How to Lead with Courage in Chaotic Times

"If you'd asked me a couple of years ago, I probably would've said empathy is the number one skill that successful leaders need. Now I think things are changing so quickly that the number one skill might be an ability to be strategic, an ability to lead a company through a transformation, which is where we are now."

"And I'm going to throw out another word that's related, courage. In periods of deep uncertainty when you do have this rapid technological change, shifting economic conditions, new political pressures, it can feel really hard to be brave but I think history shows that the best business leaders do find the strength to act even when the path forward is unclear, even when it feels scary. I'm thinking of moves like Reed Hastings and Netflix going all in on streaming or at Stack at Dick Sporting Goods who pulled guns from store shelves after the Parkland school shooting."

"Yeah. You put your finger on two types of courage and one is pivoting in your strategy when you don't know, but where you are trying to divine the future and Reed Hastings is a great example. But then there's the courage to try to do the right thing when Wall Street maybe isn't applauding that. And I think of Paul Polman at Unilever who led the company successfully for years in terms of any metric you could measure, but who also decided that Unilever would follow to the extent that they could UN development plan goals, right? So he was leading the company, but also trying to be a steward of the environment in which we all live."

Empathy was once framed as the top leadership skill, but accelerating technological, economic, and political change elevates strategic ability and transformational leadership. Courage complements strategic skill: leaders must pivot boldly when predicting the future and take principled actions even when investors or markets may not applaud. Examples include going all-in on disruptive bets like streaming and making values-driven operational decisions such as removing guns from stores after a mass shooting. Corporate leadership can combine performance with broader stewardship by aligning business choices with development and environmental goals while navigating deep uncertainty.

Read at Harvard Business Review