#624 Flexible Leadership: Thrive in Uncertainty with Kevin Eikenberry

Are your leadership tools still working in today’s unpredictable world—or are they holding you back?

In this powerful episode of Talking with the Experts, we’re joined by Kevin Eikenberry, one of the world’s leading authorities on leadership and author of the new book Flexible Leadership: Navigate Uncertainty and Lead with Confidence.

As leaders, we’re taught to stick to tried-and-true methods. But what happens when those methods no longer apply? Kevin reveals why flexibility—not rigidity—is the new superpower for effective leadership. Drawing on three decades of experience, he shares practical strategies to help you:

• Adapt without losing your core values
• Make confident decisions even amidst chaos
• Distinguish between what has truly changed and what hasn’t

This episode is especially valuable for business owners, managers, team leads, and remote professionals who feel overwhelmed by constant change and unpredictability. Kevin’s approach isn’t about abandoning what works—it’s about refining your leadership toolkit for the modern era.

From leading remote teams to fostering resilience in the face of disruption, this conversation is packed with game-changing ideas that will transform how you lead. You’ll also hear Kevin’s thoughts on building a culture of trust, sustaining team engagement, and what it truly means to lead with clarity and confidence in the 21st century.

👉 Ready to lead with purpose and power—no matter what the world throws at you? Tune in now.

🔗 CONNECT WITH KEVIN

Blog: https://kevineikenberry.com/blog/

Podcast: https://RemarkablePodcast.com

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kevineikenberry/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kevineikenberryfanpage/

Instagram: http://instagram.com/kevineikenberry

Website: https://kevineikenberry.com

📌 PROMOTION: https://kevineikenberry.com/flexible-leadership/

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Transcript

Intro | 00:01
Welcome to Talking With The Experts. Here we discuss all things business. By business owners. For business owners. Here is your host, Rose Davidson. 

 Rose | 00:12
Welcome to Talking With The Experts. I'm your host, Rose Davidson from rosedavidson.com.au. My very great pleasure to introduce you to the podcast, Kevin Eikenberry, who's going to be discussing a little bit about his book, Flexible Leadership, Navigate Uncertainty and Lead with Confidence. Flexible Leadership, by Kevin Eikenberry offers a fresh perspective on leadership in today's unpredictable world. And we'll get into all the nitty gritty about that as we go on. Kevin is the Chief Potential Officer of the Kevin Eikenberry Group, a leadership and learning company based in Indianapolis in Indiana. With a team across the United States. He has spent over 30 years helping organizations and leaders to from at least 53 countries become more effective. Global Gurus has listed him on the list of most influential thinkers on leadership for the past four years. And you can find him on his blog at kevineikenberry.com forward Slack blog. And he has a podcast called remarkablepodcast.com. Kevin. I'm not going to espouse any more of your virtues today, but welcome to Talking With The Experts. 

 Kevin | 01:30
Well, thank you. I'm glad to be here. And you already said more than you need to do. 
 I mean, I'm glad that you read that introduction that my mother wrote, I suppose. So listen, I'm super glad to be with you. And if anything that introduction shows, it should show that we're in the business of helping leaders grow, develop and be more effective. And that's what I'm hoping we can do today. 

 Rose | 01:52
Absolutely. Now, flexible leadership is so important in any business, in any corporate life, in any entrepreneur's life. How can we adopt a flexible leadership style? 

 Kevin | 02:07
Well, the first thing is to recognize that even though most everyone would agree with what you just said, we ought to be flexible. Yet most of us really don't. Art. Ultimately, when we think about what we're talking about here in terms of flexible leadership, because we get tied up into two things. Problems, Rose. Problem number one is we say, but aren't we supposed to be consistent? And how can I be consistent and flexible? More on that in a second. And the other thing, what happens is we end up, most all of the time doing what comes natural, what, is our habit. What we think is supposed to be our approach or style. And if we've identified that as our identity, it makes it extremely hard to actually flex, even though we like the idea intellectually of flexing. 
 So flexing. That's why we don't, even though... We would all like to think that we should. And again, my experience is most people agree with your opening statement. We ought to be more flexible. Problem is, we're really not. What we're trying to do is help people see away past that and understand what it actually means, what they can actually do.

 
 Rose | 03:19
Yeah, but, you know, being flexible is a part of life, I would have thought. I mean, in business, it can be a challenge to be flexible because, you know, we want that consistency and we want the same all the time. But sometimes things happen and flexibility. Is important and it helps leaders to navigate uncertainty, does it not? 

 Kevin | 03:41
Let's talk about two things. Number one, we can talk about flexibility at the big picture. 
 Like, okay, we have to, most organizations will eventually, sometimes later than they should, flex their strategies and those sorts of things. And we could talk about, flexibility at that level, but that's not really what I'm talking about. I'm talking about that. The decisions that I make, the way I interact with my team, the way I lead my meetings, the way I have my one-on-ones, the way I do my coaching every day down the road, and the situations and context in which we are leading in those moments isn't always the same, and yet it's in those moments that matter the most that often we're not. Actually flexing. We're just operating on autopilot. 

 Rose | 04:23
Interesting concept. I don't know. I suppose I've worked for organizations that aren't very flexible, I must say. You know, as a temporary hire, I'd go in and I could see... Things that could have been done better. And, you know, shortcuts to, and not make the work less important, but allowing for more efficiency. But the higher ups, managers and the leaders of the organisation didn't see it that way. We know we've done it this way since time immemorial. 
 So, you know, why should I take on somebody who has only been here five seconds and you know, allow them to put some sort of, you know, point of view across and challenge the way we've always done things. 

 Kevin | 05:19
Yeah. So the status quo is a powerful thing, right? And it's one of the things that keeps us from actually flexing, adapting, shifting. And so again, like, Most everyone would agree. And so go back to your point about in a world of uncertainty and complexity. 
 So let me just ask everyone who's watching or listening this question. Are you leading the same way you were five years ago? Because if you are. In a world that's changed and is changing a lot, Do you think that all of those changes are moving the world to more accurately reflect the way you lead? I would say probably not. Not a bet I would take. And so if we're leading the way we were five years ago, the odds are strongly in favor of the fact that you're leading less effectively. Than you were five years ago. That doesn't mean that everything about leadership is changing because it's not. But the things that are changing, the nuances, the differences, the tweaks, that matters a lot. And so people get locked into, well, I either have to be consistent or I have to be flexible. And the reality is we can be both of those things and we need to be both of those things. 

 Rose | 06:32
I agree. I think so. Case in point was the story I just related. They weren't adaptable. They weren't open to change. They weren't open to suggestions and how things could be done better. And they were just doing the same old that they'd done for decades. Forever. But and I do agree that businesses and business owners have to be consistent in their approach. But, you know, they have to be adaptable to change as well because the landscape of business is changing with AI and all these other new things coming into the marketplace. 
 You know, so why don't they use this adaptability? Why don't they use it and become more flexible and maintain that balance? 

 Kevin | 07:18
Because habit. Is a very powerful thing. 
 That's why, right? Like it's very easy for us to intellectually say, yep, we got to flex. And yet in the moment. We operate based on our habits. Or we operate even more powerfully. We operate based on what our we see as our identity. 
 So if as an organization, if we see ourselves as being X, it's very hard for us to move away from being X, whatever X might be. For us as individual leaders, if we've taken a Myers-Briggs or a disk assessment or some sort of strengths tool and we have then adopted that set of style tendencies as our identity, it becomes extraordinarily hard for us to move beyond those things. We can say that we think outside the box, we want to move. And like, I know that is what our goal might be. And yet in real time, in the real moment, it becomes very difficult for us to do. And so what we're trying to do is help people say, Yeah, that is our reality. And here's how we start to move past it. And one of the things is to just simply recognize. That the world isn't as simple. As a decision about what my style is, right? The world is far more complex than that. The world of work is far more complex than that. And so if we can start to help people see the world as both and rather than either or, I'm either this or I'm that. That's the first step. Once people buy into that idea. When they have the mindset that says, hey, there's more than one really effective way to do it. And Not just that, but I'm capable of doing it more than one way. Well. Then that person has the step, the first step. Towards being a flexible leader. I think everyone has done it. We just don't do it nearly often. 

 Rose | 09:11
Yeah, I guess that's true because work has moved from in office to remote or hybrid work settings now. And both sides of the spectrum, the leader, the manager and the employees or team members have to be flexible in how they do their day-to-day duties. Yes. 

 Kevin | 09:34
Well, and you know, a lot of organizations and I can't speak as a authoritatively about that in Australia as I can in the US. But. A lot of organizations have tried to say, this is the way we're going to do it. And what they're finding, even if they've edicted that we're going to go back in the office three days a week, that's not necessarily what's actually happening. All of the research that I'm reading is saying that office space, even in those spaces where people said they're coming back, they're not necessarily coming back. 
 So why is that? Well, There's lots of reasons, but one of the reasons is that leaders, senior leaders making those decisions are trying to act as if the world is the way it used to be, which was that situations were pretty clear. 
 Cause and effect was pretty obvious, but we clearly live in a world now where there are many more unknowns and we don't even know what all of the interactions are going to be. World is far more interconnected. And so simply stating a new policy. In a world that's complex like that, won't work as well. And that's what everyone is finding, that policy that they say, well, this is how it's going to be, isn't working because the world isn't like it used to be. It's not as clear. It's not as obvious. It's not as clear of cause and effect. And so. There's been lots of frustration for leaders around, hey, we've set a new policy. It's not really working. There's a lot of frustration for employees because we feel like we're not being heard. And the right answer is somewhere in between. And we're only going to get there if leaders are willing to have a real conversation with their folks about the work, the needs, the challenges, the issues, all of that. Put together, not simply making the decision that I'm comfortable with, that I'm used to, that I've made 50 times before, which is the antithesis of being flexible. 

 Rose | 11:30
Absolutely. Now, we need to, I guess, discuss amongst these other things about consistency and adaptability, some practical strategies for leading in uncertain times, because, you know, In 2020, we were all locked down. It was certainly an uncertain time for, you know, a couple of years and we moved back into more certainty. That isn't guaranteed. 
 You know, certainty is not a guaranteed thing in the workplace or in jobs. In the world basically, but you know, how can we, lead in terms of Arms of uncertainty. 

 Kevin | 12:05
When things are uncertain, Rose, I think the first thing that leaders need to realize is they don't have all the answers. And in fact, not even the team collectively might have all the answers. But when we look at it collectively, we have more of the answers or we may be able to identify more of the. Questions. And so I think the number one thing we need to do if we believe that the world is more uncertain or complex is to engage our team more to get a broader. Range of perspectives on what we see, what we don't see, and what we might choose to do next. The time of the leader needing to be, and being able to be all knowing, has passed. I'm not sure it was ever really true, but in a world that was clearer and less complex and less uncertain, it was more likely possible that a leader could have a lot more of the data and experience that would lead to better decisions. That's less true now than it was. 

 Rose | 13:13
But a good leader... It allows their team to make decisions and, you know, and use that word flexible and be flexible enough to you know take up the suggestions that are made by the team members. 
 So why aren't leaders doing that? I mean, even now, leaders aren't doing that. And I don't understand why not. 
 I mean, the world is changing. Been changing for so long, they must have picked up on the clues by now. 

 Kevin | 13:45
Well, sometimes. And again, there's the knowing it and being able to do it, which are two very different things, right? 
 Like very few people that I interact with as leaders would say, I am a command and control leader and proud of it. And you're not. And yet, many of them in action. Are still doing that, right? 
 So what we've got is... An ongoing long-term transition from a time when things were clearer and more straightforward when... 
 Someone being in more of a command and control work, approach. Had a better chance of working. I would say it was never... Probably the most effective way, but for a long time, it was a pretty effective way. It worked pretty well. In the world today, it doesn't work as well. And what you're saying is, why don't people see it? And chances are, most everyone that's watching or listening to us does see it. That's probably why they watch or listen to you, Rose. 
 So if that's where you are as a listener. I would say grant others some grace. Right. If you are kind of listening to this and kind of saying, wait a minute, the way I'm doing it is just fine. Maybe you need to listen a little closer. Maybe you need to listen again. But if you are a person that feels like, hey, I think I've moved. Beyond that. Grant people some grace. Why? Because they learned it from someone else that worked for that person and it probably worked for them for a while. And sometimes people just aren't aware there's another way. If all I've ever seen is one way of doing something, whatever it is. Then I don't even have in my, field of reference, the fact that I could truly do it another way. And so if you're a leader of leaders and you've got some folks that you lead that really are sort of in that, not taking the opinions of others, making all the decisions, then start to help them see another way. And be patient and gracious with them as they try to make what is probably a really challenging transition. And yet the good news is that most everyone up here intellectually, Gets that. The challenge is to help them turn that from idea to action. 

 Rose | 16:05
And that can be the challenge, can't it? I mean, if you can't, sometimes people just don't see the wood for the trees. And they just keep doing the same sign. And don't, realize that it just doesn't work anymore. 

 Kevin | 16:20
Exactly. Exactly right. 

 Rose | 16:22
Kevin, tell me a little bit about your book and where people can find it and show me again. I'd love to say that. 

 Kevin | 16:28
- We've been talking. Obviously about some of the ideas in it. It's called Flexible Leadership, Navigate Uncertainty and Lead with Confidence. You can find it wherever you, wherever fine books are sold, you might say. But you can go to kevineikenberry.com Slack flexible leadership. And when you go to KevinEigenberry.com/flexible, see a bunch of links where you can buy the book. More importantly, you can get a sample chapter And I hope you'll go and do that and give you a sense a little bit more, a little deeper dive and give you a context of where the book heads. And if you found this conversation useful, I think you'll find the book very useful. 

 Rose | 17:03
Wonderful. Thank you for making my job so much easier. 

 Kevin | 17:08
- No. My pleasure. I don't know what I did, but I'll say you're welcome. 

 Rose | 17:12
You can find Kevin on LinkedIn at Kevin Eikenberry on Facebook too. The Kevin Eikenberry fan page and Instagram. His website is kevineikenberry.com. And of course, we've just talked about the book. Kevin, it's been an absolute pleasure. Lovely advice to our listeners today. What would you, what would that, advice be. 

 Kevin | 17:37
Here's what I would leave you with, everybody, as a leader, and always remember that it's not about you. That leadership is about reaching valuable outcomes with and through others, and it's not about us. All of what we've talked about today is about what we can do differently. And that's all really important. But all of that is in service of outcomes and others. 

 Rose | 17:56
Wonderful. Love it. Thank you so much for joining me today. 

 Kevin | 18:00
My pleasure. Thanks. 

 Rose | 18:01
Bye-bye. 

 Outro | 18:03
You've been listening to Talking With The Experts, hosted by Rose Davidson. Make sure you have a look at our back catalogue over at talkingwiththeexperts.com. And be sure to subscribe to our podcast so you don't miss out on any episode. We look forward to your company next time.