This week: Unlearning Doubt. Morning posts are written for individual contributors. Midday posts are written for managers and supervisors. Evening posts are for everyone — wherever you sit.

Hi. I’m Elizabeth. Welcome to Unmanaged.

Tonight I want to talk about what happens when we don’t have all the information we need.

This morning we talked about the information gap — the gap that individual contributors experience when context doesn’t reach them, and the gap that middle managers live in every day, caught between executive decisions and the teams they’re responsible for leading. Both of those gaps are constantly in play in almost every workplace.

Here’s what I’ve observed about how those gaps develop. Leadership is often operating at a strategic level — focused on business problems and long-term decisions that exist several layers above the day-to-day work. Most of the time, they’re not withholding information deliberately. They simply aren’t thinking about what needs to travel down, because the systems around them weren’t designed with that in mind. The people who build communication systems tend to be the people those systems already serve.

That’s worth remembering. Because it means the gap usually isn’t about you. It isn’t about something you did or didn’t do. It’s a structural problem — and structural problems require structural solutions, not personal ones.

It also helps to remember that any message passed verbally from one person to another, and then another, and then another — that’s a game of telephone. Some of the information will drop out along the way. That’s not accusation, it’s just how it works.

This is why clarifying in writing matters. Not to catch anyone out — but to give everyone a shared record. To make the message as complete as possible before it has to travel further.

That sounds manageable. And it is — most of the time.

But when you know the information you’re getting is probably incomplete, and you also know you’re responsible for the outcome, and this happens repeatedly — your body starts to interpret that as danger. That’s hypervigilance: a state of heightened alertness where you’re constantly scanning for what might be missing, what might go wrong, what you might be held accountable for that you didn’t even know about.

That feeling is real. And tonight, that’s what we’re going to work with.

Feet on the floor. Deep breath in, deep breath out.

Feel the support beneath you. Tonight, that support is everything you already know.

Deep breath in, deep breath out.

Think of a moment today when you were caught off guard by information you didn’t have. Stay with that feeling for just a moment — the surprise, the scramble, whatever came up.

Now say this to yourself, out loud or in your mind:

“I can only do my best with the information I have. The gaps are a consequence of a faulty system — not a reflection of my capability. I am not responsible for the entirety of how information moves. I can clarify. I can document. And that is enough.”

Deep breath in, deep breath out.

Now think of a time when you did clarify — when you asked the question, followed up, put it in writing — and got what you needed. How did that feel? What did it make possible?

Let that memory sit alongside the earlier one.

And one more time:

“I can only do my best with the information I have. The gaps are a consequence of a faulty system — not a reflection of my capability. I am not responsible for the entirety of how information moves. I can clarify. I can document. And that is enough.”

Deep breath in, deep breath out.

You’ve got this.

For more resources or to book an introduction call, visit unmanagedpeople.com. You can also find me on YouTube at Unmanaged People.

I’ll see you tomorrow.

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