Sensemaking in Times of Uncertainty

In recent years, Gulati has brushed up on scholarship in the social and natural sciences, and has collected and analyzed leadership stories—including more than 200 interviews, seeking to provide a playbook for individuals “looking to be more intrepid at work.” Typically the domain of risk committees that analyze and consider mitigation options (still important), risk, the author posits, isn’t “enough to help us behave boldly in situations where we can neither identify all the potential dangers we face nor estimate their chances of materializing.” To that end, Gulati has identified five ways to create positive narratives, take small steps to understand the nature of the challenges that surround us, and stay calm in the face of it all. Sounds like school!

Strategy 1: Create a Positive Narrative. In schools, we have values (and a mission!) that we espouse deeply. When school leaders, often in partnership with governing boards, hold these values at the center of any decision-making in the face of uncertainty, our feelings of belonging (to/in our community) tend to increase. That increase can help to mitigate any fears we might have, and contributes to the formation of a narrative around what we’re doing, and why. In a complementary way, we can also be seeking for both weak and strong signals in the chaos around us. We can focus on the signals we hear, learning more about them, which in turn helps us to perceive the chaos as less daunting.

Strategy 2: Cultivate Confidence. The best way to cultivate the confidence we need is to train deliberately, meaning that we lean into all that is available to us—leading practices, business models, crisis readiness, and more—practicing it as often as possible, even when it’s uncomfortable and we hope that we never have to use it. Equally important are what the author refers to as ‘metatools’—ways to think and solve problems, empowering people through delegation, and transparent debate. In terms of that last point, it’s a question of engaging in deep conversation about things that excite us and things that make us nervous, then thinking broadly to find a solution to reconcile those internal tensions that we experience all the time. Becoming increasingly familiar with this terrain builds our capacity for this work.

Strategy 3: Take Small Steps. In what feels like anathema to many of us, the advice here is to “let go of the need for a perfect plan and open [ourselves] to possibilities, trusting that the path will emerge as [we] proceed.” Most school leaders (and most on governing boards) have come into our present positions having been taught that things like strategic plans are our immutable roadmaps. We like them; they’re comfortable. Why are they so comfortable? Because we (as organizations) control what is in them…traditional strategic plans don’t take into account the effect of external forces and pressures, such as parents making choices regarding where to send their children, under which circumstances. We can’t control that. As such, to take small steps requires us to engage in sense-making. What do the external situation and our own emotional response(s) tell us? How might we look at such things in a dispassionate way? Scenario planning can be helpful here: apply imagination and identify what *might* possibly go wrong, then frame out how best to address it. Engage in intense networking and consulting of research and trends, looking for pieces of meaning, and see if a pattern can be discerned. Again, in what feels like anathema to many of us, this exercise is not about being right; rather, it’s continually negotiating and updating the landscape as one sees and experiences it, making it more comprehensible over time. The author gives a critical piece of advice here: stay curious. Even if one feels confident in an early interpretation, stay curious. Small steps are continually needed.

Strategy 4: Find Connection. As school leaders, we tend to think about connecting with our supporters first and foremost. There’s deep value in that, to be sure. At the same time, we need to seek out critics, as they challenge our thinking in ways that help to identify any cognitive biases we might have, or pieces of information we have overlooked unwittingly. Our supporters, in other words, can give us what Gulati refers to as an ‘emotional boost,’ while we can grow personally and professionally by constant assessment of our own narratives and interpretations. Our personal networks as educational leaders are great places to find the kinds of resources we need, whether connections to other people, information, or helpful technologies. Connection tends to be a superpower of school leaders.

Strategy 5: Stay Calm. In what seems to be the mantra of our era, we truly do need to practice self-care: feed ourselves so that we can feed others. We all have many roles and responsibilities in schools, and we need to be at our sharpest when performing them. From reframing the situation in a more balanced way (e.g., imagining what could go right, as well as go wrong) helps our mental wellbeing, to embracing rituals when engaging in decision-making (asking a centering question, always making decisions from a certain chair, etc.), staying calm is something that is more within our control than we may realize. This strategy, like the others above, applies to governing boards as well as school leaders—and whose we lead. Modeling how to stay calm has salubrious knock-on effects for organizations.

How might you embrace these strategies and associated practices now and in the months ahead, making them a reliable habit in this era of uncertainty?