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Brain Circuits
Gripped by uncertainty? How to unfreeze through experimentation
Given the pressures on today’s workforce, a crisis is looming in terms of employee well-being. Leaders should ask themselves the following five questions to check if they’re supporting their employees’ mental and emotional well-being.
Start small
Action creates clarity, not the other way around. Experimentation is how smart companies and individuals move forward when clarity is missing. Rather than waiting for the perfect answer, try small, intentional, low-risk experiments to learn what works. Bear in mind that experiments are not pilots: the goal is to learn, not to prove.
In times of ambiguity, experimentation lets us bypass the paralysis of big decisions by focusing on small steps that feel safe enough to try. Importantly, experiments don’t have to succeed to be useful: they just have to teach us something new. Success isn’t “we incorporated AI into several processes”, or “work is all smooth now after the reorg.” Success is “we learned something that moves our understanding forward.”
A good way to think of experiments in this context is “light actions”, because this signals two things: (1) you’re taking a small and safe step (2) , and it provides you with insight.
How to experiment
Take an area where you or your team are stuck and not sure how to move forward, then peel back the layers to the smallest and safest step possible. For example:
- Trying to incorporate AI but facing trepidation or resistance? Try setting up a lunch-and-learn series, where employees commit to playing with an AI tool, sharing at one session, and joining three other sessions to get inspired.
- In such initiatives, make the AI prompts non-work-related, so the exercises feel informal and accessible.
- Facing funding cuts as a nonprofit leader? Try hosting a “funding inspiration call” for fellow nonprofit leaders and share your favorite revenue models from other businesses, then brainstorm new earned revenue sources. If there’s interest, turn it into a regular experimentation club where each organization tries different funding methods and shares learnings.
Key learning
Each tiny experiment gives you data. That data gives you confidence, and that confidence reduces ambiguity – not because you’ve magically figured everything out, but because you are no longer in a state of paralysis and have got things moving.
* This article is partly based on an article published in Harvard Business Review 8 October 2025 (see final link below).
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