Overcoming the Traps That Prevent Growth in Uncertain Times

Today, with uncertainty a seemingly permanent condition, executives need to weave adaptability, resilience, and clarity into their operating plans. The best executives will implement strategies that don’t just sustain their businesses; they enable growth. But amid all the turbulence, even seasoned leaders can fall into any number of traps that keep them from pursuing a successful growth strategy. Below are four of the most common ones. Trap #1: Conflating uncertainty with volatility. While they often coexist, these conditions are distinct and require different strategic responses. Treating them as the same can lead to misguided decisions, such as hesitating when you should be experimenting or overreacting when you need to build resilience. To avoid this trap: Recognize what the current moment requires. Uncertainty is about a lack of information and insight. Volatility, on the other hand, is constant fluctuation. While the two circumstances demand distinct approaches, they are not mutually exclusive: Volatility necessitates building buffers—whether that’s inventory, cash, or capacity—to absorb sudden shocks. Uncertainty requires leaders to take action to learn. That means testing assumptions and running experiments. It’s about placing small bets in multiple directions, learning from them, and narrowing in as more information becomes clear. If you wait for certainty, you’ll be too late. When you’re making decisions when both conditions are present, your goal is both learning and building buffers, so your strategy must be in service of both of those missions. Trap #2: Waiting too long to act. Uncertainty will always exist and if you delay moving forward, you run the risk of falling behind companies that gain first-mover advantage. To avoid this trap: Return to your North Star, the guiding mission, or long-term goal that anchors all of your decisions. This helps filter out distractions and align priorities, even when the path ahead feels unstable. Ask yourself and your team: Why do we do the work we do? Who are we here to serve? Once you have this reminder of your longer-term goal and your primary customer, you and your team are better primed to jump into action. Pick a path and adjust as you go. Start by identifying what you believe to be the general direction of the industry and start moving towards it, evaluating results along the way, and further narrowing your options. Along the way, test the aptness of the decisions you are making by asking yourself: What decision today will still make sense a year from now? If a year from now this decision were used as an example of our leadership, what would it teach? What is the cost of waiting to make this choice? You don’t need precision when you first begin moving forward. Instead, over time, through smaller individual choices, you build the path towards growth. If you wait until the best strategy is the only clear path, then you will be behind your competitors who took the initiative. Trap #3: Setting a strategy you don’t have the resources to execute. Your organization’s distinct capabilities and culture all influence its ability to achieve certain outcomes. For example, perhaps your organization concludes that your industry is moving to embrace AI. If your employees aren’t skilled in AI, your readiness to take this approach is low. To follow through on an AI-forward strategy you will first have to invest in training and upskilling your workforce. Only then will you have the resources to support this strategy. To avoid this trap: Shore up critical capabilities. Growth strategies can fail not only due to bad ideas but also due to insufficient commitment. Your capacity to implement any given strategy is based on factors such as: The scalability and advancement of your organization’s technical infrastructure The skill level of your organization’s workforce The ability of your organization to attract new, highly skilled talent The adaptiveness of your culture The financial resources available to different teams across your organization Recognize where your organization’s strengths and weaknesses lie. Once you’ve built up capacity, you can implement a comprehensive growth strategy. Trap #4: Moving forward without bringing your workforce along. In times of upheaval, leaders often forget to address the fear, fatigue, and emotional strain that uncertainty creates within your organization and that directly affects your team’s ability to execute a growth strategy. Read this HBR Executive Playbook for more advice on change management: Leading Through Continuous Change To avoid this trap: Balance demand and care. Executives must go beyond tracking tasks and metrics to checking in personally with their team members. Acknowledge how people are doing, not just what they’re doing. Consistently connect their work to your mission. In times of crisis, organizations often focus communication on threats, volatility, and business performance. This can create a culture of fear, instead of action. Instead, remind people why the company exists and how their work contributes to something meaningful. That bigger picture can serve as an emotional anchor. Create space for open dialogue. Invite your team into the thinking, not just the doing. In the current environment, employees are exhausted and need an outlet to release their emotions. When people feel heard, they’re more likely to stay engaged and committed, even when the path ahead is unclear. Open conversations can also help surface concerns from siloed parts of your organization or from frontline employees whose concerns don’t always make their way up to you. All of these insights ultimately strengthen your strategy. Go Deeper In Uncertain Times, Ask These Questions Before You Make a Decision By Cheryl Strauss Einhorn HBR.org, May 1, 2025 (7-minute read) 5 Pandemic-Era Lessons on Leading Through Drastic Change By Rae Ringel and Lisa Kay Solomon HBR.org, March 13, 2025 (7-minute read) Investing in Growth Through Uncertainty By Ranjay Gulati HBR, July 2023 (11-minute read) Strategy-Making in Turbulent Times By Michael Mankins and Mark Gottfredson HBR, September 2022 (15-minute read) 5 Questions to Help Leaders Achieve Growth Amid Uncertainty By Joerg Esser HBR.org, January 11, 2022 (9-minute read) Credits Expert advice courtesy of Gerry Hansell (Boston Consulting Group managing director and global leader for BCG’s growth strategy and value patterns work), David Hofmann (senior associate dean of UNC Executive Development), Cheryl Strauss Einhorn (founder and CEO of Decisive, and author of Problem Solved, Investing In Financial Research, Problem Solver and the upcoming book, The Human Edge: Decision-Making In An AI-Driven World).

Overcoming the Traps That Prevent Growth in Uncertain Times

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