Leading effectively in times of swift change is a topic addressed at the 2024 Power Up Concert & Conference.

In a chaotic political campaign season, it’s all about having the right team, from candidates to social media message branding. Beyond the realm of politics and winning a single election, how do you as a leader in an industry or as an entrepreneur bring together a team of different intentions, skillsets, locations, identities, and career history to succeed for the present and future?

Perhaps you are suddenly in a new position as a leader, or you are a colleague and team member who is part of a shifting of titles and responsibilities. Holding it all together with purpose and transparency is the mark of a great leader. The puzzle pieces do not need to remain puzzling.

One of the many things you can learn at the “Together We Lead” Power Up Concert & Conference event on Women’s Equality Day is how to be a great leader in times of disruption. Directly addressing the strategies of keen leadership, collaboration, cooperation and innovation are a breadth of leaders who will be speaking and leading panels sharing hard-earned wisdom across industries.

“One of the many things you can learn at the “Together We Lead” #PowerUp Concert & Conference event on #WomensEqualityDay is how to be a great #leader in times of disruption.”

Register here for the Together We Lead event.

“’Carpe the chaos’ is one of the original 9 Power Tools,” says Gloria Feldt, co-founder and president of Take The Lead. She advises, “Carpe the chaos and new ways to achieve previously unrealizable goals will almost inevitably appear.”

Feldt adds, “In truth, there is always something that disrupts and challenges us, usually when we least expect it.”

““In truth, there is always something that disrupts and challenges us, usually when we least expect it.” —@GloriaFeldt. #carpethechaos”

Here are 10 ways to lead through change for the greater good for yourself, your organization, your team and your network.

1. Lead with established core values. Remind colleagues, co-workers, team members and all you deal with of the mission and values of your entity. Eyes on the enterprise’s foundational intentions. According to Harvard Business Review, “Fundamental values and principles remind us of what’s important so that we don’t get lost in the fog of uncertainty. In a world characterized by increasing volatility, our CEOs emphasize the importance of anchoring leadership around core values and principles, which remain stable even when the environment isn’t.”

Listen to Gloria Feldt on thriving in chaos

2. Be clear about expectations of you. That means knowing the expectations insiders and outsiders have of you as leaders identifying as women. “The crisis issue area, the nature of the crisis, and the type of communication needed at a given time all intersect with a leader’s gender,” write authors Louise K. Davidson-Schmich, Farida Jalalzai and Malliga Och in their new book, Crisis, Gender Role Congruency, and Perceptions of Executive Leadership.

“When it comes to gender roles and behavior, society and individuals hold specific assumptions regarding the appropriate social roles and behaviors for both women and men. Women are traditionally associated with communal skills (e.g., care, kindness, support) while men are linked to agentic skills (e.g., assertiveness, independence, competition). Further, gender roles (masculine and feminine) are seen as binary and hierarchical, meaning that one is seen as the norm (masculinity) and thus valued more than the other (femininity),” the authors write.

Acknowledging internally what socialization has taught many can inform how you demonstrate not only your support and kindness, but also your ability to add to that definition with the expectation you will deliver with control, decisiveness and deliberate action.

“Leading effectively in times of swift change is a topic addressed at the @Takeleadwomen 2024 #PowerUp Concert & Conference. #leadershipskills ”

3. Brace for high anxiety. Whether it is an all-new team in this trying time, or your position is new to this formed team, understand your team members, colleagues and managers will be anxious about the present and the future. Maybe some have been downsized or their titles and projects shifted, but there will be nervousness and trepidation.

Expect anxiety to rise and motivation to suffer. Pick a few priorities to focus on while regaining balance. Set smaller goals with frequent checkpoints so that people can feel some sense of positive movement. Redesign operating rules, even temporarily, to address the needs of this time. Pay close attention to managing stress — including your own, reports Entrepreneur. “Each day brings jarring new information that requires system-wide response.”

4. Know thyself. Look inward and assess your capabilities, your boundaries and how you will have support while you are offering support to an entire team. Be open to who you are and also to the motivations and possibilities of what others can bring to the team.

“Know thyself. Look inward and assess your capabilities, your boundaries and how you will have support while offering support to your team. #womenleaders”

Insead Knowledge reports, “To make better decisions, we need to build self-awareness and consciously open our heart and soul to other avenues of thinking. By being curious about the multiple sides and layers of a situation, acknowledging our emotions and connecting to our dreams and aspirations, we can overcome entrenched beliefs and find meaningful solutions to crises.”

5. Express that you know the cost of emotional labor. Difficult times are not just challenging for you, but for every member of the team. New research shows leaders who address their own emotional labor and that of others, produce “organizational resilience,” according to the Journal of Entrepreneurship and Regional Development.

“Entrepreneurs are expected to have much stronger emotional connections to their employees than managers more generally, due to their personal stake in the business, involvement in recruitment, likely smaller organizational scale and therefore closer and more personal interactions with individual employees.” In addition to frequent check-ins with both remote and in-person workers on their emotional well-being, they need to monitor themselves and “model the behavior required to prevent worker burnout.” The report continues, “The most common emotional labor practice observed was engaging in frequent non-work conversations with workers to monitor their moods, provide emotional support, and otherwise help address the negative consequences.”

“Express that you know the cost of emotional labor. #support #leadership”

Watch Power To You podcast on managing your career in turbulent times

6. Encourage learning and growth. Of course there will be resistance, but there also will be resilience and a readiness for newness and innovation. Take this time to learn more, and express the need for everyone to spur their own competence and growth. Whitney Johnson, CEO Disruption Advisors and author of the new book, SMART GROWTH: How to Grow Your People to Grow Your Company, tells Forbes, “Growth is slow as competence is gradually acquired. It can be painful and discouraging. Patience and perseverance are required, and good management. Individuals need good training, metrics appropriate to their situation, other people available as resources to help them, and celebration of their wins, even the small ones.”

7. Rearrange the hierarchy. Perhaps remove some of the steps on the ladder, particularly of reporting, and make top leadership more accessible. The BBC reports, “Some organizations have experimented with flatter arrangements – fewer levels of seniority, and therefore fewer lines of reporting from the most junior employee to the most senior. These approaches are based around a less rigid hierarchy, with elements of self-management and autonomous departments and teams.“ How someone structures their days and who they answer to directly, can be a relief. According to the BBC, “Many employees have also been eager to explore a way of working that departs from the command-and-control arrangement that many feel is antiquated and leaves workers feeling stressed out and disengaged.”

8. Strengthen relationships inside and outside the organization. This requires effort, and means that you engage in connecting to all stakeholders to project reassurance and to engender trust. A 2022 study in the Business & Society Journal shows, “Managing grand challenges demands a relational leader who encourages collaboration, coordination, and trust with various stakeholders.” This is typically and historically the strength of leaders identifying as female have projected. “Using a laboratory experiment, we find that female leaders are perceived as more relational, and hence, more effective than their male counterparts.”

9. Take the time to innovate. In a time of reorganization and uncertainty, perhaps use this backdrop to create and offer new solutions or pathways. A World Bank study of 40,000 businesses from 49 countries in 2020, show that women-led businesses were hit harder economically than businesses led by men. The upside is, “At the same time, women-led micro-firms were markedly more likely to report increasing the use of digital platforms, but less likely to invest in software, equipment, or digital solutions. Finally, the findings also show that women-led businesses were less likely to have received some form of public support although they have been hit harder in some domains.” Additionally, women-led businesses “exhibited higher rates of product innovation compared to their male peers.”

“In a time of reorganization and uncertainty, perhaps use this backdrop to create and offer new solutions or pathways. #innovation #leadership”

10. Adapt. This is not about being passive or submissive. This is about swimming with the current and not pushing against inevitable change. In a new study in the Asian Journal of Economics, Business and Accounting called, Leading in a Time of Crisis: The Coronavirus Effect on Leadership in America, the authors “recommend developing leadership qualities that emphasize transparency, empathy, and stakeholder engagement, and enhancing adaptability in leadership styles. Additionally, (the study) highlights the need for culturally sensitive communication strategies, tailored to diverse audiences.”

“Great leaders don’t let the crisis and chaos lead them. They take action because they understand that those are the times when innovation can be developed and new ideas can be implemented, because people are searching for solutions. They see the opportunities to advance themselves and solve problems,” says Feldt. “The Power Up Concert and Conference will absolutely help leaders and entrepreneurs to find their paths to success.”

““The @Takeleadwomen #PowerUp Concert and Conference will absolutely help #leaders and entrepreneurs to find their paths to success.” —@GloriaFeldt.”

Leadership Takeaway of The Week:

“Individuals need good training, metrics appropriate to their situation, other people available as resources to help them, and celebration of their wins, even the small ones.”

Whitney Johnson, CEO of Disruption Advisors and author of SMART GROWTH: How to Grow Your People to Grow Your Company.

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About the Author

Michele Weldon is editorial director of Take The Lead, an award-winning author, journalist, emerita faculty in journalism at Northwestern University and a senior leader with The OpEd Project. @micheleweldon www.micheleweldon.com