Over recent weeks, financial markets have shifted sharply in response to escalating conflict in the Middle East. Oil prices have surged. Stock markets have fallen. Pension funds tied to global market performance have felt the impact. Energy costs, already a source of quiet anxiety for many households, are moving in the wrong direction again.
None of this stays neatly outside the workplace door. When people sit down at their desks or join their morning calls, they bring the wider world with them. For leaders in pharmaceutical, life sciences and technology organisations, supporting employees during uncertainty has become one of the most pressing and under-recognised leadership challenges right now.
The Invisible Weight Your Team May Be Carrying
External events create internal strain, and that strain rarely announces itself in a team meeting. What leaders are more likely to see is subtler: a usually engaged colleague who seems distracted, a drop in the energy people bring to collaborative work, slightly slower responses, a quieter-than-usual tone in one-to-ones.
The CIPD notes that the situation in the Middle East is deeply unsettling for many employees1, not only those working in the region, but also colleagues with family connections, travel disruption, or financial exposure to market changes. In globally connected technical workforces, this is not a peripheral concern. It is immediate.
Beyond personal connections to the conflict, there is a broader financial dimension. Pension values tied to equity markets have been hit by recent volatility. Energy price shocks will filter into household costs. For employees already managing tight budgets after several years of cost-of-living pressure, this is not abstract economics. It is tangible worry carried quietly into the working day.
Professional Masks Are Not the Same as Professional Resilience
In scientific and technical environments, there is often an unspoken professional norm: compartmentalise, stay focused, get on with the work. This serves teams well in many circumstances. Under significant external pressure, it can prevent people from accessing the support they actually need.
Supporting employees during uncertainty does not mean turning workplaces into therapy spaces. It means recognising that composure does not always signal resilience. Often, it signals caution.
The unspoken pension conversation
Many mid- and late-career professionals closely track pension performance. The recent equity market falls will have registered, even if nobody has said so aloud. Leaders do not need to offer financial advice, but acknowledging that markets are turbulent and ensuring employees know what support exists can make a meaningful difference. A line in a team communication pointing people to available financial wellbeing resources is simple, practical and often quietly appreciated.
Personal and cultural connections to conflict
In any diverse team, some colleagues will have personal, familial or cultural ties to regions affected by conflict. These connections create a kind of ambient grief and anxiety that does not switch off at 9am. It is not always visible, and it is rarely volunteered. For leaders, the most important thing is not to solve this but to create an environment where people do not feel pressure to conceal it.
What Empathetic Leadership Looks Like Right Now
Empathy in leadership is frequently discussed in theory and practised inconsistently in practice. In the current climate, it comes down to three concrete behaviours.
Name what others are not naming
A brief, non-political acknowledgement that the world feels unsettling right now removes the pressure on people to pretend otherwise. It does not require taking a position on geopolitics. Something as simple as ‘I know things feel uncertain in the wider world at the moment. I want to check in on how people are doing’ shifts the emotional temperature of a team without overstepping. It gives people permission to bring their whole selves to work, which paradoxically often improves rather than diminishes focus.
Be curious rather than diagnostic
When a usually engaged team member seems off, the natural instinct is to ask about their workload or outputs. The more useful question is simply: ‘How are you finding things at the moment?’ Open questions, asked with genuine interest and without pressure to answer in any particular way, create the conditions for honest responses. Leaders do not need all the answers. They need to be present enough to notice when someone might need support.
Point people to practical help
Employee assistance programmes, financial wellbeing resources and mental health first aiders exist in many organisations but are often underused. During periods of external uncertainty, proactively reminding teams about these resources is straightforward and effective. It signals that the organisation takes the full human being seriously, not just the professional version.
Communicating Honestly Without Adding to the Noise
There is a real risk that leaders default to either silence or overcommunication when the world feels chaotic. Neither approach serves teams well. The CIPD’s Labour Market Outlook has highlighted that global uncertainties are already affecting employee pensions and financial security2. This is not a topic employees need leaders to introduce. It is one they are already carrying. The leader’s role is to acknowledge it calmly, not amplify it.
Honest leadership in this context means communicating what is known about the organisation’s position, being transparent about what is not yet clear, and giving people a sense of what remains within their control. Short-term clarity, even on small things, is genuinely stabilising when the longer-term picture feels uncertain. A clear project priority, a realistic team objective for the coming fortnight, a straightforward conversation about what is expected this week: these things matter more than they might appear to.
What employees need most from leaders right now is not certainty about world events, which no leader can provide. They need the steadiness of someone who is paying attention, who will not pretend things are fine when they are not, and who trusts them enough to have an honest conversation.
Frequently Asked Questions About Supporting Employees During Uncertainty
The Leaders Who Show Up When It Matters
Geopolitical events will continue to ripple through financial markets, household finances and the personal lives of people in every organisation. The question is not whether this will affect the teams leaders manage, but how well-prepared those leaders are to respond when it does.
Supporting employees during uncertainty is not a specialist skill or an HR responsibility delegated downward. It is what good leadership looks like in practice: noticing the people behind the professional performance, creating space for what is real, and communicating with the kind of honesty that earns trust over time. In sectors where people are the competitive advantage, that leadership capability is not a nice-to-have. It is what makes the difference.