With the US election looming, Harvard Business Review asked me and Jennifer Howard-Grenville to see if we could write an article that spoke directly to the world's prevailing mood of uncertainty and anxiety. The election is just one strand of what is coming to be known as the Age of the Polycrisis. 

Where do we stand when the ground underneath us is shifting? What if the ground doesn’t stop shifting and an acceptable “new normal” never emerges?

In our article we explore the concept of liminality.  Liminal experiences involve a prolonged separation from normal ways of being and doing. They represent a break from the familiar, but don’t fully replace it.  Instead, they’re at once disturbingly different and confusingly similar.  And when they come to an end, they leave those who have survived them forever changed.

Many of the leaders we speak to describe feeling helpless and confused, uncertain what to do but knowing they are expected to do something. Their organizations need them to provide clarity in troubling times. 

We emphasise that during liminal times we have more agency than we realise. We identify the key questions and actions for leaders to help their organizations (and themselves) navigate successfully through these uncertain times.

Previous articles that I have written with Jennifer Howard-Grenville in Harvard Business Review can be accessed below.

Three ways to prepare for the Future of Work

Living through liminal times in the post pandemic world of work