What if uncertainty isn’t something to fear or even survive, but a skill you can train and a competitive advantage you can build?
Scott Stirrett has spent more than a decade helping people do exactly that. Scott is a Canadian entrepreneur, author, and the founder of Venture for Canada, a national charity that has supported over 10,000 young professionals since 2013. He’s also the author of The Uncertainty Advantage, a powerful guide for navigating the future of work that argues uncertainty isn’t a bug in the system. It is the system.
Scott walks us through how empathy and emotional skills play starring roles in his six pillars that help build real resilience, alongside some surprising mindset shifts and practical exercises you can start using right away. We also talk about why traditional career playbooks no longer apply and how leaders and professionals can turn volatility into opportunity instead of paralysis.
If you’re navigating change, rethinking your career, or leading others through uncertainty, this episode offers both reassurance and a roadmap.
To access the episode transcript, please scroll down below.
Listen in for…
- The six pillars that help build real resilience and momentum in uncertain times.
- Seeing the opportunity in uncertainty and volatility.
- How to act when you don’t have perfect information.
- Why it is so important to build your uncertainty muscles.
“We don’t choose what era we live in. We live in an era of rapid change. Learning to develop a positive relationship with uncertainty is one of the most important things that you can do, perhaps at any moment in human history.” — Scott Stirrett
Episode References:
- Scott’s Book: The Uncertainty Advantage
- Antifragile: Things That Gain From Disorder by Nassim Nicholas Taleb
- Thinking in Bets by Annie Duke
- MIT study on human skills that complement AI: mitsloan.mit.edu/ideas-made-to-matter/these-human-capabilities-complement-ais-shortcomings
About Scott Stirrett: Founder, Venture for Canada and Author, The Uncertainty Advantage
Scott Stirrett is a Canadian entrepreneur, author, and the Founder of Venture for Canada (VFC), a national charity that has supported over 10,000 young professionals since 2013. Under his leadership, VFC raised $80 million and partnered with leading organizations to equip early-career Canadians with entrepreneurial skills to thrive in an uncertain world.
Scott is the author of The Uncertainty Advantage, a guide for young professionals navigating the future of work, endorsed by leaders including Andrew Yang and Amanda Lang. The book draws on lessons from building VFC, emphasizing adaptability, entrepreneurial thinking, and lifelong learning.
A graduate of Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service, Scott began his career at Goldman Sachs in New York. He’s been recognized as a Telus LGBTQ Innovator, Ashoka Fellow, and Globe and Mail Changemaker. His commentary has appeared in The Washington Post, Forbes, The Globe and Mail, and more. He currently co-chairs the Canadian Centre for Housing Rights.
Connect with Scott:
The Uncertainty Advantage: scottstirrett.com
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/scottstirrett
Facebook: facebook.com/stirrett
Instagram: instagram.com/scottstirrett
Substack: substack.com/@scottstirrett
Connect with Maria:
Get Maria’s books: Red-Slice.com/books
Hire Maria to speak: Red-Slice.com/Speaker-Maria-Ross
Take the LinkedIn Learning Courses! Leading with Empathy and Balancing Empathy, Accountability, and Results as a Leader
LinkedIn: Maria Ross
Instagram: @redslicemaria
Facebook: Red Slice
FULL TRANSCRIPT:
Maria Ross 00:04
Welcome to the Empathy Edge podcast, the show that proves why cash flow, creativity, and compassion are not mutually exclusive. I’m your host Maria Ross. I’m a speaker, author, mom, facilitator, and empathy advocate, and here you’ll meet trailblazing leaders and executives, authors and experts who embrace empathy to achieve radical success. We discuss all facets of empathy, from trends and research to the future of work to how to heal societal divisions and collaborate more effectively. Our goal is to redefine success and prove that empathy isn’t just good for society. It’s great for business. What if uncertainty isn’t something to fear or even survive, but a skill you can train and a competitive advantage you can build? My guest today, Scott Stirrett, has spent more than a decade helping people do exactly that. Scott is a Canadian entrepreneur, author, and the founder of Venture for Canada, a national charity that has supported over 10,000 young professionals since 2013. Under his leadership, Venture for Canada raised $80 million and partnered with leading organizations to equip early-career Canadians with the entrepreneurial skills they need to thrive in a rapidly changing world. Scott began his career at Goldman Sachs in New York after graduating from Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service, and has since been recognized as a Telus LGBTQ innovator, Ashoka Fellow, and Globe and Mail change maker. His writing and commentary have appeared in the Washington Post, Forbes, the Globe and Mail, and more. And he currently co-chairs the Canadian Center for Housing Rights. He’s also the author of The Uncertainty Advantage, a powerful guide for navigating the future of work that argues uncertainty isn’t a bug in the system; it is the system. In this conversation, Scott walks us through the six pillars he believes help people build real resilience and momentum in uncertain times. And empathy and emotional skills play starring roles in these pillars, alongside some surprising mindset shifts and practical exercises you can start using right away. We also talk about why traditional career playbooks no longer apply, how to act without perfect information, and how leaders and professionals can turn volatility into opportunity instead of paralysis. If you’re navigating change, who isn’t? Rethinking your career or leading others through uncertainty, this episode offers both reassurance and a roadmap. Lots of gems in this one today. Take a listen. Welcome, Scott Stirrett, to the Empathy Edge podcast. We are going to have a great conversation about your work and your philosophy that uncertainty yields opportunity. And this could not be more timely for people dealing with rapid change, rapid transformation, and constant chaos. And we’ve talked a lot on the show about the fact that empathy and emotional intelligence can help teams through that chaos. But I love what you’re going to share with us, especially around your work with young professionals. So welcome to the show.
Scott Stirrett 03:22
Thanks for having me on.
Maria Ross 03:23
So as we start every show, we would love to hear a little bit about your story. How did you get here and why are you doing this work? Why this book?
Scott Stirrett 03:33
I’ve had a up-and-down relationship with uncertainty throughout my life, and I was motivated to write The Uncertainty Advantage because I experienced firsthand in my 20s significant challenges with navigating uncertainty. I graduated from Georgetown University in 2013 when I was 22, and shortly after graduating from Georgetown, I went to go work at Goldman Sachs in New York City. I worked there for around a year, and then I quit my job to go found a non-profit in Canada where I’m originally from called Venture for Canada. And over the last around 11 years, I scaled Venture for Canada alongside the team from just a little idea to a national organization that supports over 10,000 young people across Canada to launch their careers, and we raised over $80 million of funding to support our work. And in my work at Venture for Canada, I saw firsthand the challenges that a lot of young people face in navigating uncertainty, and how fear of uncertainty is arguably the most prevalent thing that holds people back at the beginning of their careers. It prevents them from taking risks, from realizing opportunities. And likewise, I saw in my own 20s my struggles with uncertainty. I was diagnosed with obsessive-compulsive disorder, which at the core is a fear of uncertainty. And while most people don’t have OCD, many people, like most people, have an uncomfortable relationship with the unknown. And the throughline through my work is how do you help individuals learn to see the opportunity in uncertainty rather than to fear it?
Maria Ross 05:13
Oh my gosh, so much in there, so thank you for sharing that with us. And, you know, it’s interesting because we’ve always talked about We in the past, we’ve always talked about uncertainty in terms of young people and they sort of have this blank canvas in front of them and they don’t know what’s going on. But especially in the times we’re in right now, uncertainty is everywhere because of the pace of change. And you know, I I started out my career as a change management consultant, and so that that was very much about helping people through that fear, helping them get excited, helping them figure out what do they need to upskill or to bolster themselves so that they could take advantage of the change, rather than have to run from it or fear it. So I’m really excited. You know, I know your your book and your research and your experiences offered a framework in The Uncertainty Advantage about how to turn volatility into opportunity. So maybe we can start there. Why do you believe that thriving in uncertainty is kind of the most important skill that people can master for career success today? The
Scott Stirrett 06:17
first reason is because our era is defined by rapid change. There’s always been a degree of volatility in human history, but what’s different now is how quickly things are evolving. That’s because of AI, climate change, a variety of different factors. But there are unique things that are driving rapid evolutions in terms of how we live, how we work, and I think one of the most important things that we all need to do at this point in our careers is to think about how we see the opportunity in uncertainty, because we don’t choose what era we live in, but we can choose to develop a better relationship with uncertainty. And that’s first and foremost why I think it is really critical for young people to embrace building their uncertainty muscles. The second core aspect is is that learning to develop a positive relationship with uncertainty is correlated with a whole host of socio-emotional benefits. The more comfortable you are with the unknown, generally the more positive mental health that you have, the more that you’re willing to like take risks, and that can be everything in forming new relationships and launching new businesses. We live in a world where more rewards go to those who are willing to take smart, you know, calculated risks. And I’m really passionate about this because I think that the more that you help young people, in particular those who maybe are more socioeconomically marginalized, see the opportunity in uncertainty, the more that we can unlock a ton of potential throughout the world and help people take risks within the context of what’s appropriate for them. And the third reason why I I think it’s really important to teach comfort with uncertainty is that not only is uncertainty or comfort with uncertainty an important skill, it’s also something that’s really teachable. All of us maybe have different innate abilities in terms of how to cope with the unknown, but everyone within the context of where they’re at can learn to develop a better relationship with uncertainty. And I share this firsthand. 5 years ago, I was at the worst of my OCD experience. I struggled to get out of the house. I struggled to do basic things. In some ways, today I have more comfort with uncertainty than I ever have. And that’s been a testament to slowly building up or rebuilding my uncertainty muscles over time. All I’ll say is if I can do it, so can others. And I think anyone can learn through practical tips and habits to build a mindset and the skills that help them to thrive in the unknown.
Maria Ross 09:00
Amazing, amazing! It’s funny because there’s so many parallels there to helping people understand that they can build empathy as well. That it is a muscle, and you can strengthen it, but you just have to be more intentional about it. It’s not something where people are just necessarily born being good at adapting to change, because we as humans learn to adapt. That’s how we evolve. But the human brain does not thrive on change, it thrives on predictability and knowing what’s next. And, you know, that’s those are the shortcuts that our brains love. So I’d love to hear a little bit more about the approach you take to learning that. There’s 6 pillars in the uncertainty advantage and, you know, obviously, many of those overlap with my work. So can you kind of give us a brief primer on those pillars, and how they play into strengthening that ability to adapt? And really what we’re talking about here is resilience, and we talk about resilience and adaptability. I mean, we all experienced it to some degree or another during the pandemic, but that is the skill that teams and leaders are craving right now, because they know it’s like you said, it’s change. They always used to say, Change is the only constant, but not at this pace, right? So you you hit the nail on the head there. But tell us a little bit about those pillars, and how each of them work to strengthen that resilience muscle or that adaptability to change muscle.
Scott Stirrett 10:31
Yeah, the first pillar of the uncertainty advantage is self-compassion, and essentially, the more that you are kind to yourself, the more that you can learn to develop a positive relationship with uncertainty. Those who are relentlessly self-critical are less comfortable with failure. And uncertainty inherently means that sometimes you’re going to have adverse or negative outcomes. And I think about a lot of what’s involved in learning to develop a better relationship with uncertainty is learning to accept that bad things can happen, and being kind to yourself that sometimes you’re going to make mistakes. And that’s part of a life. You want to learn from them, but mistakes are par for the course. And some of the ways that you can learn to foster more self-compassion to yourself is to learn to talk to yourself in a more kind or gentle way, to label self-critical thoughts, and and to really focus more on the journey rather than the destination. The second core pillar of the uncertainty advantage is the importance of adaptability. Essentially, that in a world that is really unpredictable, setting rigid plans for yourself can be a waste of time and can set yourself up for a lot of frustration. So, my advice is, rather than set rigid plans for yourself, is be iterative in your your goal making. Think clearly in terms of what is your like life mission statement, what is your vision statement, what do you want to accomplish in the long term, at a really high level. Be really adaptive in terms of your short-term goals. So don’t say, In two years I want to make X, Y, Z amount of money or have X job. Be more iterative and think, Okay, in the next couple months, what am I looking to accomplish?
Maria Ross 12:15
Right.
Scott Stirrett 12:16
And adapt based on what’s happening. The third pillar of the uncertainty advantage is the importance of antifragility. And antifragility is the ability to not just withstand challenges; it’s the ability to grow stronger in the face of setbacks. And one of the ways that you can learn to be a more antifragile person is to learn to develop your risk-taking muscles, because the more risks that you take, the more that you can benefit from all of the uncertainty that’s out there in the world, rather than just tolerate
Maria Ross 12:50
it. I I just I would love to interject here, because I’ve heard around this topic, more framed as resilience, but I love the term antifragility because it sounds like you’re fortifying yourself, right? This idea of just try to even do small challenges, like learn a new skill, or learn an instrument, or learn some phrases in another language, or whatever it is. It’s sort of giving yourself those own your own little personal challenges of something that you think maybe you could never do, and giving it a try. And I’ve heard that. Is that part of what you mean by that?
Scott Stirrett 13:25
Yeah, 100%. And credit goes to the public intellectual Nassim Taleb, who created the concept of anti-fragility and wrote a book called Antifragile on the topic. So I’m borrowing that concept and applying it in the personal development space.
Maria Ross 13:40
Mhm.
Scott Stirrett 13:41
But I think it’s really important for folks because I think sometimes people will think that what doesn’t kill you makes you weaker, but in fact, it’s what’s really important is to take that mindset of always pushing yourself out of your comfort zone.
Maria Ross 13:54
Yeah.
Scott Stirrett 13:55
And I This is my first week back, actually, in Canada after traveling for two and a half months. I took a little sabbatical after leaving Venture for Canada to go on a trip, and after two and a half months, I can tell certain skills that I have feel like they’ve atrophied after two and a half months. Like, I’m glad I took two and a half months off and not a year off, because I can see how when people take really extended periods of time off, it’s easy for skills to to atrophy over time.
Maria Ross 14:22
Yeah, absolutely.
Scott Stirrett 14:24
To link back to anti-fragility, that’s why it’s really important to always be pushing yourself out of your comfort zone. Even when I was traveling, it was in like rural Japan for a lot of it, and I don’t speak any Japanese, and there were a lot of things that were out of my comfort zone. So I felt I was learning some new skills. But all to say is that if you just go lay on the beach for three months, your ability to withstand setbacks are going to decrease. So it’s important within the context of where you are to always be pushing yourself out of your comfort zone. Of course, there’s a Goldilocks. Like it’s like in the gym, if you push yourself too hard, you’re going to injure yourself.
Maria Ross 15:00
Right.
Scott Stirrett 15:00
So you always want to push yourself, but also be mindful of not overexerting yourself because that’s where burnout and other challenges end up happening.
Maria Ross 15:09
Yeah. Well, and it also instills, you know, part of my frameworks, when you’re you’re developing the when you’re trying to develop empathy for yourself, one of the habits is, obviously, it starts with self-compassion and self-awareness, but also this idea of building your self-confidence, so that you’re not you can take on other points of view without defensiveness or fear. And giving yourself these little challenges, these little stretch goals, that actually helps build your self-confidence to say, The sky didn’t fall. If I tried it and it didn’t work, it’s okay. This is like the worst case scenario that could happen. You get more comfortable with risk and uncertainty. Not that anyone’s I mean, there might be people that are completely comfortable with it. I’d love to meet those unicorns, but for us mere mortals, it’s a great way to build self-confidence, which actually helps you, not just in the the this component of getting used to uncertainty, but it also helps build your ability to be more compassionate with other people. Like you said, because if you’re if you learn to be compassionate with yourself and like, Oh, I try things. I fail things. At things, it’s all okay. You have more space and grace for other people.
Scott Stirrett 16:21
Yeah, learning to be more kind to yourself is definitely correlated with also learning to be more kind with with others.
Maria Ross 16:29
Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.
Scott Stirrett 16:30
And I think it’s really important to double-click on that concept of building your kind of risk-taking kind of muscles, and Annie Duke, the champion poker player, has a great book called Thinking in Bets, and in it, she really emphasizes the importance of people thinking about life as a series of like, not just like a couple dozen bets, but like tens of thousands of bets over a lifetime. And if you think about every day that you’re making a bet on something, and yeah, maybe it’ll work out, maybe it doesn’t. But that’s part of life. Like, we’re all betting all the time.
Maria Ross 17:04
Yep.
Scott Stirrett 17:04
And not all bets are going to pay off. But what’s important is that you bet, because no bets means no rewards. And and again, it’s important to emphasize that it’s important to do that judiciously within the context of your socioeconomic kind of environment. So, people can take more risks because they have access to more resources.
Maria Ross 17:22
Exactly.
Scott Stirrett 17:23
But everyone needs to think about constantly making bets in life.
Maria Ross 17:28
Yeah. Okay. What’s pillar four?
Scott Stirrett 17:30
Pillar four of The Uncertainty Advantage is the importance of generalist skills, which are the ability are the kinds of skills that are needed across a wide range of domains. So, that can include communications, teamwork, the conflict management, all of these skills are important whether you work in the government or you work in the private sector or you work in a startup or a big corporation. And it’s really important for everyone to develop these skills, especially where a lot of technical skills are at greater risk of automation because of artificial intelligence. And in a world that is really uncertain, my core thesis is that technical skills in aggregate are going to become less important. And it is going to be more important for people to develop skills that are harder to automate and that you can apply across a wide range of domains.
Maria Ross 18:22
Yeah, we talk about that a lot on the show in terms of my viewpoint is AI is fantastic, but it also gives leaders who don’t have those kinds of skills no place to hide, because they can’t hide behind the work anymore. They can’t hide behind the tasks. They actually are going to have to motivate people and uplevel people and support people. And there’s a I’ve mentioned it a few times, but I’ll put it again in the show notes here. There’s a study by MIT that came out last year that talks about the five skill human skills required to augment AI that AI currently can’t replicate. And many of those skills are the skills that you’re talking about now. So I’ll put a link to that study for folks in the show notes again.
Scott Stirrett 19:00
Yeah, it’s really important for people to think about it. How do you build the skills, the portfolio of skills and talents that can help you withstand a lot of uncertainty that’s going to come if you invest all of your skills or you focus on fostering skills that are really highly technical and you go all in on those, and then all of a sudden AI makes those skills redundant, then you’re putting yourself at a disadvantage.
Maria Ross 19:26
For sure.
Scott Stirrett 19:26
So the more you invest in generalist skills, I think the more that you’re going to be able to thrive in a world where AI is likely going to have more and more influence.
Maria Ross 19:35
Would you kind of put that under the banner of emotional intelligence skills?
Scott Stirrett 19:39
Yeah, totally. I think
Maria Ross 19:39
When you call them general skills, yeah.
Scott Stirrett 19:41
I think general skills are at the core like socio-emotional skills, empathy being one of them.
Maria Ross 19:46
Got it. Okay, so that’s four. What is five?
Scott Stirrett 19:51
The fifth pillar of the uncertainty advantage is the importance of an entrepreneurial mindset. And to be entrepreneurial is to identify and act upon opportunities to create value for others. And the core point is that in a world that is moving really quickly, there are more opportunities emerging than ever before, which means that it’s more important than ever to be really great at identifying opportunities and even more importantly on acting on them. And that being entrepreneurial isn’t just for like startup founders, it’s for everyone, that we all need to work on fostering our entrepreneurial mindset. And the way you do that is through running a series of of experiments, of launching side hustles, of testing out different ideas. It’s easier today in many ways to run experiments than ever before because of AI. And if you’re entrepreneurial, I encourage you to think about an idea and go run with it in the next like couple weeks, test it out. Maybe it works, maybe it doesn’t. But the core point is that even if it doesn’t work out, that you’re building your entrepreneurial mindset.
Maria Ross 20:54
Mm-hmm. What say to someone who might push against that? Of like, I’m the person that likes to just do steady work and be good to my colleagues, and I don’t necessarily want to experiment.
Scott Stirrett 21:06
I’d say to that person that there’s a risk in not taking risks, that I think AI is potentially going to push the world more into a place where there’s fewer employees and there’s more people that are freelancers or contract employees or self-employed, and that even for people who are employed in in big organizations, there’ll be more of a mindset that by employers that everyone has to be entrepreneurial all the time. This business as usual, just doing the same thing over and over again, isn’t going to cut it. So I would say to that person that it’s important to not get left behind and invest in entrepreneurial skills.
Maria Ross 21:43
It’s funny because I was at—I can’t even remember what it was, an online panel or an online gathering of leaders, and one of the leaders was saying, With AI, I no longer will— and they said it nicer than this, but sort of, It will no longer be acceptable for someone to come into my office complaining about something unless they have a prototype, unless they have some way that they think they possibly could solve it, because they have the capabilities and they have the tools now to be able to do that. So if you think the way something is done is not efficient or effective, great. Let’s talk about it, but try to run some sort of experiment. Try to run some sort of prototype for me of what would work before we have that conversation. And I thought that was really interesting.
Scott Stirrett 22:32
Totally. Yeah, I think it’s one of the most important things of someone with an entrepreneurial mindset is the ability to not just like identify a problem, but like act on it. There’s a section in the book where I talk about the different levels of helpfulness in an employee, and the most helpful employee, is they identify a problem, they think about a solution, they solve it, and then they like go to their boss and say, I found this problem and I fixed it. Right. And the least effective employees, or some of the least effective, are those who just identify problems and dump them on their boss. And then their boss is just more stressed out because they have a bunch more problems to solve.
Maria Ross 23:08
for sure Well, and I think that also includes, you know, I don’t want to scare people of like, But I work better in a group, right? That also includes being the person to pull a group together to help solve the problem collaboratively. It doesn’t mean you have to do it on your own in your office, on your computer, trying to prototype something. It also means having the initiative to say, Hey, there’s a problem identified. Who else here is interested in trying to find a solution on this? Let’s put our heads together. Let’s get together on this, and then let’s go to our boss with a proposed solution. So it doesn’t mean you have to be a lone wolf, but you know you could be the one that’s initiating the collective and saying, Let me find the people who care about this as much as I do. And we I might not have all the answers—that’s where empathy comes in. Other people might have different perspectives and viewpoints—but I’m I want to take the initiative to bring those people together.
Scott Stirrett 24:00
Totally. Yeah, a big part of being entrepreneurial is not just taking action by yourself, but working with other people.
Maria Ross 24:06
Exactly.
Scott Stirrett 24:07
And most entrepreneurial ventures that create a lot of impact end up involving hundreds or thousands of other people, so your ability to work with other people, to be an empathetic leader, to be somebody who can motivate other people, is a core part of being entrepreneurial.
Maria Ross 24:20
For sure. Okay, and what’s the sixth magic pillar?
Scott Stirrett 24:24
The sixth pillar of The Uncertainty Advantage is the importance of network building. And that in a world that is moving really quickly and where there’s a lot of new opportunities, it’s more important than ever for people to foster a network that is really resilient. And some of the advice I talk about in the book is the importance of building a network that is both wide and deep. What I mean by that is build a network that’s deep in the sense that people who you know really well, people you can go to for advice, mentors, people who provide socio-emotional support. And in the book, I talk about a report from MIT about the importance of a personal advisory board that you create for yourself, which isn’t a formal board, but it’s a kind of group of people who give you advice. But also, it’s really important to think about weak ties and how do you foster some kind of relationship with like thousands of different people on a regular basis. And a lot of jobs come through weak ties rather than deep ties. So it’s important to emphasize that your weak ties in some in some ways can be more important. But in terms of your resilience, your anti-fragility, your ability to bounce back from setbacks, deep ties are really, really critical. So sometimes in the career development advice people emphasize deep ties over weak ties, or vice versa. What I really emphasize in the book is that both are really important for different reasons.
Maria Ross 25:43
Obviously, yeah, that’s great. And, you know, in my five pillars of being an effective and empathetic leader, the first two are self-awareness and self-care, and part of the tactics I offer to leaders for self-awareness is is build that community, build that peer support group, that personal board of directors. Everybody needs a sanity check. Everybody needs sort of these people that will not only be there to support them, but also call them out and hold them accountable on goals they’re setting or behaviors they’re trying to change or whatever it is. So I love that this is also a resilience-building strategy. And this is also my entire as to why empathy has been identified as the number one skill for leaders in the 21st century. It’s because our, to your point, our problems are too complex. They’re coming at us too rapidly. There’s not going to be one lone savior hero. Like we need to be able to create networks and connections and collaboratives and connect with people quickly in order to creatively solve problems. And I go back to the thing, the leaders that have been skating by without wanting to build those skills are going to be exposed in this current environment. And so for anyone kind of early in their career listening to this, it’s important to work on that skill. But I would also submit anyone who’s not good at this right now, it’s not too late. We can intentionally, like you said earlier, learn those skills and build that muscle. Why do you think that uncertainty is actually a competitive edge when leaders and people can approach it with the right frameworks?
Scott Stirrett 27:21
I think it can be a competitive edge for a few reasons. I think the first is because a lot of people don’t like uncertainty, and learning to embrace it is something that differentiates yourself from most people. I’ve done a lot of talks over the last six or seven months about uncertainty within-person groups, and I’ve had maybe 700 people fill out this short survey that I have where it’s like, you know, 12 questions and it gives you a score of how comfortable you are with uncertainty. And I’d say that there tends to be like maybe in average like four people who dislike uncertainty for every one person who loves uncertainty. And it’s because our brains are like hardwired to fear the unknown. And it’s partially because of it’s how we survived. Often the unknown would result in death when we were like cave people. And as a result, when we think of unknown situations, our brains almost always for most people go to the worst possible outcome as a way to keep ourselves safe. Now, in the real world, that’s not necessarily always a or often a helpful way to go to.
Maria Ross 28:36
Right.
Scott Stirrett 28:36
And learning to really develop a positive relationship with the unknown, is I think a huge differentiator between you and and and other people. And then I think second is that learning to develop a better relationship with uncertainty helps you with so many different things like risk taking, your just mental health, your relationships with other people. Sometimes psychologists or trainers talk about meta skills that are that are really important, and I think that, you know, empathy is a good example, I think, of a kind of meta skill that is really important, but so is I think comfort with uncertainty. It helps you be more empathetic. In some ways, I think that learning to embrace the unknown is one of the most like important meta skills you can have because it helps you with so many things. There’s one study I read where one of the authors said that like your comfort level with uncertainty is one of the greatest like predictive factors on whether you develop like a mental health challenge later in life or or not. And I think most people, if you were to ask them what is like the greatest impact on your mental health, a lot of people wouldn’t necessarily appreciate that your relationship with the unknown is is really really critical for your overall well-being.
Maria Ross 29:47
Right, right. Well, and I think, you know, there’s I mean, among the many lessons that the pandemic and the lockdown taught us, is that we can’t always know. We don’t always know, and everything from we don’t know when we’re going going to go back to work or back to school, to we don’t know if we’re going to find a vaccine for this horrible disease, we don’t know, you know, and science even, you know, with what what they learn and what they know, it was being able to say we don’t know what’s going to be next, but we’re going to keep experimenting, we’re going to keep seeing what’s out there. And that’s why, you know, through the course of the pandemic, some of the guidance changed, because they were like, okay, we need to be open to the fact that what we thought was going to work here doesn’t, we need to change the guidelines, we need to change some preventative measures. And that’s all okay. It doesn’t mean somebody was right or wrong. It’s just the evolution of being comfortable with the unknown and saying, we’re still going to forge ahead and try to find the right answers, we’re still going to forge ahead and try to find a way to manage this for people. So so many folks that, you know, were working or going to school during that time really had to learn to be, you know, that was always the phrase of like get get comfortable with the uncomfortable, how many times do people say unprecedented times, right? And I I don’t know that that I think for a long time we’ve been living under a lovely little facade that things are stable, even though again we had these great sayings like the only constant is change, I don’t know that it really was driven home as clearly as it was during the pandemic, and then now the times we’re in in terms of the market and technology and the workplace, like this is where the humility comes in, the humility of empathy of let me learn from other people’s points of view and let me learn from other perspectives, because that’s how we find the way forward through change.
Scott Stirrett 31:44
Totally, and I think especially in the the North American context, I was born 1991, grew up in the 1990s, a time of in some ways record like peace, stability, and even, you know, there’s the famous Francis Fukuyama essay about the end of history, and, you know, are we entering this this period of kind of almost utopia?
Maria Ross 32:04
Yeah.
Scott Stirrett 32:04
And, you know, I think what for people who grew up in the 80s and 90s, I think one of the reasons why like this moment right now is I think so challenging for a lot of people is that the world as people thought it exists is different, and the reality of human history is always wars and instability and pandemics, and the world is a fragile place that is at the core extremely uncertain. Mhm. And I think in some ways, speaking for my contemporaries and a lot of other people born in the 80s and 90s, I think that for many, people need to do the work to kind of recognize that perhaps for many, the world is different than what they thought it was.
Maria Ross 32:46
Exactly. It hasn’t necessarily gotten that it there’s more change and more chaos. I think there’s just more transparency now. You know, like where where we’ve got social media, we’ve got a 24/7 news cycle, we’ve got, you know, market tickers across the channels that we watch that are giving us second-by-second, minute-by-minute updates on stock prices changing, right? We didn’t have that kind of ongoing monitoring of the change that was going on in the world, and also for many of us, we didn’t have the the proximity or the visibility. So we only were living in our own little bubble, in our own little neighborhood, and not knowing what was going on in all these other areas of the world, and now we see it, and and our brains are interpreting it as, Wow, there’s so much more going on now than there used to be. It’s like, Well, really? I don’t know. Maybe it always was that way, we just didn’t know.
Scott Stirrett 33:38
Yeah, and I think there’s both more awareness of the uncertainty, but I also think that in many measures, the world is more uncertain today than it was 20 years ago. There is a world index called the Uncertainty Index that tracks the level of uncertainty in the world, and in according to that index, the world today is around five times more uncertain than it was at the beginning of 2008. So, there’s so many things that are driving like higher levels of of uncertainty across the world, and in some ways, I think that the level of uncertainty is just going to accelerate.
Maria Ross 34:10
Yeah.
Scott Stirrett 34:10
And all to say is that coping with really high levels of uncertainty is hard for hard and challenging for most people because the way our brains are are hardwired, which is why learning to develop a better relationship with the unknown is critical, because, again, we don’t choose what era we live in. We live in an era of rapid change. Learning to develop a positive relationship with uncertainty is one of the most important things that you can do, perhaps at any moment in human history, but right now, it is especially important. I think those who fear the unknown are really going to have a lot of issues in a world that is going to be even more uncertain.
Maria Ross 34:52
Yes. Well, that’s a great place to leave it, so, Scott, thank you so much. This has been such a interesting conversation. Definitely want folks to check out the book, The Uncertainty Advantage. We’ll put links to it in the show notes, as well as all the links to stay in contact with you and your work. But for anyone who’s working out right now while they’re listening to us, can you share where’s the best place for them to find out more about you and your book and your work?
Scott Stirrett 35:17
Yeah, to find out more about me, I recommend you check me out on first Substack, where I send out a newsletter once a month on how to develop a better relationship with uncertainty. And secondly, I recommend you check out my book on Amazon.com, where you can order it as a hard copy or Kindle.
Maria Ross 35:35
Wonderful. And your website is scottsturrett S T I R R E T T .com. But again, we’ll have all your links in the show notes so folks can get in touch with you. Scott, thank you so much for your time.
Scott Stirrett 35:47
Thanks for having me on.
Maria Ross 35:48
And thank you, everyone, for listening to another episode of The Empathy Edge podcast. If you like what you heard, you know what to do. Please rate, review, and share it with a friend or a colleague. And until next time, please remember that cash flow, creativity, and compassion are not mutually exclusive. Take care and be kind. For more on how to achieve radical success through empathy, visit theempathyedge.com. There, you can listen to past episodes, access show notes and free resources, book me for a keynote or workshop, and sign up for our email list to get new episodes, insights, news, and events. Please follow me on Instagram @redslicemaria. Never forget, empathy is your superpower. Use it to make your work and the world a better place.
