Uncertainty Is the Reality — Here’s How Great Leaders Navigate It
Uncertainty doesn’t announce itself. It just shows up — in a policy change you didn’t see coming, a conversation that went sideways, a team that’s looking to you for answers you don’t yet have. And in those moments, every leader faces the same quiet internal question: What do I do with this?
Here’s what we know. Our brains are wired to protect us by drawing on everything we’ve experienced before. That’s a gift — and it’s also something worth examining closely, because in uncertain moments our most automatic responses aren’t always our most effective ones.
What makes the difference isn’t whether uncertainty finds you. It always will. What matters is what you’ve built on the inside before it arrives.
Here’s what great nurse leaders do differently when uncertainty shows up
When Experience Becomes Conviction
When we assign meaning to an experience and repeat it enough times, it stops feeling like an opinion and starts feeling like a fact. We become so convinced we’ve seen this before that we stop asking questions — and that’s where even the most seasoned leaders can miss what’s right in front of them.
Consider this: research shows that up to 80% of misdiagnoses occur in cases where no differential diagnosis was ever considered. Not because the clinician wasn’t skilled. But because certainty had replaced curiosity.
Sound familiar in leadership? The new team member who reminds you of someone who let you down before. The change initiative that looks just like the one that failed three years ago. Our past experiences don’t just inform us — they can quietly convince us.
The Uncertainty No One Prepares You For
Leadership development programs are brilliant at preparing you for what’s predictable. Strategic plans. Best practices. Forecasting tools. And those things absolutely have their place.
But real uncertainty renders many of those tools temporarily ineffective. When our usual tools stop working, our nervous system notices. We instinctively perceive threat, and that can show up as reactive judgment, impaired decision making, and logic that feels sound in the moment but isn’t.
The good news? Awareness is always the starting point.
Leadership Is an Inside Job First
In the middle of uncertainty you cannot control the policy change, the staffing shortage, the organizational restructure, or the news cycle. But you can always come back to yourself first.
Self-awareness isn’t a soft skill — it’s the foundation everything else is built on. That includes knowing your go-to response when you feel threatened. Do you fight? Flee? Freeze? None of these make you a bad leader. They make you human. But knowing your pattern means you get to choose your response rather than simply react to the moment.
And it means you get to model that self-awareness for every person watching how you lead.
A Practice Worth Trying
Ted Lasso said it best: “Be curious, not judgmental.”
The next time certainty starts rising — about a person, a situation, or a decision — pause. Breathe. Then ask yourself: What would I need to believe for a different outcome to be possible here?
That single question creates space between your reaction and your response. It invites curiosity back in. And curiosity, far more than certainty, is what navigates complexity with grace.
You don’t have to have all the answers. You just have to stay open enough to find them.
Uncertainty is not a sign that something has gone wrong in your leadership. It’s simply part of the job. The leaders who navigate it best aren’t the ones who have all the answers — they’re the ones who have done the inside work to stay grounded, curious, and present when everything around them is shifting.
If this resonated, there’s more where it came from. New leadership insights delivered every two weeks — practical, warm, and written specifically for nurse leaders like you.
Reflection: Think about a current challenge where you’ve felt certain about the outcome. What might you discover by staying curious just a little longer?
About the Author
Dr. Crystal Lawson is a nationally recognized nurse leadership expert, keynote speaker, and CEO & Founder of We Rise Up, LLC. She equips, empowers, and inspires nurse leaders to rise into their full potential — with confidence, clarity, and compassion. Learn more at DrClawRN.com.
