Leadership in Hard Times: How to Stay Clear, Grounded, and Values-Driven When Power Is Misused
Leadership in Hard Times: Staying Clear When Power Is Misused
Lately, I’ve been feeling strange about writing a leadership newsletter at all.
What’s happening in our country isn’t just unsettling — it’s wrong. The cruelty is real. The harm is real. And the way power is being used right now is designed to overwhelm, divide, and wear people down. There are moments when sitting down to write about leadership feels like bringing a teacup to a wildfire. And still, I don’t believe the answer is silence.
When Harmful Leadership Floods the Zone
What we’re witnessing isn’t a lack of leadership. It’s a very particular kind of leadership — one that floods the zone, keeps everything urgent, and exhausts people into confusion. Even when something is clearly unjust, the churn makes it harder to organize, respond, and sustain action.
Let me be clear: this isn’t just “human nature.” This isn’t a shared moral failing we all need to gently examine. There are moments when leadership becomes singular, unchecked, and actively harmful. This is one of those moments.
And at the same time, the dynamics feel familiar. Not in scale. Not in consequence.
But familiar in the way it feels when:
Accountability never travels upward.
The rules keep changing.
Exhaustion becomes a tactic.
I’ve seen quieter versions of this in workplaces and systems. And I’ve seen what it does to people over time.
It makes us doubt ourselves.
It fragments us.
It tempts us toward numbness or despair.
Why Values-Based Leadership Still Matters
This is why leadership — ethical leadership — still matters.
Not because a newsletter will put out a wildfire. Not because clarity alone changes policy. But because sustained, values-anchored action is how real resistance works.
Not just loud, visible action.
But steady action that doesn’t burn people out or hollow them out.
For me, that means:
Staying connected.
Talking with friends.
Checking in on neighbors.
Naming out loud that we see what’s happening — and we don’t accept it.
And yes, continuing to write about leadership. Because how we lead, relate, and organize is part of how collective action becomes sustainable.
The Teacup Isn’t Meant to Put Out the Fire
The teacup I’m holding isn’t meant to extinguish the blaze. It’s meant to remind us what water is. To remember what clarity feels like. What accountability sounds like. What shared humanity makes possible.
Leadership in hard times is not about pretending everything is fine.
It’s about refusing confusion as a strategy. Refusing cruelty as normal. Refusing exhaustion as inevitable.
Tiny Leadership Tip: Staying Grounded in a Crisis
Here are the leadership practices I’m holding onto right now:
Be clear about what’s wrong.
Clarity is grounding. Naming harm matters.
Be honest about where you have power.
Even small spheres of influence are real.
Choose actions — big or small — that move you toward people, not away from them.
Isolation weakens. Connection sustains.
Ethical leadership is not abstract. It lives in conversations, teams, communities, and daily choices.
I Want You to Know
I’ll keep writing.
Not because I have answers and not because this is easy.
But because staying in conversation feels like part of the work.
And leadership — the kind rooted in accountability, courage, and shared humanity — is still worth practicing.
- Kate