One of the most capable leaders I worked with didn’t recognize they were burning out until it was already affecting their team.
For most of their career, the answer had always been the same:
Take it on. Lean in. Push through.
And it had worked. In fact, that approach had become their hallmark—and recognized, rewarded, and reinforced with a steady stream of promotions, expanded scope, bigger teams, bonuses, and awards.
So when things started slipping—shorter patience in meetings, rereading the same email three times, a sense that everything required more effort than it used to—the instinct wasn’t to question the system.
It was to question themselves.
“Why can’t I handle the load like I always have?”
They started compensating in the only way they knew how—working longer, jumping in faster, saying yes before thinking it through.
And the impact, of course, rippled downstream, churning their team—who were already running on empty.
The leader believed they were protecting their team by absorbing more themselves.
In fact: Their team was watching them work every weekend, fire off late-night emails, and run on fumes—and drawing their own conclusions. The quiet ones got quieter. A couple of the strong ones started taking calls from recruiters.
Here’s the trap: Nothing about their capability had changed. What had changed was the context. The volume of decisions coming so fast they were in constant reaction mode and even stepping back to think felt like time wasted.
But because their old playbook had always worked, they didn’t question it. They questioned themselves instead.
That’s the blind spot. Not burnout itself—but the reflex to read a capacity problem as a personal failing.
The shift that matters isn’t working harder or even working smarter.
It’s pulling up to ask a different question:
Not “what’s wrong with me?”
But “what’s changed around me—and what does that demand of me now?”