Leading through the uncertain uncertainty COVID-19

Everyone loves heroes/heroines; the only way to become one is to stay strong and emerge out of the uncertainty. Remember, extraordinary people do ordinary things extraordinarily.

Jeff Bezos was in a week of kaizen training from an old Toyota school kaizen expert. On the fourth afternoon, Jeff was sweeping the dust in the fulfillment center. The elderly kaizen expert walks to him and asks, “Mr. Bezos, I’m in favor of a clean fulfillment center, but why are you cleaning? Why don’t you eliminate the source of dirt?”

“Extraordinary people do ordinary things extraordinarily.”

The news about COVID-19 cases and death tolls, mixed with job loss and news about a recession, is the new normal. Along with it, you cannot go to your favorite bar, coffee shop, gym, or even meet your friends. Working from home is not new, but you are confined. You are stressed, worried, and anxious. And most of the people you talk to are feeling the same. But, all emotions have an expiry date.

Uncertainty is the trigger for these emotions, and certainty is the antidote. The uncertainty is about when things will go back to normal; vaccination, its distribution, then market recovery. There is uncertainty about when things will return to ‘normal’ and what the ‘new normal’ will look like. We can’t control that, though we can set some expectations. What we can control is how we spend our time, our relationships with those we live with, our professional ethics, etc. It is the right time to move out of the circle of concern to the sphere of influence.

“There is good in everything, if only we look for it.” — Laura Ingalls Wilder

Helping your team handle uncertainty

1. Define certainty: What is uncertain? For now, it is when things will go back to normal. The normal that we are heading towards, however, will emerge to be different from what we have become accustomed to. A secure job, steady monthly income, growing business, and the ability to socialize will provide certainty.
2. Predict timeline: How long will the uncertainty last? It will last until the vaccination goes out to the entire world, which Bill Gates predicts to be by the end of 2021. However, this doesn’t mean that people cannot go back to work within 6 months if you take China as a model.
3. Be optimistic, but plan pessimistically: Be positive about the future defined by our predicted timeline. Call out what are the worst things that can happen during this period and plan to reduce the risks.
4. Communicate frequently: People are anxious. There are a lot of things that change every day, like losing or gaining a customer. These changes will have an impact. It is essential to keep communicating frequently. It helps to reduce anxiety.
5. Collect feedback: Take feedback, collect ideas, and improve the plan. With a rapid change, collective ideas are better.
6. Improve continuously: Keep watching for changes and continually improve.

“It’s not what happens to you, but how you react to it that matters.” — Epictetus

Handling uncertainty for oneself

1. Master remote working: One of the most significant changes that can affect you is remote working. If you are new to it, invest time in improving your remote working skills.
2. Pick up a goal: “There are 30,000 days in your life. When I was 24, I realized I’m almost 9,000 days down. There are no warm-ups, no practice rounds, no reset buttons. Your biggest risk isn’t failing, it’s getting too comfortable. Every day, we’re writing a few more words of a story. I wanted my story to be an adventure and that’s made all the difference.” — Drew Houston. If you wanted to finish a book or course, or learn an instrument, this is a good time. You are saving time from commuting, social gatherings, and vacations. Instead of worrying, it is better to focus the mind on interesting things that you wanted to do. Moreover, many of the online courses are now free or discounted.
3. Keep yourself busy: Keep yourself busy doing rewarding things. Then you will have limited time to focus on reading or focusing on uncertain things.
4. Avoid unnecessary news and conversations: “Tell me to what you pay attention and I will tell you who you are.” — Jose Ortega y Gasset. Focus on the news that you want to read. It is better to read about progress on vaccinations than to read about death tolls. Pick trustworthy sources when reading the news. I don’t passively consume news; I decide what I need to know and go find it.
5. Be creative: Avoid burnout doing work. Use the opportunity of being at home to be creative. Some of our teammates found pleasure in drawing, origami, online karaoke, online workout, or running in the garden.
6. Be mentally and physically healthy: Sleep. Meditate. Reduce alcohol. Exercise. Have better nutrition.

Case study

EverestEngineering is a global remote-first software agency.

Like many other companies, our people were uncertain about the consequences of COVID-19. Anxiety and pain were spilling across the workspace. We handled it separately at the organization, customer, and individual levels.

Organization

We identified the uncertainty — job security and salary. We had an open conversation with all our people about the market and how our customers are reacting. We anticipated the risk for the next six months, which is until the end of October. We spoke about our runway. It was apparent that we will not take annual pay rises. We said we would wear the pain of this together, and that we will do everything we can to avoid job losses. If we recover fast, we will also share the reward for helping each other.

Customer

We committed that our goal is to help the customer to navigate this situation and be successful. And they should not even feel a glitch of performance from our side during this period. Simple things like doing the job well, playing to our strengths, showing that we are making a difference to our teams and clients can give them value and make them successful, in turn, gives us a sense of achievement.

Individual

We are used to remote working from the beginning. Though we are not used to social distancing. At the organization level, we gave clarity on job security and salary. We check-in every day online and chit-chat for thirty minutes and sometimes do creative group activities like online karaoke, online workout.

Summary

Once in awhile, tragic events like COVID-19 pose a challenge. It creates uncertainty. Stress, anxiety, and pain are normal. You cannot eliminate suffering while you are suffering. It is the right time to move out of the circle of concern to the sphere of influence. Focusing on things that you cannot control drains a lot of energy and causes stress. There are elements of uncertainty you cannot control and elements that you can. Focus on things you can control, outline the options, pessimistically plan, be optimistic about the future, and reduce the confusion. And most important, take care of yourself.

Everyone loves heroes/heroines; the only way to become one is to stay strong and emerge out of the uncertainty. Remember, extraordinary people do ordinary things extraordinarily.