Welcome

Todd 0:00

This is the clutter clippers for midlife. As an adult, do you feel as if life keeps getting more chaotic and out of control? Do you look back on your younger self and just think, eh, what happened to me? I'm so confident and sure of myself back then. Every stuff's slack. It's not just you. It's very common as an adult to feel a sense of angst when we're facing uncertainty. Our guest today is Dr. John Austin. He's Dean of the Honors College and the P. D. Merrill Endowed Chair of Business at the University of New England. He's a researcher, an educator, and executive development leader. He spent more than two decades teaching professionals how to lead and how to make decisions in uncertain environments. He's convinced that each of us has the capability to thrive in a chaotic world, and he develops techniques to help people build the confidence they need to do so. He's also the author of the book Certain About Uncertainty. He lives on Peaks Island, Maine, with his family and his rescue dog Lucy. John, welcome to the show. Thank you so much, Todd. I'm happy to be here. Yeah, so glad to have you because I've read about what you're doing and it just speaks to right where I'm living. When I'm faced with uncertainty, it just, yeah, I struggle with it. So glad to have you. So thankful for that.

John Austin 1:34

Absolutely. You know, and you're not alone. I mean, that's the thing. All of us really struggle with this. And I think the thing about it is that we all think we're the only one who's struggling with it.

John’s Research and Work

Todd 1:45

Yeah. And it's good to hear that others are dealing with the same issues. And so today we get to throw some science into the mix. So uh glad that you're able to talk to us. And uh, I'm sure our listeners are going to enjoy this. But let's dig into your research and your work. So, to set the table, how do you define the word uncertainty?

John Austin 2:06

Great question. And it's a question that people have been talking about for uh well over a hundred years. And the way I define it is well, let's just say what it isn't. So uncertainty is not the same as risk. And I think this is one of the places that we really get into some trouble here. So risk is when you don't know what will happen, but you can kind of figure out the odds of it. There's data there with that. Uncertainty is when you can't even define the odds. So you can sort of think of it as if the rules of the game themselves are not really clear. In the book, I like to use the metaphor of the fog, which I mean, it's not a lot of people talk about fog and uncertainty together, right? Uh, and there's a reason for that. When you think about fog, fog doesn't mean danger, it means you can't see as far as you would like to see. So you have a choice there on whether you're afraid of it or whether you act and whether you move forward with it. But the fog itself is not danger. And that's a key thing to think about because if we're thinking about risk, actually, risk is a danger, right? Uncertainty, it's a little different.

Todd 3:20

Yeah, I didn't think about that. Uncertainty. So thanks for zeroing in on that for us. Now, how did you decide to research uncertainty? And how do you do that?

John Austin 3:29

Well, so there's a couple of reasons for this. When I think about this, the main one is that over the last two decades, uh, I have worked with executives, I've worked with a lot of different organizations, I've worked with graduate students, undergraduates, and I no matter whether I'm talking to someone who is 20 years old, someone who has been in the industry that they're working in for 30 years, I keep seeing the same pattern. And that is that smart, accomplished people, they're just paralyzed by ambiguity. And I realized that we don't talk about this a lot. And maybe there was a framework out there that I could help to sort of pull people into this. So that was the first thing is I kept finding myself trying to help people develop their leadership, help people become more effective in organizations. And we weren't talking about this central thing. So that was that's probably the main thing. Then there's something else which has always stuck with me, which really got me started on thinking about the research here. So when I was 21 years old, I was a lifeguard. Uh, I was a lifeguard at an ocean beach, and I watched an 18-year-old uh minimally trained lifeguard calmly execute an absolute perfect rescue. It was about 10-foot surf, and it was um it it was pretty rough on our beach. Uh and he had no real great training. This was his first job, no experience in that situation, yet he acted with total confidence and he he just did it brilliantly. And I often kind of reflected back on that as I was going through my career and just and initially I thought, wow, isn't it amazing? Some people just seem to be born with this, they seem to have this ability. And as I worked with more and more people, I started to realize that's not really the case because I think people develop this. And so that's the question I started to ask. Why do some people thrive? And what is it that they have as skills that prevent them from freezing in that moment? Yeah, so that's that's kind of the the something that's the story that I think keeps coming back to me as I think about this.

Todd 5:47

Side note when I was in the military, I was stationed up in Washington, DC, and uh something bad happened during one of our ceremonial events. It happened in front of everyone. And after the fact, the colonel came up and talked to me about it, and he said, Were you scared? And I'm like, I was petrified. So but somehow I just uh okay. Inside I'm falling apart, but I was able to do that. But yeah, uncertainty. That was I was very scared.

John Austin 6:15

Well, you know, and the other thing about that is and I I had a similar water rescue during this time as well. And um you are not thinking about these things in that moment, you're just reacting, you're just acting, right? Uh, and that's part of what what we figure out how to do here. Um, but there's uh we feel panicked, but sometimes we're still doing a good job of acting in in that moment with that. Right. Yeah, yeah.

Todd 6:44

Yeah. Looking like a duck swimming on the surface, yeah, right, eating like crazy.

John Austin 6:48

And and this this lifeguard, he was terrified. He talked about that. Uh, and uh, but he looked great. And in fact, he was he was a local uh a local person. Uh I was not from the area, so it was great. We got to put him in front of all the local media and he got to be on local TV and in the newspaper for you know this rescue he did.

The Surprises from John’s Research

Todd 7:09

Yeah. Yeah. Training helps with uh dealing with that. So yeah, that's great. Now, what are some of the surprising things that came out of your research?

John Austin 7:18

You know, I think the biggest surprise for me is that ambiguity aversion is something that it's not innate. Uh, it's not something that we're born with. And one of the cooler research that I came across is research that shows that eight to nine-year-olds, they don't just don't exhibit aversion to ambiguity. But if you study later adolescence, uh young adults, you start to see that pretty much everyone has this aversion to ambiguity. And so that to me was really kind of a surprise. And it got me thinking, what's the difference? What happens in those years, right? Uh, and uh I think the other thing is that surprise itself is actually a very important trigger for us. So surprise events actually rewrite our brains in ways that are essential to learning. So if you think about that, we spend all of our time trying to remove surprise from our lives in many ways as adults, and organizations that are designed to eliminate surprise. And yet, surprise seems to be really important for us to be able to learn and create memory. So those two things I think are kind of the the my big aha's.

Todd 8:40

Right. I don't like uncertainty, I don't like surprises, but then after things happen, I look back on them and it's like, oh, okay, cool. Well, I I learned from that. So Right, right. I just I still don't I still don't want it though.

John Austin 8:53

No, in that moment, it's it's like how how did I not see this coming? And there's this there's there's a fear that can come up, right? Yeah.

Todd 9:00

Yeah. Now, where do we waste effort when we're facing uncertainty?

John Austin 9:05

That's a that's a great question. I think the um the thing that I often say to people is that there's a moment where you have to stop trying to gather data to get out of the uncertainty. Uh so I think we waste a lot of time trying to find the data that will make us certain. In genuinely uncertain situations, more data doesn't usually create clarity because the problem isn't really insufficient information, right? If there's something the rules have changed here. So you're trying to solve uncertainty with a tool of certainty, if that makes sense.

Todd 9:44

Yeah.

John Austin 9:45

Uh and I'm not saying don't go out there and try to find it and look for that data, but at a certain point, you say, okay, it's it's not there, and I need to act on what I know here. So I think that's probably the biggest time waste with that. And then the other one is probably the if I just work harder, I'll be able to get out of this. And what work harder usually means is do the thing you've always done, but just do more of it, right? So psychologists kind of call this the threat rigidity effect, where when we're under threat, we narrow and focus more in a specific area, right? So you grip tighter on something when you're in that fog, you hold on to the steering wheel tighter, right? Uh, but uh the if the environment is shifting, we actually might have to be looking more broadly uh and looking for some of those things.

Todd 10:40

We'll talk more about it as we go, but is it more of a take a step back and just pause type thing?

John Austin 10:45

And there is uh there is that. So in in these moments, there is there are cues out there, but those cues might be overshadowed by all of the details we filled in from our past experiences, right? So we think we see something and now it's it's not playing out that way, but we keep trying to kind of plug something in. So if you think about instead pausing, looking at what is unexpected. So actually asking yourself, I shouldn't say asking yourself, training yourself when something surprises you to, like you said, pause and then also start looking around for the thing that seems out of place. And now that gives you something to focus on, but it's a it's a problem to focus on, it's a puzzle, right? And that's that sort of gets us going. But now the puzzle is around paying attention to what we're what's right in front of us, as opposed to you know this automatic processing that we might have done there. Right. You know, and and you and think about this, it's it's not just pausing because there's an emotional side to that moment, right? You're you're you're probably a little threatened in that moment. So I would say also breathe.

Why Uncertainty is Harder on Adults

Todd 12:06

Just pause, breathe. I like it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. All right, so that's laying the foundation. Let's let's talk about how uncertainty impacts us as adults. So now you've said that kids don't struggle with uncertainty the way adults do. Why is that?

John Austin 12:22

So it's interesting. So where this came from, maybe let me just explain the the study that first got me really aware of this. And that is there was a study that was um published in 2015. It's it's referenced in my book in the first couple chapters. And in it, children and adults were given options between a choice that has known odds and a choice that has unknown odds. And this is a type of decision choice that's been around for 50 years. Uh, and it's a way that we assess this idea of whether or not we have a preference for certainty or uncertainty. What they found was that adults strongly preferred the known odds problem. Uh and uh the kids, it was kind of 50-50. They really just uh didn't care. And I saw a subsequent follow-up study where kids were actually interviewed about this, and some kids said, yeah, it's more fun to not know. That was kind of interesting, right? And so when I read that study, it it got me thinking, well, in some ways you could say we're born as explorers, and then as we learn, we kind of shift from explorers to warriors, right? We start thinking about you know the the downside of not knowing, whereas kids might be also thinking about the adventure of not knowing, right? So that doesn't really explain why, but uh there has been some theorizing that to grow and survive, right, in the world as a kid, you just everything's new for a long time, and you still have this habit of my job is to mess with things and to figure out what they do, and that maybe over time we're done messing with things, right? We kind of should have a different way of thinking of that. I will say one thing though, is that kids do show a bias towards things that are familiar. So that's one uh that's a similar type of thing, but um that what that means is if they already, if something looks familiar to them, they will choose that. Um that's a little different than choosing something because you know the odds of it. So that was a nice thing to shake out because that was a question. Is that all what that we're measuring here with this?

Todd 14:44

Yeah.

John Austin 14:45

I think the other thing, maybe the question isn't why are kids more comfortable with uncertainty, but what are all those things that happen that make us less uncertain? And you know, the there's a Pavlovian response here, right? To how how we are rewarded in schools. Um we get rewarded for having the right answer, not for um asking good questions necessarily. Career incentives are all about knowing and social conditioning, right? Uh, you're not gonna look like the type of person people want to follow if you don't really look like you know the answer, right? So I think all of these things lead to a very clear preference over time with that.

Todd 15:32

Yeah. It sounds it seems like ego would become a part of that as well. Yeah. You know, and anything that um is uncertain, kind of you might get embarrassed or something. So the fear of being embarrassed is so many things there. But yeah. Yeah. Well, kids don't care though. They're just like, whatever. So I think you're right. I think, yeah. But they have to eat chicken nuggets and peanut butter and jelly every day. So they don't want interesting, right?

John Austin 15:58

So kids are all about the adventure except for when it comes to food.

Traps We Fall Into When Facing Uncertainty

Todd 16:02

Yeah. I want chicken nuggets. So we we talked earlier about uh how we waste effort. Now, what traps do we fall into? I think you just alluded to one of those. What traps do we fall into as adults when facing uncertainty?

John Austin 16:18

Well, and you alluded to one of them as well, which is that um there's the expert trap, right? That we we we um we we need to feel like we're the expert. So there's a couple that and there's something called the illusion of explanatory depth, uh, also, which is that we feel like we know how things work if we know a little bit about them, right? Uh and part this all ties into a broader thing, which is which there's an illusion of control, that um the more expertise we accumulate, the more our expertise becomes our identity, right? Yeah, so admitting that our expertise is not giving us an answer can actually kind of be very threatening, not just to um in that situation, but almost a threat to who we are, right? Uh I think that's a big one. And then I'm sure you're familiar with Daniel Kahneman's work, which is the thinking fast and thinking slow, uh, and all of his work that he did with Amos Tversky, I think a lot of that really comes into play here. And their prospect theory, which talks about loss aversion, is I think key here. And that is that initial losses hurt about twice as much as equivalent gains feel good. So they studied this in the 1970s. And if you think about that, that means that uncertainty we think more about the loss side because it's more painful than we think about the potential gain side. So that's a very, I know it's kind of an academic way of thinking of this, but I think I think it's interesting. It it suggests that we're gonna hold on to what we know, the status quo, because that new thing opens up the possibility of both loss and gain, but we feel loss more powerfully, right?

Todd 18:16

Yeah. Yeah. And when you said, just to confess, when you said, I'm sure you're familiar with this person's work, I went, I'm sorry. Right. I see that's that's like I'm inside I went.

John Austin 18:26

I just set you up, right? I that's like the worst thing to say, right? Because it's like I'm I'm setting you up to have to act like you know what I'm talking about.

Todd 18:34

Oh, I was pretending to. I was sitting here going, oh yeah. No. But then you said uh, you know, some of the things. Oh yeah, and I actually I had heard of those things, so that's cool.

John Austin 18:44

But uh yeah, the ego, I went, Wait, I'm gonna have to remember this because it really is a that's a great example. I'll keep using saying that.

Todd 18:53

Right in that moment. You're talking to me, and I'm going, uh yeah. So yeah, that happened.

John Austin 18:58

So literally sitting here, the uncertainty struck, and I went, oh I want to flag that for a moment because think about uh I I I fell into something that I often coach people not to do. It's really an arrogant thing to start a sentence with, of course, you know. Uh and it it's it really is a it's setting yourself up as I know something, and okay, I'm I'm going to say that you should know it too. Right. Think about that, right? That that's not a that's not a good way to have an interaction with someone.

Todd 19:30

Uh well, I didn't take it as arrogant, I took it as I should know this. Right.

John Austin 19:34

And I went, oh it's it's it's the it's the the person who's taught facilitation over the years catching myself for falling into my own trap.

Todd 19:42

No, all good. No, but it is uh what you're talking about. Yeah, I I yeah, I I had heard those things. So that's uh that's cool.

John Austin 19:49

Uh you know, let me just add one other, which is that uh those are individual things, but recognize that all of our organizational incentives as well are biased towards knowing things and knowing the with that. Yeah.

The Antidote When Ambiguity Creates Anxiety

Todd 20:02

And social comparison. In the corporate world, we've got dashboards, we're measuring everything and we're looking at the numbers and what can we do to change and you know, just trying to deal with that. Uncertainty scares organizations, I think.

John Austin 20:17

And so as a result, it scares people within organizations to to act uncertain, right? So that means that we also only see people who are performing as if they know everything uh around us. Uh so we're all doing this performance as if we actually know everything at the all of the Yes.

Todd 20:37

I I see that so often. It's like you go into meetings and people are talking and sharing information or asking questions they already know the answers to and things like that. So and uh I've done it. I'm not excluding myself here, but yeah. So especially when you're doing a lot of tech layoffs and everything, people start behaving in this way to, you know, you have to be the expert. But um side note, I did a brief, brief reading on uh reversal theory and telic state versus paratelic state and all of that. Let me know what you think of this as it relates to an organization. If leaders in an organization can create an environment where it's almost playful, then that helps to deal with some of those issues with uncertainty, right?

John Austin 21:27

Well, what do you think? Yeah, so uh so that's it that's interesting because if we accept that ambiguity creates anxiety, then reducing anxiety might actually help us deal with more ambiguity, right? So uh it in that way, uh I think it makes sense. If you're putting people at ease, you're allowing you're giving people this idea that they're not stressed. Then when you do introduce uncertainty in that situation, you're already working from a lower level of. Stress. So it it strikes me that absolutely even if you can't directly help people be more comfortable with uncertainty, putting people more at ease is another way to get them able to better respond in those moments. Yeah.

Todd 22:17

Yeah. That's cool. Because uh if leaders are uncertain and they're fearful, it's very contagious. And so that's when everybody starts acting like, you know, I've got to do something.

John Austin 22:29

Yeah, let me just build on that. That the the thing that I find interesting also is that we don't role model not knowing very well. And um it, you know, maybe you say, well, John, you don't really need that, you know, when you're dealing with people who've been working for 20 years, but when you're dealing with newer employees, uh, I think it's important. And I think about this a lot now that I'm working with undergraduates. Uh I try to be the professor who kind of doesn't know what he's doing so much. I mean, you know, I have expertise, but I want to be able to show when I don't know. Uh, and so I think about that. And I think it's important for people to be able to see that is an option sometimes.

Todd 23:19

Yeah. Um that's cool. My background is engineering. I studied electrical engineering and at NC State. And one of the coolest things I saw were professors that would just sit down and work on a problem and they didn't know. So I'm a, you know, I'm younger, I'm you know, sitting under the tutelage of a professor, and this guy's got a PhD. When they would just sit down and work on a problem, and there was no ego, there was no, well, I don't know this. They would figure it out. And it was that was cool to watch because in a lot of scenarios, it's like like maybe you're a dad, you know, you don't want your kids to look at you and go, oh, he doesn't know the answer. And so you kind of pretend maybe. But that was very instructive, though, to sit with a professor and and they go, huh. And then just sit and start figuring things out. That's cool. But uh that doesn't work too well in corporate environments, though.

John Austin 24:14

And you know, that is a shame, right? But uh if we could um there are some teams that do do that well, that that work together, it sort of define and what you're talking about. One of the great things about being trained as an engineer is learning how to do that, learning how to sort of break down a system, understand its parts, and really figure out what you don't know, right? So you're seeing the process that the professor uses to figure something out they don't know. And I think that's so valuable. And I think engineering is a field that does a great job with that. I think you're right there that in in most of our work settings, we don't have that opportunity to see and work together in doing that type of stuff. Yeah.

Todd 24:56

Yeah, if you're dealing with a customer and something is wrong, ambiguity is, you know, because they get frustrated. So you have to kind of manage the customers' frustrations and things. But then, but if if you can really dig into a problem, and what I've seen really good engineers is they see the problem and it's an anomaly and they're excited about solving it. That's that's really cool. But uh yeah, learning how to get to that place.

John Austin 25:24

That's that's the thing. You know, I think a field that's done a lot better at it recently, uh, it's a field we used to say was really bad at it, and it's medical doctors. So uh for years, doctors were found to be the most overconfident in the in the uh the people who are most uh one of the professions that was least able to admit they don't know something. And and it makes sense, right? Because you only go to a doctor for an answer and you're not satisfied if you don't get it. But if you've noticed, doctors now are seem to be a bit better, at least in the United States. And I I attribute that to much better attention to this issue in medical school, where doctors are now able to sit with a patient next to them and try to figure out what's going on. And it makes us more comfortable as patients. That's great. Yeah. So so I think that's what that's a field that has really advanced uh in their ability to do this.

Todd 26:23

Now let's let's dig into your, you call it the uncertainty intelligence framework. So in your book, you lay that out. Uncertainty intelligence framework. Can you describe that?

John Austin 26:34

Yeah. So uncertainty intelligence is uh, first of all, the the key thing here is that it's not a personality trait you have, right? The ability to thrive in an uncertain situation. When I went and looked at people who were doing this well, what I saw is they had an underlying set of skills. And those skills could be developed through practice. And if you do this, you make better decisions, uh, you maintain your performance better under stress, uh, and you just demonstrate stronger leadership. And this is this is not necessarily new. What I did is just pull this together. And there's three areas that are part of uncertainty intelligence. Uh the first one is anticipatory awareness, and that's the ability to see and project emerging changes. The second is adaptability, that's revising your plans as the world changes around you. Uh, and then the third is learning agility, and that's rapidly developing new skills and competences, uh, and learning which of your old skills to throw out. So I kind of use a shorthand for these, which is uh see react prepare, in that those people who are good at uncertainty have developed all three of these skills. Oh yeah. So that's kind of and so in the book, I like to dig into for each one of them what are some techniques you can use to develop these types of intelligence. And what are some of those tools from the book? I'm glad you asked. So uh I do a lot of work with uh foresight. So forecasting is we try to predict what the most likely future is. So foresight is anticipating the range of possible futures that are out there. Okay. And so I've I've spent a lot of time in my career working with teams to help them identify multiple potential futures and then use that to develop more robust plans around that. Uh, and so one of the tools in my book is something I call uncertainty vectoring, which is a tool that I developed that I helps you really think about how you identify the different uncertainties in your situation, map how they interact with each other, and then use that to generate different futures. Uh and this has been done for years in an area called scenario planning. And I just uh adjusted it a little bit to focus more on the uncertainties. This is actually a great way to develop anticipatory awareness here. It it gets you to uh anticipate different ways the world could go before you find yourself in the position of being surprised and having to react to them. So that this is a tool I love. And uh because you can use it in a group setting, you can use it individually when thinking about your careers, those types of things. Nice. As it relates to um adapting, this is where you're reacting in that moment. Uh, there's really a tool that I like to think about here, which is uh it I call it the three translation moments. And what this is is translating what's going on in in uh the world to how do I respond to it very quickly. And it comes down to very quickly in that moment being able to create a new mindset, uh, so that's seeing things a little differently, uh, moving from that mindset to new behaviors, so acting differently, and then anchoring it. So embedding that in the situation. And I think of that as making sure that you're committing to an action. So those are three translation moments, and each one of them requires you to develop sort of a different type of skill as when you're in that moment of change. The key thing about adapting is this is uh what you see in emergency situations when certain people seem to just be really good at getting things moving, right? Um that's that adaptability skill. And then one other one, if you're working with teams, uh I like to think about uh how it is that uh we can very quickly realign the skills and expertise that we have in a group when a new situation comes up. And so there's a tool I use called Situated Expertise, which really builds into uh how you can redeploy your teams and redesign things around new situations. So I hope that's not going too much into the weeds with the no, no. That's cool.

Todd 31:27

So you mentioned anticipatory awareness. And what is that again?

John Austin 31:34

So that it's um scanning broadly, um, detecting weak signals uh and projecting how change unfolds.

Todd 31:42

Okay. And then adaptability, when you know, we know that adapt to things as they emerge. And then that learning agility is cool because I mean the way things change in the tech industry, it's like, okay, AI disrupting a lot of things, and so teams have to be revamped. People have to learn new things. So that's cool. And this, I mean, this applies to individuals as well, because as an individual dealing with family situations, dealing with work, dealing with all of these things, things are constantly changing. And so we have to, as things emerge, have the ability to pick pick up new skills and learn things. So that's yeah. I mean, this applies to teams, to companies, to individuals, everything.

John Austin 32:24

You know, you know, and I I want to say that a key part of learning agility is also being prepared to unlearn things. Right. So think of this. I'm I'm I have as a professor right now, I have students entering college who are not gonna leave college for four years. Think about how long four years in is based on how quickly the world is changing. So there is not a professor out there who can honestly say everything they're teaching is gonna be relevant in four years. At least the way I see it, right? So we our job is to prepare them for that future, but we ourselves don't necessarily know what that is. So the best thing that we can do is train students on how to learn and also develop that ability to unlearn and realize that something that we taught them is no longer relevant, right? Right. Yeah.

Todd 33:23

Yeah. I mean, one of the things that hits us in the workplace is something new technology comes out. We're working with the old technology. We know how things operate there and we don't want to change. And sometimes we end up losing our jobs as a result. So uh yeah, let's uh my background was uh telephony. And so when I started, it was working in voice over IP. And so we ended up, we were doing a lot of work with customers who were replacing old PBXs. And so the old PBX technicians, I say old, the folks that knew the PBX technology did not want to learn the voice over IP. But those PBXs were going away. And so we literally we deployed a new phone system for a customer, and they they knew these old Nortel PBXs, the engineers. They literally refused to learn the new system. And we were we were trying to teach them. And they ended up after the project was over, they had to interview for their jobs, and they you know lost their job. If they had just learned the new system. So, anyways, but yeah, learning agility. You gotta be able to stop doing the old stuff, start doing the new. So, yeah, it's it was difficult though. That's that's often a very difficult thing for people to do.

John Austin 34:42

You've gotten really good at that old thing. Uh, you know, yes, and that's tough. Yes, we I think we have to have empathy for this. It is tough. Uh and and it's totally legitimate for someone to say, I am not, I just am not interested in this. But you when you make that choice, you also do have to understand that that old thing might not be as valuable anymore.

Habits YOU Can Start Building Today

Todd 35:05

Yeah, yeah. So, but interestingly enough, I met with a customer two, three years ago that it was a university, and these guys had built their PBX system in 1984, and it was the same crew still working there today. And I went, it was awesome, but they were eager to learn the new stuff, and it was it was very cool. So they were they were a good crew, but these these guys they built this phone system in when Reagan was president, and that's amazing. So it was awesome. So uh so let's talk about some practical advice now. What what are some habits people can start today in dealing with uncertainty?

John Austin 35:50

I like to think small, and habits that's a great way to think of it, right? So so yeah, so the um every day there is some uncertainty in your life, and we do such a good job of just pushing it aside. So, one thing that I would suggest is have start a kind of a daily uh decision lab, right? So for two weeks, just maybe on your commute or just at the end of your day, log one decision you made that day that you made, even though there was some uncertainty, right? And you start tracking this, you start to notice that there are certain types of uncertainties that you defer decisions because of, and there are others that you're totally comfortable with. And it gives you sort of an insight into the your own way of dealing with uncertainty. And what are the uncertainties that you might be ignoring with this? So it's kind of it's kind of a way to capture some of those default biases that you have.

Todd 36:52

Okay.

Speaker 36:52

And then then a second thing I often uh talk about on the when you're trying to make sense of things is are you looking somewhere that no one else is looking? And one way to get to start practicing that is give yourself a time, like set it at 15 minutes a week, put it on your calendar and look somewhere outside of your field. Just go look at something, right? So scan something that no one else is looking at, and you don't even know why it's relevant. Uh, but you basically what you're starting to do is say, I'm just gonna go sit and listen to this thing. Uh, maybe it's an awesome podcast, right? And it's something that um you you start to kind of see things outside of your field. It's one way that you start to build those muscles of anticipatory awareness because you're looking more broadly with that. I think those would be two habits that I think have high.

Todd 37:55

And I would think I would think that that would also start to foster that wonder that we had as kids as well, right? Right, yeah. So learn learning something new.

John Austin 38:03

That's that's absolutely true. And and I do think there's something about that curiosity of saying, Oh, I wonder what I wonder about this. What is it? What is it that doing? I I I I'm I have this benefit, I'm on of a university campus. So I can just go in and listen to lectures in fields that I know nothing about, right? And that's cool. Especially in the science fields, I'm totally lost, but I'm fascinated uh by trying to figure it out. And also I love the passion of the people talking about it. And so I always learn something, even if it's just learning how little I know.

Todd 38:38

Yeah, that's so cool. Yeah, one time I I was in lecture, it was a physics lecture, and it was man, this guy, the professor, was uh he must have been 70, 80 years old, but still going strong, and he loved what he did. And just the passion that he had in talking about physics, and he was talking about the universe in one lecture. He spent an entire hour speaking off the cuff from no notes, just talking about the known universe. And oh man, it was wonderful. Literally everyone was just wrapped attention. So yeah, that's cool. But yeah, that guy was he was preserving that. He had that wonder after in working in the field for decades, right? And he still had that wonder. It was cool, but uh yeah. Now, what are one or two practices that give 80% of the benefits?

John Austin 39:31

So was it those two you just mentioned? Oh, no, no, no. I'm just uh that's such a good question. And um, so there's one technique that I keep finding myself using with different groups, and I might kind of adjust it a little bit for it depending on what the issue is, but it I call it the backward-forward flip. And it's um regularly looking back at surprises that hit you over a set time period. I often use three years, but you could maybe maybe it's one year, but you look back, you set a date in time, say three years ago, exact, you know, um in April 2023, right? Uh or something, whatever it is, whatever's three years ago. And then you say, all right, where exactly was I and what has surprised me that has happened since then? Really think about what has happened that that you just didn't anticipate, and use that to reflect on what did you miss? Where were you not looking? Were there weak signals out there? Where would you have seen them? Were you resisting adapting your own uh way of working? And how did you eventually learn that? And then take that and now after you've done all that, just flip it forward and you start to really think a little differently about the amount of uncertainty that might be about to hit you, and then also give you some ideas and different things you might do about it. So I think that's a really helpful one. And um interesting observation when I do this with younger people, when I ask them to describe future uncertainties, they tend to um focus on positive uncertainties. When I do this with groups of people that have been around longer, it flips. And when people talk about future uncertainties, they tend to tend to talk more about negative uncertainties. I don't know any research on this. I'm just observing what I've seen in groups with that. So I think that's that's that's one practice. Um what do you call it again? I call it the backward-forward flip. You look backward and then you flip it, look forward. I don't know if that's a good name, but it's the one I came up with probably about 10 years ago.

Todd 42:04

Yeah. Yeah, it would seem then that journaling would be a help for that. So if you um especially if you're maintaining like an electronic journal, writing is good because it's it helps with just tactile the touch and everything. But then if you have an electronic journal that you're storing things in, it seems like you can look back on that and uh call out the big major events that that hit you.

John Austin 42:27

But uh Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. So I I I think that's a great way to sort of realize that that we're living through it and we have successfully lived through a whole bunch of uncertainty. So we're overwhelmed right now, perhaps, but you know what? We were in the past and we're still here, right? Um you know, and the other one is really just a simple question. And get get in the habit of asking people what keeps them up at night or what are they uncertain about? Because as we've talked about, people hide their uncertainty. You never see it. And I think asking people what is it that they don't know, and and inviting them to talk about the future, because then it's not scary for them to admit to you they don't know because none of us know it. So asking them that that question of what what do you wish you knew about what was going to happen in the next few years, you you start to realize it normalizes uncertainty. We're all uncertain, and everyone who just acts like they know what they're doing, they're as uncertain as the rest of us. And so you you often learn a lot when you especially if you ask someone who's quite skilled uh these types of questions.

Todd 43:38

That's funny. Yeah, those interview questions. Where do you see yourself in five to ten years? And then you make you make up an answer, and it's like, you know, you're not gonna be you have no idea where you're gonna be in five years. Right, right, right. So yeah. I think I was asked that once, and I said, you know, I don't know. And I'm I'm good with that. So it's a good answer.

John Austin 43:59

Good answer.

Todd 44:00

And here's why, because when I was 18, I had my entire life mapped out and it ne it didn't work out anything like I anticipated.

John Austin 44:07

See, I I'm guess I was that opposite person. I had no idea what I was gonna do when I entered college. I think back on that. I was like, and then I kind of just rolled with the flow or yeah, kind of went with it for a while. And then um I it it seemed to work out initially.

Where to Connect with John

Todd 44:24

Uh yeah, that's cool. So funny. But um wow, well, that's a good place to wrap it up. Um so where do people find you?

John Austin 44:34

I have a website that is certain about uncertainty, and that there's dashes between those words. Certain about uncertainty.com. Yeah, we'll include links in the description. Okay, and you you can find me on LinkedIn. I am I'm open to anyone reaching out to me on LinkedIn. Uh there's about 10,000 John Austins on LinkedIn. So I'm the one who's the you know university professor and the dean of the honors college. So those are the two best places to find me.

Closing Thoughts

Todd 45:02

Okay. Yeah, so we'll include links in the description, and uh so you folks can find him. And I'll also include a link to uh John's book. So we'll uh we'll have that up there. I'm looking forward to picking up a copy of the book and uh digging into that. So uh I mean here are my takeaways from this, right? We have agency. And life, if we allow it, life it just happens to us. But we can't look at it that way. We have agency. It's not just happening, we have the ability to shape how things are turning out for us. Now, we do make our plans for the future, but we we have to realize that the future is never going to perfectly match what we imagined. And in military terms, there's that common saying, no plan ever survives contact with the enemy. So we need that ability to embrace uncertainty and be willing to adjust as life unfolds. And I confess I'm not good at it. And that's why when I when I saw Dr. Austin's content out there, I was like, wow, love to talk to this guy. So thanks for thanks for responding. I I appreciate it. And it's been very instructive for me. So I appreciate your time today. Thank you so much for meeting with us.

John Austin 46:15

Well, I I appreciate the opportunity. Absolutely. This has been a great conversation, and uh it's uh something I would never tire of talking about.

Todd 46:24

That's wonderful. Yeah, I can tell you're passionate about it, and it's uh yeah, you've got the spark and it's it's interesting to listen to. So yeah, thank you so much. Now, if if you enjoyed this episode, please consider leaving us a review. And uh you can also use links in the description to reach out to us, give us feedback, things like that. But until next time, we'll see you on the path.