In a world of disruptive change, uncertainty is the buzzword on everyone’s lips.

Disruptive change can throw everything into chaos unless leaders and teams have the skills to lead confidently through it. How do you lead complex change without burning out, disconnecting or losing your team?

Welcome to the age of Leading Through Uncertainty, where emotional responses to challenging situations are part of the human experience.

Drawing on numerous interviews with leaders from all walks of life demonstrating leadership in action, this new edition of the classic book on leadership and uncertainty has been revised and updated for the post-pandemic age. It explores these fundamental questions:

• How do you lead confidently and competently in uncertainty?
• How do you create human connection in a performance-driven culture?
• How do you adapt rapidly to technological advances and disruptive change without losing yourself or your team in the process?

Jennison’s style is gentle, compassionate but assertive and her book is a brilliant mix of story-telling, anecdote and critical perspectives.

HR Director

If you only read one management book in the near future, let this be it.
Professional Manager Magazine

Very convincing. Her book adds weight to the argument for a different approach to leadership development based on embodied experience.
HR Director magazine

No one can deny the uncertainty we each face daily. Jude’s insights, drawn from both business settings and working with horses, replace a fear of uncertainty with a sense of hope and opportunity. Her stories inspire, her insights inform and her tips encourage change. Through her work with horses, Jude has developed an intensely human capability: to help leaders recognize their style and improve its impact on others.
Dave Ulrich Rensis Likert Professor, Ross School of Business, University of Michigan Partner, the RBL Group

Jude Jennison’s leadership lessons show great empathy and creativity. Her ideas are fresh – and they work.
Julia Hobsbawm, OBE Author of Fully Connected: Social Health in an Age of Overload and Honorary Visiting Professor in Workplace Social Health, Cass Business School, London

A thoroughly engaging, human and insightful book and definitely one for now!
Gina Lodge CEO, Academy of Executive Coaching

Leaders transform complexity to clarity and uncertainty to understanding. Get Jude’s new book to move into deeper clarity and deeper understanding in order to navigate change with grace, authenticity, connection and presence.
Kevin Cashman Global Head of CEO and Executive Development, Korn Ferry Best-selling author of Leadership from the Inside Out and The Pause Principle

An uncertain landscape has become the one certainty for business and good leadership has become even more important. This book is for all those who want to ensure they can lead their organizations through these challenging times. Practical insight from those who’ve ‘been there, done that’ and some very different approaches to the challenges of leadership.
Ian O’Donnell MBE Director, FSB and Head of Policy for the West Midlands Combined Authority

Wholehearted, engaging and compassionate. Jude Jennison’s second book delivers powerful truths and insights into successful leadership in the face of uncertainty. This book positions business struggles as human struggles, allowing leaders to embrace the unknown in an embodied and authentic way in order to move through to what’s next.
Dr Veronica Lac PhD Founder of the HERD Institute and author of Equine-Facilitated Psychotherapy and Learning: The Human-Equine Relational Development (HERD) Approach

This book is a key narrative at a time when change and the implication of change has never created more pressure on leaders and leadership.
Martin Yardley Deputy Chief Executive (Place), Coventry City Council

Humans can think, they can emotionalize, they can make good decisions, they can make bad decisions, they can be creative and innovative, they can be mean and fight each other. In short, they are what they are supposed to be and do. If they ‘find’ the link back to their natural roots, where they belong, they have a better chance of understanding themselves and moving forward. Jude Jennison gives us these ideas through her book. By reading it, your mind will definitely be challenged!!!
Professor Alexandros Psychogios Professor in International Human Resources Management, Birmingham City Business School

Jude Jennison understands the complexity of modern-day leadership and the pressure leaders of today are under to perform at their very best. Jude’s approach, through working with her horses, places a spotlight on your skills and ability to adapt in unfamiliar surroundings. The results are powerful and empowering. A must for anyone who is serious about being the best leader they can be.
Sue Grindrod Chief Executive, Gower Street Estates Limited t/a Albert Dock Liverpool

I was struck by Jude’s knowledge and insights on leading through uncertainty. Her warm and engaging style brings out the best of the CEOs she has interviewed to make this a valuable book.
Sue Noyes Non-executive Director and Former CEO, East Midlands Ambulance Service

If you struggle with your emotions in business, if you don’t dare to express your feelings, if you are suppressed by what is around you take your time and read this book! You will probably find yourself. Definitely you will get a new perspective on leadership.
Gerhard Krebs Founder of HorseDream and the European Association of Horse Assisted Education

Table of Contents

Foreword by Gina Lodge of the Academy of Executive Coaching

Introduction

Part One – The context of uncertainty

Chapter 1 – My path of uncertainty

An introduction to how I came to work with horses and how they taught me about uncertainty.

Chapter 2 – Human beings vs super-computers

• Explore how technology has driven rapid pace of change and update it to include information on how businesses adapted rapidly to the pandemic
• Recognize the emotional impact of technological change and how what is possible logistically is not always viable emotionally

Chapter 3 – Emotional engagement

• Understand how emotions have a significant impact on our ability to lead change and why we need to pay attention to them
• Update on how the pandemic required us to pay attention to emotional health more than ever and how it needs to continue

Part Two – I am not a machine!

Chapter 4 – Stress and overwhelm

• What causes stress and overwhelm in organizations and the impact it has
• How do you balance what is achievable vs what needs to be done?
• Update on the ongoing mental health issues in continued uncertainty

Chapter 5 – Fear and polarization

• Desire to hang onto what is known, understood and can be controlled
• How do you shift to a culture of hope, opportunity, exploration and co-creation?
• How do you navigate differences of opinion that seem far apart?

Chapter 6 – Pain and trauma

• Pain and trauma are part of the human condition and must be included in leadership and not brushed over
• The pandemic was a global traumatic event leaving people reeling. How do we recover at a time of continued uncertainty?
• How do you empathize with the suffering of others without it derailing organizational results?

Part Three – Lead from the front

Chapter 7 – Create the framework

• The importance of clarity in a world of chaos and uncertainty
• Providing clarity when you don’t have all the answers
• Focus on what you know, rather than what you don’t
• The importance of allowing creativity within a framework

Chapter 8 – Adaptability and agility

• How do you adapt on a knife edge? How do you respond quickly with certainty when there is none?

Chapter 9 – Stay with the discomfort of uncertainty

• The impact of ambiguity, uncertainty and a lack of clarity
• What wants to emerge in the stillness and discomfort of uncertainty?
• Stay connected through dissonance and have compassion for others

Part Four – The humanity of change

Chapter 10 – Listen well

• Deep listening beyond the words How do you create the space for dialogue in a culture of fast paced change?

Chapter 11 – Connect and support

• Stay connected through differences of opinion
• How do you create an environment where everyone feels seen, heard and understood?

Chapter 12 – Build trust

• Why trust is a choice
• How it gets eroded in uncertainty and how to rebuild it

Part Four – Who’s got your back?

Chapter 13 – Stay grounded in the midst of chaos

• The challenge of finding stillness for creativity to emerge
• Compassion, self-care, mental health
• Include some of the content from “Be human” chapter in 1st edition

Chapter 14 – Build your support network

• Expand your network to create mutual support
• Ask for help from your network

Chapter 15 – Lead from the heart and soul

• Aligning the head, heart and gut
• How do you continually modify your behaviour to meet an ever-changing, fast-paced environment?
• How do you make time for structure and framework in an ever-changing environment?

Acknowledgements

About the author

Index

FORMAT / ISBN / PUBLICATION DATE / RRP

Paperback / 9781788603362 / May 10, 2022 / £17.99

Ebook / 9781788603386 / May 9, 2022 / £9.99

Paperback and eBook Bundle / £20.49

Jude Jennison

Jude Jennison is a leadership author, international speaker and pioneer of Leadership with Horses, helping leaders to develop their non-verbal communication, self-awareness and emotional resilience. She works with executive boards, senior leaders and entrepreneurs to develop embodied leadership skills and create behavioural change. She combines 16 years’ senior leadership experience in IBM with executive leadership, coaching and team development skills, as well as the unusual approach of working with a herd of horses to help leaders become more confident in leading through the uncertainty of our time.