Now More Than Ever, Leadership Isn’t About Having All the Answers
Part of the series: This Is Not Business as Usual — Lessons from Leading on the Frontlines
Having led frontline teams during the first Trump administration, I’ve learned that moments like this test more than policy or strategy—they test our humanity. What follows isn’t theory. It’s shaped by lived experience and by what leadership actually requires when fear, uncertainty, and collective trauma are present.
Now More Than Ever, Leadership Isn’t About Having All the Answers
As we move into February, we continue to witness deeply troubling realities in real time: journalists being detained, people taken from their communities, and renewed reporting and disclosures related to the Epstein files, including deeply disturbing allegations of abuse involving young girls. These are not distant events. They are being absorbed daily by people who are also expected to show up to work, lead teams, and make consequential decisions.
We are in a moment where complexity and uncertainty are no longer episodic—they are sustained. Burnout remains elevated, trust in public systems continues to erode, and people are absorbing an unprecedented volume of real-time news and social media—often involving violence or trauma—while being expected to function, decide, and lead as usual.
This is not abstract. Five-year-old Liam and his father, Adrian—both asylum seekers—were released from the Dilley detention center after being held in immigration detention. Many of us have been witnessing stories like this unfold in real time. They are absorbed by parents, caregivers, and leaders alike, even as people are still expected to show up to work, make decisions, and lead. This is not an isolated case.
There are also those who, for their own reasons, have chosen not to engage with what is unfolding. That distance—intentional or not—widens the gap in how this moment is experienced across teams.
I remember asking these same questions in 2016, when I was leading teams during the first Trump administration. What did it mean for staff who were part of mixed-status households? How do you ask people to show up when they are genuinely worried about their families?
At the same time, I heard others frame that fear as “the price people paid” for being here the “wrong way.” The frustration I felt was real—but so was the responsibility to hold it together while advocating and leading through the reality that policy alone was not enough.
I didn’t always have the answers—but I knew I couldn’t look away. Holding that tension, while still leading and advocating, became the work.
Leadership in moments like this isn’t about certainty. It’s about staying present when there are no easy answers—and not turning away from the people most affected.
In this environment, leaders are being asked to carry more responsibility, make harder decisions, and do so with real consequences for people and institutions. What increasingly shapes outcomes in moments like this is not just experience or technical skill, but how leaders understand their responsibility, their power, and the obligations that come with it.
The Cost of Misreading the Moment
When leaders treat sustained crisis as temporary, they often default to familiar responses—pushing for resilience, maintaining urgency, or narrowing attention to performance alone. Over time, this creates distance between leadership and the people most affected by decisions.
People notice when fear, uncertainty, or grief goes unnamed. They notice when they are asked to carry on without recognition of the broader context they are living in.
In moments like this, leadership is not judged by intent, but by effect.
A Signal Leaders Should Pay Attention To
This week, many leaders were invited to join a national strike, following a general strike organized in Minnesota. Regardless of individual participation, these actions signal something leaders should pay attention to: many people feel that existing systems are not responding to their lived reality.
For leaders, this is not a distraction. It is information.
How leaders interpret signals like this—whether as inconvenience, noise, or a call for reflection—is shaped by how they understand their role and responsibility.
Closing Reflection
This is not business as usual.
What this moment requires is steadiness, humility, and the willingness to lead without false certainty. Leadership is not defined by having all the answers, but by staying present, humane, and accountable when conditions are difficult—and by whose dignity is protected in the process.
This is difficult work.
It is necessary work.
And it matters.