Leading In Peak Uncertainty: 7 Brain-Based Principles For Navigating Uncertain Times
- Nick Jankel
- Aug 8
- 8 min read
Updated: Aug 11
Welcome To Peak Uncertainty
In a world of radical uncertainty, the leader who can metabolize fear into fierce focus and transform anxiety into authentic action is the one who shapes the future.
We are living through an age of the metacrisis, a rolling storm of disruption, complexity, and volatility that batters even the most stable of industries and institutions. Whether it's climate shocks, geopolitical turmoil, AI disruption, or changing workforce expectations, the old certainties that once gave leaders confidence have eroded.
What used to stay certain for years may only stay true for weeks, or even days. According to WEF 2025 Report, "uncertainty is the defining theme of the global economic environment." 82% of economists consider it very high currently.
What is more, uncertainty is very different from risk. Conventional management theory is largely about managing and minimizing risk, whereas today's leaders must become masters of leading in uncertainty.
Risk is about managing the known unknowns so you can measure and plan for them to mitigate their impacts.
Uncertainty is about navigating the unknown unknowns, where no amount of analysis will provide an ironclad prediction, so you must adapt and learn as you go.
Risk is when you know the odds but not the outcome; uncertainty is when you don’t even know the odds.
The Neuroscience of Uncertainty: Why Leadership Feels So Hard Right Now
Leadership in uncertainty isn’t optional anymore; it’s the baseline reality for all leaders. But here’s the catch: Uncertainty doesn’t just challenge us, it hijacks our nervous systems.
When faced with uncertainty, the brain doesn’t calmly ask, “Hmm, I wonder what creative possibility lies within this moment?”
Instead, it reacts like a threat is at the door. Why?
The amygdala, our brain’s ancient alarm bell, activates.
The stress response floods the body with cortisol and adrenaline.
The prefrontal cortex, the seat of executive function, decision-making, and empathy, goes offline.
We often default to reactive and maladaptive behaviors: avoidance, aggression, micromanagement, perfectionism, or paralysis.
Studies show that people would often prefer certain pain over uncertain outcomes because the brain interprets uncertainty as a threat to survival. Uncertainty isn’t just uncomfortable, it’s perceived as pain. Neuroscientific studies show that ambiguous stimuli amplify pain perception, as the brain errs on the side of caution, triggering threat responses even when none are necessary.
This hyperalgesic (painful) effect, driven by areas like the periaqueductal gray, insula, and Anterior Cingulate Cortex (the ACC, where signals from the body and brain are integrated), explains why leaders fall back into outdated habits or rigid control just when their creativity is needed most. They collapse rather than expand in uncertainty.
We lose our minds JUST as we need them most!
Leaders often default to “Data Waiting,” where leaders delay, hoping for more certainty, “Analysis Paralysis,” where action is perpetually postponed in search of the perfect plan, and Control Freakery, trying to create the best spreadsheet ever, even as the ground shifts beneath their feet while working those formulae.
Meanwhile, more agile competitors are already disrupting the sector.
Countering The Loss of Coherence
When reactive, trying to beat uncertainty, leaders start to pivot away from adaptability, flexibility, and creativity.
This is why even brilliant, seasoned leaders can regress in uncertain times. They grip tighter. They double down on what worked before. They silence dissent. They ignore intuition. Leaders under pressure fall back onto old habits, rigid plans, and controlling behavior just when they need to be most adaptive, creative, and emotionally intelligent.
When this occurs, leaders lose perhaps the single most crucial superpower for navigating uncertainty and today's incoherent markets: Coherence.
Research over decades shows that our Sense of Coherence (SoC) reduces with chronic stress, loss of agency, autonomy, and meaning, and with a lack of supportive relationships. Leading in uncertainty requires us to counter the loss of coherence by prioritizing it in ourselves and our teams.
A strong SoC allows leaders to:
Better cope with stress and perceive challenges as manageable
Build inner resilience to handle the demands of their role
Foster a more positive work environment, which increases employee engagement and motivation
Promote the use of servant leadership as a style, supporting others to cope with uncertainty
Stay adaptive to navigate uncertainty
here's the liberating truth: Uncertainty isn't the problem. Our relationship with uncertainty is.
From Fear to Flow: The Change In Relationship To Uncertainty That Future-Fit Leaders Must Make
Successful leadership in uncertainty begins not with learning new tools but with rewiring and transforming our relationship to uncertainty, a task I attempt to initiate and accelerate in my uniquely transformative keynote speeches, particularly my experiential keynotes that last 90-120 minutes.
Instead of fighting to control the uncontrollable, great leaders choose to:
Normalize Uncertainty
“Uncertainty is not a bug in the system. It is the system.”
We must evolve beyond the industrial-era mindset that sees uncertainty as rare, irritating, and an anomaly. In VUCA realities, uncertainty is natural, necessary, and even liberating, because it creates space for innovation and transformation.
Leadership Tip: Acknowledge uncertainty and frame it as usual and to be expected. Say: “This is unfamiliar and shifting terrain, which is to be expected, but we’ve got what it takes to navigate it, learn from it, and have success in it.”
Regulate Before You React
Before we can lead others through uncertainty, we must lead ourselves through it. That starts with emotional regulation, mastering the art of staying centered when chaos knocks.
You can’t lead transformation if you’re stuck in survival mode, feeling threatened by uncertainty.
When stress hits, pause. Breathe. Connect with your body. This isn’t fluffy wellness, it’s cutting-edge leadership hygiene.
Brain Science Tip: Just three deep breaths can reduce amygdala reactivity and reengage your prefrontal cortex, putting you back in command of your choices. Also, try splashing cold water on your face.
BUILD STABILITY TO UNLOCK MORE AGILITY
To increase behavioral agility to flex in uncertainty, we need to boost our sense of emotional stability. Staying rooted helps us embrace uncertainty rather than shrink from it.
There are three great drivers of stability that I speak about: Meaning (purpose, sense-making), Mastery (empowerment, agency, learning), and Membership (togetherness, belonging, safety).
When you lead from purpose, not panic, you become a beacon for your team. You reduce the noise. You amplify trust. You inspire aligned action even in ambiguity.
Leadership Practice: Regularly revisit your “why.” Anchor every decision in your core purpose and the purpose of the organization. Purpose gives uncertainty meaning, and meaning processes fear.
Shift from Control to CONNECTION
In times of uncertainty, people crave certainty. If they can’t get it from outcomes, they must get it from relationships.
That means cultivating a culture where people feel safe to speak up, share ideas, and "fail-forward" as one team. It means developing a sense of belonging, a sense that we are all in this together.
This is why psychological safety is the number-one predictor of team innovation, especially when the path ahead isn’t clear. However, don't confuse safety with comfort. Uncertainty is uncomfortable, as can be responsibility, but they don't need to be a source of physical, social, or emotional harm.
Also, remember that in complex systems, in uncertain times, collaborative adaptation is a determinant of survival. In these realities, the strength of our relationships is often more important than our individual intelligence.
Leadership Move: Say often: “It’s okay not to have the answers, we’ll find them together.” Then model that vulnerability yourself.
Take 100% ownership for 100% empowerment
In times of great uncertainty, it can feel like we are being spun around and around by reality, leaving us dazed and confused. This is a key source of disempowerment, leading to inaction and indecisiveness.
Many people associate responsibility with moments of being blamed and shamed for failing in their past. We reframe it as ReponseAbility: the ability to respond to every challenge with creativity and fresh energy.
One way to feel more empowered is to take ownership. This does not mean we take the blame or the praise for everything. It means we stand in the center of the chaos and seek to have agency, no matter how uncertain things get.
Leadership Hack: Inhabit a founder's mindset by imagining you trake 100% responsibility for the problems your company faces with uncertainty. See what ideas emerge with this mindset and notice if old memories and feelings of shame or blame arise. Let. them go.
Focus on clear, calm & candid communication
In times of uncertainty, where noise increases and signals become harder to understand, you can help your team with calm, clear, and above all, candid communication.
Leadership is largely about energy transmission. Your calm is contagious. If you are panicked, stressed, and anxious about uncertainty, even if you think you are putting on a brave face, that will spread to your team.
Being candid is key. People don't want leaders who pretend that the old habits, the old plans, are still perfect. They want leaders who acknowledge the uncertainties and show they can still lead within them.
Clear, calm, and candid communication is also what is needed for tough conversations and uncomfortable realizations. We can rewire how to speak clearly, compassionately, and with empathy, even when sharing difficult feedback without avoiding the edge.
LeadershipTip. Speak the truth. Acknowledge the uncertainty. Vocalize the "ouch." Share your own vulnerability around uncertainty (without losing your strength and courage as a leader). Model what it looks like to cut through the bullshit and say what needs to be said without adding drama to the situation.
From Optimization to Adaptation
One of the most vital mindset shifts is from optimization to adaptation. Adaptive leaders don’t wait for complete certainty. They don’t seek perfection. They embrace what Nobel Prize winner Herbert Simon called “satisficing,” making decisions that are good enough for now and open to course correction later.
They don’t try to predict the future, they experiment their way through it, always seeking to adapt to the new moment as it arises. Adaptive leaders make reversible decisions quickly and irreversible ones slowly, always maintaining strategic flexibility.
A metaphor I often use in my keynotes and workshops on leading in uncertainty is the game of Backgammon, which involves luck, but you can master how to make moves each turn that prepare you to make the most out of the next roll.
Leadership Suggestion: Design low-risk experiments. Learn from them. Then scale what works, but do it adaptively. Use your imagination as a leadership muscle.
LEADING IN UNCERTAINTY WITH DATA & INTUITION
I've pioneered a neuroscience-driven approach to leading in uncertainty that fuses the rigor of data with the subtle power of leadership intuition.
Academic research has shown that stock traders who integrate both data and intuition consistently outperform those who rely solely on one approach, especially during volatile market swings.
Data offers the latest information, clarity, structure, and pattern recognition. Intuition draws upon emotional, bodily, and experiential cues to guide rapid, holistic decisions based on deep experience.
This hybrid model counters analysis paralysis by harnessing both logic and instinct, enabling “good‑enough” decisions that keep organizations moving forward even amid radical uncertainty and relentless ambiguity.
Recent behavioral economics shows that intuition is far from mystical; it’s a learnable, structured skill built from patterns, physiology, and experience. Business studies report we’re right up to 91% of the time when using intuition in decisions, especially when physical signals (like tightness or clarity) align with facts.
It is possible for leaders to:
Cultivate awareness of bodily cues and emotional signals that signal fear v. opportunity, a clear voice of calm vs. noisy, jittery anxiety
Practice mindful techniques (like breathwork or journaling) that unlock a refined sense of intuition
Reflect on past intuitive hits and misses to refine their "executive summary"of their inner guidance techniques
Why Organizations Love MY Keynotes ON LEADING IN UNCERTAINTY
I don’t just deliver speeches, I shift mindsets.
Attendees to your event can gain.
A robust understanding of how and why uncertainty feels painful, and how to manage it
A feeling of being in-it-together, which boosts psychological safety and belonging
Hands-on tools to develop intuitive acuity grounded in body, brain, and bias awareness
Strategies for making fast, flexible decisions, blending facts with wisdom
Confidence to lead when the map ends, embracing uncertainty as strategic terrain, not threat
Participants leave, not hoping to predict the future but eager to shape it. Contact my team to inquire now.