ng. This is why leadership and growth have traditionally been about projecting confidence and certainty in the future. Leaders create a future vision and project a sense of certainty that it will happen as planned, while optimising plans along the way to ensure it does. Since the pandemic, however, this sense of certainty and confidence has not been resonating with employees. Why not?  COVID-19 showed that planned assumptions can become irrelevant. Having lived through a pandemic for more than two years, and experienced extreme change across all aspects of how we work and live, people are hyper aware that plans are only as good as the assumptions on which they are built. Uncertainty and curveballs are part of change, and with technology-driven change predicted to increase in the future,1 employees are not naively accepting that the plan will just happen. They know it will be hard and bumpy along the way. The pandemic also triggered our fear response at scale. Humans are wired for ‘fight or flight’ when faced with the unknown. In today’s world, animals won’t eat us but uncertainty still triggers the same fear response. COVID-19 did so on multiple levels as we grappled with job insecurity, fear of infection, death, loneliness, social isolation and loss of safety – all at the same time. This has led to greater mental health issues. The World Health Organization reports that COVID-19 triggered a 25 per cent increase in the prevalence of anxiety and depression worldwide.2  Share the pain along with the growth Leaders today need to connect with employees by recognising growth is hard and uncomfortable. Rather than projecting confidence, which invalidates what employees are feeling, help them navigate uncertainty and fear by recognising it as part of the growth process. Leaders can build deep connections by being open and vulnerable and recognising the uncomfortable challenges that their people are experiencing. Employees are not looking for leaders to have all the answers. They are looking for proof that they are ‘in this together’. So what are five ways leaders can role model uncomfortable growth? Recognise growth is hard and uncomfortable. Talk about worries and the difficulty of the challenge at hand. Discuss what you have struggled with and learnt that has made you stronger and wiser. Employees will connect with you as a real person and feel they are not on their own. Share both the dark and the light.Help your people communicate how they are feeling. An effective technique is for everyone to rate how they are feeling on a scale of 1-10 at the start of a meeting. It’s OK if some days people score low. It says that we all have tough days, and that’s normal. It also means you can support them better, resulting in deep appreciation that you care as much about them as their work.Reinforce that you believe in your employees more than the plan. The plan will always change – even more so as change accelerates. Your employees are the ones who will need to create ‘plan B’, and they will feel empowered when curve balls come, rather than overwhelmed.Encourage employees to bring their whole selves to work. COVID-19 has resulted in personal and work identities collapsing, and while we are now accustomed to seeing pets on Zoom, we should spend more time understanding who employees are as individuals and what they care about. This will build the deep connection that people are seeking, and give them the courage to be open and vulnerable about their fears.Upskill everyone on how to have uncomfortable growth conversations at work. Have the tools and guidelines in place on what managers can do in the moment, versus when they need HR or expert support. Training and tools will enable transparency, courage and connection. Being an ‘uncomfortable growth’ leader is recognising that hard challenges are part of growth. It builds connection through vulnerability and honesty. When leaders share their own struggles, it gives employees permission to own theirs and feel normal, enabling leaders and employees to support one another in turning challenges and uncertainty into new solutions and growth.