People look for someone they trust.

Are you familiar with that feeling when all the meetings around your workspace are closed door?

It’s unsettling.

Worrisome.

You don’t know what’s going on but you do know one thing…

You’re not involved. Not in the know. Not being consulted. Not being told. Not “in the tent.”

You and your cohorts in the bullpen search for information but it’s nowhere to be found.

And you all start inventing your own versions of the truth. There’s even a shared version of the truth that the gang of ‘people not in the tent’ came up with.

Is it accurate? Don’t know. It seems plausible enough. The buzz is that things aren’t going well.

And of course, you think the worst.

“Maybe we’re all getting fired”

It’s brutal.

Until something happens.

Usually not as bad as the water cooler feared.

We can’t quantify what we lost during that period of uncertainty.

The better approach for a leader is to remove uncertainty.

It frees your people to do their work without the distraction of inventing their own stories.

It’ll free you too.

Tell them what you can. Tell them what you know.

Be honest about what you don’t know.

Start there.