It’s only 9 a.m. and Michelle, a middle manager in a government organization, just received her eighth panicked email from a team member asking about the impending layoffs that were announced yesterday afternoon. People are clearly worried, and Michelle is beginning to feel overwhelmed.

She’s in an unfortunate, yet common, position. She wants to keep people calm and focused, but information comes in drips from leaders above her. The culture she worked so hard to build is becoming flooded with uncertainty. People are scared. What can Michelle do to minimize feelings of threat and help the team keep running smoothly?

Layoffs aren’t the only context in which uncertainty reigns. It shows up wherever there’s rapid change, which research suggests has become the norm within organizations. One study shows that organizational change accelerated by 183% between 2020 and 2024, and by 33% in 2024 alone. In other words, change isn’t just increasing—it’s increasing faster every year.

All this flux makes working life feel much riskier and less stable, as people fear for their livelihoods amid ever-evolving governmental reductions and corporate restructurings. With so much uncertainty in the air, is it any wonder employee engagement hit an 11-year low in 2024? People can’t predict what’s coming next, so they’re checking out entirely.

To help team members perform their essential tasks, leaders must learn to reduce uncertainty, minimize threat, and, ideally, create productive feelings of comfort and safety in an increasingly volatile world.

Provide clarity if you can’t provide certainty

A feeling of certainty isn’t just a nice-to-have. In life and in work, humans crave a sense of predictability about their environment—and we can think of this craving as a genuine psychological need. Thousands of years ago, a need for certainty kept us physically safe, whether from predators or suspicious-looking berries. Our sense of certainty was rewarded with survival.

‍

Read the full article here.