From Holding It Together to Holding Space: A New Mandate for Leadership Teams

In moments of restructuring, strategy shifts, or prolonged uncertainty, many leaders assume that their job is to "hold it together."

They believe what their teams most need from them is calm, clarity, and control.

So they show up composed.

Decisive.

Reassuring.

But beneath that composure, something else is often true:

Many leaders aren’t overwhelmed by their workload, they’re depleted from pretending they’re fine.

They perform what they believe is expected: coherence, steadiness, even confidence. And while that instinct comes from care and responsibility, it also comes at a cost.

The Hidden Cost of Performing Stability

This dynamic isn’t about ego. It’s a cultural and structural pattern.

Most organizations don’t give leaders the space, time, or permission to process uncertainty. There’s little tolerance for doubt.

No place to think without performing.

It’s not just psychological; it’s relational and systemic. Many leadership roles are structurally isolating. When no one is holding space for the leader to process or reflect, performance becomes the only "safe" default.

There’s also a cultural belief, especially in Western business settings, that leadership equals control. So the moment you admit ambiguity, you risk being seen as weak, unstrategic, or "not ready."

Many leaders aren't just performing stability, they're performing coherence. They fear that if they show internal fragmentation (doubt, fear, confusion), it will fracture the team.

So they present as if they’ve made sense of what’s happening, even when they haven’t. They (try to) radiate clarity, alignment, and readiness, even if they’re still metabolizing shock.

So what’s being performed isn’t just calm, it’s resolution. And that performance is exhausting, because it often precedes actual sense-making.

Instead of genuine clarity, we get polished confusion. Instead of trust, silent drift. Instead of real alignment, surface-level agreement masks deeper dissonance.

This is not a failure of leadership character. It’s a failure of leadership conditions. And the longer it goes unaddressed, the harder it becomes to course-correct.

What’s Really Being Performed?

It’s not just composure that gets performed. It’s coherence. Leaders feel pressure to show that they’ve made sense of things, even when they haven’t. They project alignment, clarity, and control before these things are truly present.

But without a shared space to process complexity, that performance isolates leaders and disconnects teams.

At a deeper level, what’s being performed is not only emotional control but also resolution, a premature sense of "we’re fine now," often before the dust has settled. 

Leaders present a simplified narrative to avoid further confusion, but this flattens the emotional texture of what the organization is going through. In doing so, they unintentionally signal that nuance, doubt, and ongoing sense-making are liabilities rather than necessary parts of adaptive leadership.

This tendency creates a culture where questions are privately held rather than openly explored. It privileges answers over insight, speed over sense-making, and image over alignment. And while it may offer temporary relief, it ultimately drains trust and impairs decision quality.

Research in psychological safety and team effectiveness shows that when tension goes unacknowledged at the top, it leads to:

• Reduced learning

• Increased political behavior

• Erosion of trust

• Decision fatigue and paralysis

In short, the appearance of strength creates organizational fragility.

The Missed Opportunity

Times of uncertainty are not just challenges to survive.

They are openings.

These are the very moments when teams can build trust, reshape their leadership culture, and re-align on what matters most if they have the space to do so.

When leaders step out of performance mode and into a space of shared sense-making, they model a more grounded kind of leadership, one that sees complexity not as something to conceal but as something to meet with collective intelligence.

Too often, these moments pass unclaimed.

Pressure to project certainty overrides the opportunity to cultivate real alignment. Rather than pausing to metabolize what’s shifting, teams rush toward action, missing the deeper recalibration that could transform not just what they do next, but how they operate together.

The missed opportunity isn’t just emotional.

It’s strategic.

What’s lost is a chance to build the very muscle teams need to navigate future uncertainty: the ability to think honestly, reflect collectively, and act from coherence, not choreography.

But too often, those moments are bypassed. Leaders perform strength instead of making sense. Teams push forward without addressing what's shifting underneath. And the cost of silence compounds.

Final Thoughts

The answer isn’t for leaders to simply “open up” more. What’s needed isn’t individual catharsis, it’s collective capacity to move from performance to real coherence; leadership teams need structured opportunities to think clearly, feel safely, and make sense of complexity together. 

That doesn’t happen by accident. It requires intention, space, and support.

What that looks like:

• Dedicated space for the leadership team to reflect, not just plan

• Structured facilitation to surface what’s unspoken and reset alignment

• Advisory support that holds up a mirror, not a megaphone

• A shift in mindset: from "holding it together" to holding space together

Because when leadership teams are carrying more than they can name, the most strategic move isn’t to power through. It’s to pause.

---

This article is part of a four-part exploration of leadership teams, their hidden dynamics, growing pressures, and the path from overload to renewal. Discover the rest of the series:

1. Why Leadership Teams Are So Hard to Get Right

2. Are Leadership Teams Getting Better at the Wrong Job?

3. From Burnout to Renewal: Why Top Teams Can’t Afford to Run on Fumes

---

About the Author

Nazly Frias is the founder of Leadership Impact, a boutique leadership advisory practice specializing in working with executive teams and senior leaders in impact-driven professional service firms and organizations.

With over 15 years of international experience, Nazly brings a unique dual perspective: she has served as both an insider—leading and being part of leadership teams in global impact consulting firms and public innovation labs—and as an external trusted advisor. This combination allows her to understand the internal dynamics, pressures, and blind spots that leadership teams face while maintaining the objectivity needed to guide transformational change.

Originally from Colombia, Nazly works with clients across the globe in English and Spanish and is based in Berlin.

Get in touch with Nazly