One of the key features of a leader is the ability to portray confidence in the face of uncertainty. This does not need to be false confidence, but rather the ability to tolerate the fact that there is always a percentage chance that a decision may be wrong and may lead to failure. By telling ourselves – and others – “yes, we can do this,” confidence begins to reduce uncertainty because of its self-fulfilling properties.
Leadership, however, is demanding. Decisions are energy-consuming, fatiguing, and often anxiety-arousing, particularly when uncertainty levels are high. Without a clear sense of direction, we can find ourselves in what psychologists describe as “deliberation mode,” where we become unsure of our next goal. In this state, we oscillate between positives and negatives, widen our attention, and become more vulnerable to anxiety, uncertainty, and loss of confidence.
Confidence helps move us into “implementation mode,” where attention narrows toward a goal. In this state, we are more likely to focus on opportunities and possibilities rather than threat and downside. This is where purpose becomes critical.
Having a clear sense of purpose helps leaders in three important ways: it supports decision-making in the face of uncertainty, helps tolerate the anxiety associated with potential failure, and makes it easier to cope with – and hopefully learn from – setbacks when they occur.
Purpose is closely connected to values. Different people are driven by different values, although not all values are equally sustainable. Ruthless dominance, for example, may be a person’s guiding value, but it contains the seeds of its own failure because no one can dominate indefinitely without eventually encountering someone more dominant. More enduring values are those such as professionalism, loyalty, integrity, reliability, compassion and perseverance. These values do not depend on external competition and therefore remain within our control.
Affirming values through a purpose statement can be a powerful way of anchoring the ego in something larger than the self – something that can outlast success, status, retirement, or even death. Brain imaging studies show that affirming personal values by writing down what we stand for, why we hold those values, and what they mean to us reduces emotional activity in the amygdala while increasing self-reflection in the frontal regions of the brain. Values make the ego less fragile because they create a sense of continuity and meaning beyond immediate outcomes.
Research also suggests that purpose and morality are closely linked to happiness and meaning. Researchers at Cologne University sent text messages to 1,200 people over three days asking whether they had recently performed, witnessed, experienced or learned about actions they considered moral or immoral. The responses included examples such as giving food to a homeless person, reminding a waitress about an unpaid bill, taking someone else’s drink from a work fridge, arranging to cheat on a partner or lying to a friend.
The research found that immediately after acting morally, people rated themselves as happier and reported a stronger sense of purpose in life. Immoral actions had the opposite effect, leading to lower happiness and reduced feelings of meaning.
A purpose statement will often contain some form of moral direction and to the extent that people act in alignment with it, they are likely to experience greater happiness and meaning. Happy leaders are good leaders.
Author: Professor Ian Robertson, Academic Partner, The Leadership High, Neuroscientist and Clinical Psychologist, Co-Director of the Global Brain Health Institute
