{"id":23405,"date":"2026-10-05T23:39:40","date_gmt":"2026-10-05T23:39:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nzsda.org.nz\/?p=23405"},"modified":"2026-10-06T01:54:17","modified_gmt":"2026-10-06T01:54:17","slug":"leading-through-tough-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nzsda.org.nz\/index.php\/2026\/10\/05\/leading-through-tough-times\/","title":{"rendered":"Leading Through Tough Times"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t<div data-elementor-type=\"wp-post\" data-elementor-id=\"23405\" class=\"elementor elementor-23405\" data-elementor-post-type=\"post\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-e4ff228 e-flex e-con-boxed e-con e-parent\" data-id=\"e4ff228\" data-element_type=\"container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"e-con-inner\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-8966a28 elementor-widget elementor-widget-heading\" data-id=\"8966a28\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"heading.default\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-widget-container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t<h2 class=\"elementor-heading-title elementor-size-default\">Leading Through Tough Times<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-element elementor-element-e189aa3 elementor-widget elementor-widget-text-editor\" data-id=\"e189aa3\" data-element_type=\"widget\" data-widget_type=\"text-editor.default\">\n\t\t\t\t<div class=\"elementor-widget-container\">\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<p>When business is tough, leadership gets tougher. Your team may be worried about job security, increasing workloads or what the future holds. You may be dealing with exactly the same uncertainty yourself. You don&#8217;t need to have all the answers. But how you lead during these periods matters.<\/p><p><strong>Here are six simple things to focus on.<\/strong><\/p><ol><li><strong>Communicate, even when you don&#8217;t have all the answers<\/strong> &#8211; Silence creates uncertainty. If you don&#8217;t know something yet, say so. Tell people what you do know, what you don&#8217;t know, and when you expect to know more.<\/li><li><strong>Be visible<\/strong> &#8211; When things get difficult, don&#8217;t disappear behind emails and meetings. Talk to your people. Check in. Listen. Make time for questions.<\/li><li><strong>Be honest<\/strong> &#8211; Don&#8217;t promise that everything will be fine if you don&#8217;t know that it will be. People can deal with difficult news. What is much harder is feeling they haven&#8217;t been told the truth.<\/li><li><strong>Set clear priorities<\/strong> &#8211; If you have fewer people or fewer resources, you can&#8217;t simply expect everyone to keep doing everything. Decide what matters most \u2014 and what can stop, wait or change.<\/li><li><strong>Remember the people who stay<\/strong> &#8211; After a restructure or significant change, don&#8217;t assume everything simply goes back to normal. Your remaining team may be worried, tired or taking on additional work. Give them clarity about what happens next.<\/li><li><strong>Keep doing the small thing<\/strong>s &#8211; Say thank you. Recognise good work. Keep your one-to-ones. Follow up when you say you will. When people are uncertain, consistency matters.<\/li><\/ol><p>Finally&#8230;<\/p><p>Tough times don&#8217;t require perfect leaders. They require leaders who are visible, honest, consistent and willing to have difficult conversations. Your people may not remember every decision you made, but they will remember how you treated them while you made it.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>When business is tough, leadership gets tougher. Your team may be worried about job security, increasing workloads or what the future holds. You may be dealing with exactly the same uncertainty yourself. You don&#8217;t need to have all the answers. But how you lead during these periods matters.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":22039,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-23405","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business-advice"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nzsda.org.nz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23405","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nzsda.org.nz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nzsda.org.nz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nzsda.org.nz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nzsda.org.nz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23405"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/nzsda.org.nz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23405\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23409,"href":"https:\/\/nzsda.org.nz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23405\/revisions\/23409"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nzsda.org.nz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22039"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nzsda.org.nz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23405"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nzsda.org.nz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23405"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nzsda.org.nz\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23405"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}