The World Was Always VUCA

If you’ve ever led a team through chaos—your market collapsing, your product disrupted, your plans unraveling, or your best person leaving mid-project—then you know what VUCA is. Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity, and Ambiguity.

The world may be more VUCA than it used to be. Technology change, the erosion of social capital, climate change, shifting aliances—all these seem to be accelerating. But I take comfort in the fact that VUCA isn't really new. And if VUCA is an ancient thing then the wisdom to manage it also already exists. Paradox-aware leadership is ancient wisdom. It is also THE indispensable understanding for guiding lives and teams in a VUCA world.

As a labor of love, and particularly for my two young adult sons, who are navigating their own VUCA world with fresh eyes, I've written a short study showing how Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings is a master class in leadership in a VUCA world. They love the story as much as (and maybe even more than) I do.

If you're not familiar with it, the story centers on nine characters from wildly different backgrounds who form a Fellowship around a shared quest: To destroy the Enemy's Ring of Power before his armies overrun their world. As I consider Frodo the Hobbit, Aragorn the Ranger, and all their companions, these are the questions I ask: How do they deal with volatility when their wizard-leader Gandalf falls? How does Frodo handle uncertainty when he sees the Ring corrupting hearts inside the Fellowship? How does Frodo manage the complexities of taking the treacherous Gollum as his guide? And how does Aragorn choose to lead the armies of Gondor in the face of total ambiguity?

They continually face opposing necessities—trust and skepticism, autonomy and interdependence, hope and pragmatism. Paradox-aware leadership means refusing false choices. Instead of Either/Or choices, these wise leaders hold competing truths in tension and search for unexpected Both/And solutions.

Without further introduction, I invite you to read

The Road to Mordor: Paradox-Aware Leadership in a VUCA World.

It might just change how you think about your own next impossible decision.

Cheering you on,

Jared