The responsibility we have as leaders right now is more important and more daunting than anything any of us have faced before.

The danger to our families and loved ones, the people working in our businesses, and those living in our communities, our nation and the world is unprecedented in modern times.

The need for effective leadership has never been greater.This crisis represents an opportunity for exceptional leaders to emerge.  Now is the time to discover the leader you must be and can be.

Here are  ten points are worth pondering as you consider the kind of leader you need to be – and how you can focus on accomplishing what really matters most amidst the enormous uncertainty and constantly evolving challenges being faced by governments, businesses, communities and people around the world.

  1. The current crisis represents one of the greatest challenges SMEs have faced in modern history.
  2. The level of uncertainty regarding the circumstances surrounding the threat to the health and wellbeing of the general population is fueling an equivalent level of concern over the uncertainty over business conditions in both the near-term as mandatory closures are expanding – and long-term as the current economic conditions will likely pose a significant threat to the viability of businesses due the interruption of revenues.
  3. The indefinite mandated interruptions and the unpredictable repercussions make planning tenuous for nearly everybody – and impossible for many.
  4. There is an absence of clear guidance in terms of changing regulations and available resources – exacerbating the difficulty in planning through the current crisis – and planning for recovery when it abates.
  5. All current strategies regarding the response to the pandemic are suggestive of the VUCA conditions they impose (volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity).
  6. The available strategies for businesses to respond, cope or simply survive are interdependent on the strategies being implemented with respect to the pandemic.
  7. Business decision-making is being overwhelmed by tactical demands in the absence of durable strategies – beyond the basic need to weather the storm and survive.
  8. The response to VUCA conditions is widely regarded to be a reliance of creative tendencies rather that reactive “command and control” leadership. Creative tendencies are in and of themselves functions accepting uncertainty as a basic premise – and designing thinking to be flexible in accordance with the inherent uncertainty, volatility, complexity and ambiguity that is the nature of the challenges the current crisis lays bare.
  9. Creative thinking requires curiosity, collaboration, intellectual humility, decentralization, trust, clear communication and courage-driven leadership guiding synthesis of solutions and execution of ideas that are rooted in the need for contribution and multiplying people’s resourcefulness and effectiveness.
  10. Isolation, fear, decision-paralysis, seeking comfort in false-certainty, causing misinformation; and employing manipulation (including fear-mongering or offering irrational and irresponsible exuberance, self-serving and self-dealing, protectionism, hiding or hoarding of anything – are all antithetical to the thinking and behaviors that will get us through this time of crisis.