In this blog post we will discuss an aspect of leadership that can destroy company culture and progress…Leadership fatigue or burn-out!
Leadership Fatigue Syndrome
Much is being said about leadership development, personality, style, growth, roles, or leadership function, and I have listed at the end, for your use, some blogs I researched that deal with all of these aspects.
But, I wonder how many companies or employees have to settle for leadership who are simply too tired to contribute in a meaningful way to the company’s objectives or to company culture! One can identify tired leaders very easily….Let me ask you:
- Are you just committed to just go through the motions at work to get through your day?
- Do your team members stare at their hands or at the ground when you are talking with them?
- Is your primary motivation making certain that your turf is protected at any cost?
If you experience one or more of these symptoms and especially the last one, you might be suffering from Leadership Fatigue.
Don’t worry, you’re not alone. This condition affects a high percentage of leaders that have been in the same role for too long. If you don’t wake up and smell the coffee and rediscover why leading is a privilege and a serious professional responsibility, Leadership Fatigue can be damaging to your own career as well as those in constant contact with you.
Where Do I Start?
But wait, all is not doom and gloom. In fact, you can still rediscover that your true role is about more than building and protecting your turf. You can believe and act like you are in your role to serve and support others and to drive positive results for your organization. The process starts with you rediscovering your passion for encouraging, coaching and motivating others and the great feeling that comes from seeing others succeed and grow in front of your eyes. You’ll also rediscover what it’s like to lead and work with people that respect you without fearing you. I know, it sounds ridiculous right now, but over time, you’ll come to understand that this is possible!
Is it B.U.R.N.O.U.T.?
Most of us have days when we feel helpless, overloaded, or unappreciated—when dragging ourselves out of bed requires the determination of Hercules. If you feel like this most of the time, however, you may have burnout. Burnout is a gradual process. The signs and symptoms are subtle at first, but they get worse as time goes on.
Think of the early symptoms as red flags that something is wrong that needs to be addressed. If you pay attention and act to reduce your stress, you can prevent a major breakdown. If you ignore them, you’ll eventually burn out.
The problem with tired leaders is that they are not fully themselves, and that can cause real problems. (Think of those late-night emails or weekend calls that set the tone of always on / always available / always working / no down-time / work-first.)
Working Smarter
As leaders, we must do better. We need to manage ourselves: setting appropriate boundaries, investing in ourselves and our health, and working smarter, not harder
It’s not easy however, to overcome years of bad habits and sometimes we “hit rock bottom” in order to see the need to make a change. There is no miracle cure and no pill for Leadership Fatigue other than the recognition that leadership is truly a privilege and that you owe it to yourself and everyone around you to stay fresh, focused and committed to the role.
Is a Fresh Start in Order?
I’ve seen many good leaders grow tired and then wake up thanks to a new assignment, a new boss that helped revive their spirits or as part of recovering from an illness or a job loss. I’ve also met more than a few that were too tired mentally and lacked the resolve to wake up and start leading again.
For those that are willing to take on the fight to overcome the slings and arrows of corporate outrageousness and creeping Leadership Fatigue, you have our complete support and regular encouragement here at Transformative Workplace Solutions. Focus and hard work are the only miracle cures that I’ve found for this, to date.
How Do I Recognize This Might Be An Issue?
Leadership is sometimes wearisome – so wearisome that we come close to giving up. Over the years, I’ve watched leaders slide into defeat, and I’ve seen some of these common signs of trouble. I list these symptoms of “leadership fatigue” here not to discourage you, but instead to help you recognize them, address them, and move forward.
- Living by a “get me through the day” philosophy – You may begin the day with a plan, but surviving becomes the theme of the day.
- Losing vision – A leadership vision assumes a commitment far beyond today. Fatigued leaders, though, don’t consider beyond the end of this workday. Anything longer demands too much energy.
- Faking joy and excitement – Few actions are more exhausting than pretending to have joy you don’t have. Every sentence is hard, and every nod of the head feels like a ton of weight on your shoulders. Our weariness is only compounded by our pretense.
- Magnifying minors – What seemed insignificant last month is unexpectedly huge when we’re tired. That simple difference of opinion now feels like blatant disagreement – even rebellion or betrayal of your leadership.
- Failing to return emails and phone calls – Communicating with people takes time, energy, and focus. Weary leaders tend to delay responding to others, if they choose to respond at all.
- Focusing on a “grass is greener” syndrome – It’s amazing how leadership fatigue affects the lenses through which we see other options. Every other role, it seems, is suddenly better than our current one.
- Avoiding people who speak truth – When we know we’re tired of leading, it’s just easier to avoid people who know us well enough to recognize the problem.
8 Ideas to Fight Leadership Fatigue
Now, here are some ideas I find useful to help you fight leadership fatigue:
- Create an Artifact to Remind Yourself Daily of Your Real Purpose. The daily challenges in our organizations can be all consuming. Chasing the urgent consumes much of our time and the urgent-unimportant has a way of filling any openings. An exercise I’ve used for years now to help leaders remind themselves is to develop and make visible their own personal leader’s charter. A simple morning re-read of this framed charter hanging on the wall or sitting on a shelf provides a powerful reminder of your real role and the opportunity you have to build others and your business with every single encounter in the upcoming day.
- Cultivate a Beginner’s Mind. Approaching issues by suspending judgment and seeking first to understand is a remarkable way to change the tone and tenor of every day. Beginners learn to ask questions and viewing people and teams and challenges from a fresh perspective can lead to an inner calm and a perpetual journey of discovery. The wisest leaders I’ve worked around understand that with every person and every day they are beginners.
- Keep it in Context. Remember, you have the privilege of helping people and helping your firm every single day. Each day is a blank canvas that you get to fill-in with positive encounters, helpful ideas and productive interactions. Problems and issues represent opportunities to serve and to teach. Recognizing and reminding yourself of this privilege of serving helps to tame the stress.
- Don’t Cede Control to the Gremlins. Faced with circumstances that are personally toxic…a hostile environment; a micromanaging senior executive breathing down your neck or an endless barrage of Everest-like problems, it’s easy to fall into the professional death spiral. Unless lives (yours and others) are on the line, beware this trap of equating your self-worth and your life’s value with your stressful work experience. While I don’t advocate a casual attitude about your work, remember that you have to give permission to that micro-managing manager or the stressful circumstances at work in order for them to take control of your perception of self. Strive to not cede that control by looking at the reality of the less than life or death issues swirling around you. (In some cases, external help/counseling/coaching is a great idea if you’re in this mode.)
- Engage in the Moment—One Encounter at a Time. Instead of focusing on the noise and heat that you expect to encounter every day, reign in your focal point to the person, group or issue immediately in front of you. Much of our angst is over the expectation of what will happen. The act of focusing on what’s happening in the moment versus boiling the ocean of uncertainty over what may happen or what’s happening in the background is liberating. You get to create the future one controllable moment at a time.
- Get a Mentor. I love the idea to of a great executive mentor for all of the wonderful wisdom they bring to our issues and for the metaphorical clubbing upside the head they provide to help us see ourselves and our situations with a level of clarity that we are unable to gain on our own. Great mentors peel back the layers of complexity and help us identify our core problematic and strength-based issues and then they give us a push (or sometimes a kick) in pursuit of resolving or strengthening around those issues.
- Manufacture “You” Time. Finding time to think deeply about what you are doing and what you need to do is priceless. Our always-on world and our omnipresent devices don’t make this easy. Something as simple as 15 minutes of reading (in your profession, in your discipline, pure escapism… whatever) gives your brain both a much needed stress rest and a jolt of energy and creativity.
- Don’t Be Afraid to Push the Eject Button. While it may sound like I’m suggesting you give up, there are absolutely circumstances where enough is enough. I tripped and stumbled a bit with my own eject activity, however, I would do the same thing all over again. The transition helped me refuel and regain much needed context. Importantly, it set the stage for some of my life’s best work. Sometimes a new adventure is just what the spirit needs to revitalize.
No Need to Suffer in Silence
Here’s what I’m saying…. I’ve encountered too many people suffering in silence in their roles responsible for others. Nothing good comes of this martyrdom…for you for or for those around you.
Pick a strategy to recharge…try a variety of approaches until something works or, cultivate the courage to go do something else. The only mistake is to stay locked in irons, making yourself and everyone around you miserable.
Leading others is too important to be left to someone out of gas and out of heart. Given our challenges in this world, we need all the leadership energy and heart we can muster.
Here are 20 popular leadership blogs I found useful that you might want to check in with on a regular basis:
- Switch and Shift: The Human Side of Business by Shawn Murphy @TheShawnMurphy
- Smart SenseAbilities Blog by Kate Nasser @KateNasser
- TalentCulture: World of Work/Leadershipby Meghan M. Biro @MeghanMBiro
- The Future of Work from Adi Gaskell @adigaskell
- Developing Positive Leaders, Organization, and Teams by Jon Gordon @JonGordon11
- Developing Leaders in Business and in Life by Mark Sanborn @Mark_Sanborn
- Leadership Freak by Dan Rockwell @Leadershipfreak
- Great Leadership by Dan McCarthy @greatleadership
- Leadership Archives by Michael Hyatt @MichaelHyatt
- Leadership Wired Blog by John Maxwell @JohnMaxwellCo
- Random Acts of Leadership by Susan Mazza @SusanMazza
- Eric Jacobson On Management And Leadership by Eric Jacobson @EricJacobsonKC
- Skip Prichard Leadership Insights by Skip Prichard @SkipPrichard
- SmartBlog on Leadership by Smart Brief @SmartBrief
- Leading with Trust by Randy Conley @RandyConley
- How We Lead by Ken Blanchard @kenblanchard
- Soul to Work by Scott Mabry@soul2work
- Tanveer Naseer Blog by Tanveer Naseer @TanveerNaseer
- Todd Nielsen Blog by Todd Nielsen @toddbnielsen
- Great on the Job by Jodi Glickman @greatonthejob