Can I Act with Uncertainty?
Yes! ...I think. (Just kidding.) Yes, you can.
I had been trying to get with a friend for a while. My work schedule hadn't allowed me to get to his house and spend time with him and his wife. He's battling brain cancer, and it finally worked out for me to be there for a couple of hours. I was grateful for the time together. I was there for over an hour, chatting and helping him rest, when I got a text that one of the pastors at GFC was having a medical emergency. I have full confidence in our CARE Pastors to handle the situation, but I felt like I needed to be there too. I needed to act with uncertainty in my next step?
Which option was right — stay with the man battling cancer, or go to the unknown situation?
As a leader and a pastor, that's a pretty dramatic decision. Both options carried strong positives and strong negatives. And here's the answer to the question I asked earlier: they were both right.
As a leader, you've probably discovered the same thing I have — the questions you wrestle with are rarely right versus wrong anymore. Right and wrong get settled at a lower, foundational level. A high-level leader is making decisions about what's best for the organization. Multiple options will present themselves as "right," each one carrying the full weight of the moment. Your job is to decide which of the viable paths will move your team most effectively toward its goal, while it grows in maturity, efficiency, and culture. I've stood many times looking at where I was and where I wanted to be, only to realize there were several paths to the finish line. So how can you be certain which one is best?
Here's a simple triage — three questions:
What do you know?
What do you have?
What brings peace?
What do you know?
You are your greatest resource. You carry a lifetime of experience, stretching from birth to this very moment. You didn't fall out of the sky into this situation. You lived a lifetime of conversations, experiences, victories, and challenges to arrive here. So use your senses — what do you see, hear, touch, taste, and smell in this moment? Go figurative, too — what do you sense, discern, feel, and emote about the question in front of you? What have your education, your training, and your intuition built into you as a foundation for this decision? And finally — what does your gut say? If you're a Christian, ask the Holy Spirit to lead and prompt you on this journey. If you're the one in the room who has to make the call, you're not there by accident. You're there to lead, because you're the one chosen to bring all of "you" to the decision.
What do you have?
If you are your greatest resource, what you have is a close second. Outside of yourself, the resources available to you are plentiful. Hopefully you've built a close team around you — one that can tell you exactly what resources they and the organization have at your disposal. They should also be able to grant you access, or serve as your proxy, to secure whatever you need to decide and act. You're living in a time when more information is available than at any other point in history. Technology keeps growing as a tool that can hand you multiple perspectives and scenarios for whatever you're facing. But here's my caveat — technology can be a tremendous help solving problems, but it cannot fathom the internal situations humans face. If the question is 2 + 2, technology is your friend. If the question is whether to stay with a man battling cancer or rush to a new medical emergency, I'm putting my money on you. Bottom line — you have more resources than just yourself. It's your job to develop them in seasons of calm so they're ready to be used in seasons of crisis.
What brings peace?
As a leader, you'll make decisions that are tough. Usually, one side is happy, and another side doesn't care for you or your choice. That's the weight of leadership. You're positioned to be the champion of the organization — not the most popular person in the room. If you walk through the first two steps, you'll have everything you need to make a good decision. Now you actually have to make it. Never rush a decision. But don't wait longer than you need to, either. In the moments when I've searched myself and searched my resources, I usually pray and ask God to help me land the decision. He is the author of my peace. Over the years I've made some tremendously good decisions, and I've made some that didn't end well. Either way, I've had peace. Knowing what I knew in the moment, I did the best I could with the resources I had. My peace was never based on the outcome. It's rooted in knowing who I am, whose I am, what I bring to the moment, and the confidence that I've surrounded myself with the best people to help me succeed. My peace comes from knowing my heart is pure, my mind is sound, my words give life, and my actions align with my convictions. I am being true to the leader God wants me to be in that moment.
So — you want to know what I chose that day? Should I have stayed, or should I have gone? What would you have done? Tell me your choice, and I'll tell you if it lines up with mine.
