Merete Wedell-Wedellsborg nails it with “psychological withdrawal” that erosion of agency I’ve seen everywhere in my coaching. Polycrisis makes it hit even harder.

Polycrisis describes how multiple, overlapping crises- climate change, political polarization, economic instability, technological disruption, and social fragmentation each interact to amplify uncertainty. They’re entangled, producing sustained complexity that resists resolution. For leaders doing organizational culture work (already on fraught terrain), this stretches cognitive and emotional capacities to their limits.

Right now, I’m gearing up for a workshop on burnout and resilience for folks in this exact space. And let me be real: the fatigue many of us are experiencing (myself included) is coming from every direction. As I type this, another breaking news alert just popped up on my phone. The exhaustion is real. How on earth does one muster the strength to make decisions today, plan for tomorrow, when it feels like the world is collapsing around us? There may be a reason people partied like it was 1999! Those old enough to remember Y2K know that knot-in-the-stomach anxiety, wondering if banks, planes, power grids would all crash when the clock hit midnight. Today’s realities make even that pale in comparison.

In this context, psychological withdrawal makes sense; it’s how we adapt. When the connection between effort and outcome becomes less clear, it’s easy to feel depleted. In many of my coaching engagements, clients are referencing hesitation, decision fatigue, or a subtle loss of faith that leadership matters. I’ve felt it too: recalibrating pace, expectations, what “progress” even means amid compounding uncertainty.

But here’s what gives me hope (and what I’m leaning into for the workshop): naming it. When leaders and teams see themselves in collective polycrisis (not failing within it), agency returns. It opens space for compassion, a clearer focus, and a different leadership, one based in adaptive capacity, shared meaning-making, and slower, intentional action.

Leaders: What’s one small practice helping you reclaim agency amid the exhaustion? We may not resolve uncertainty anytime soon. But we can reimagine how we lead inside it.