The strategies here are designed to help managers assist their teams when uncertainty is acute and stress is heightened by the potential for profound change. But managers should know that employees also experience high levels of anxiety from the smaller forms of uncertainty that permeate their daily lives at work.
“There are obvious big things such as layoffs, joining a new team, and reorganizations,” said Fosslien. “But there are actually studies that have shown that smaller-scale personal changes, like getting a new manager or having your priorities shift, are often almost twice as stressful as these larger transformations are. I think that's something leaders often overlook.”
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Helping employees navigate uncertainty essentially comes down to helping employees navigate the never-ending vicissitudes of life at work — whether those changes arise from societal shifts, company policies or daily alterations to workflow.
