How to recognize and prevent leadership burnout

Burnout symptoms: physical exhaustion, cynicism, reduced efficacy, detachment, irritability, insomnia, neglecting self-care. Early signs in leaders: working longer hours with less output, withdrawing from people, increased negativity, decision fatigue, health declining. Burnout is gradual—by time obvious, damage is done. Vigilance prevents: performance decline, health crisis, regrettable decisions, talented people leaving. Self-awareness is prevention. Denial accelerates decline.

Heroic hours aren't sustainable. Create practices: clear work/life boundaries, protected time off, delegation of routine tasks, saying no to overcommitment, regular breaks and vacations. Model these publicly as leader—team follows your example. Sustainable pace beats burnout-recover cycle. Marathon requires pacing. Always-on culture burns out best people. Boundaries aren't weakness; they're performance optimization. Recovery enables peak performance.

Leadership is lonely, but it shouldn't be isolating. Create support through: peer CEO groups or masterminds, executive coach or therapist, trusted advisors and mentors, leadership team you can be vulnerable with. Isolation amplifies: stress, poor decisions, skewed perspective, hopelessness. Support provides: sounding board, perspective, encouragement, accountability for self-care. Asking for help is leadership strength, not weakness. Nobody succeeds alone.

Can't lead effectively while physically depleted. Non-negotiables: adequate sleep (7-8 hours), regular exercise, healthy eating, annual physicals. Physical health affects: decision quality, emotional regulation, energy levels, stress resilience. Sacrificing health for work is false trade-off—impaired health reduces work effectiveness. Taking care of body isn't vanity; it's job requirement. Peak performance requires physical foundation.

Burnout often stems from: losing sight of why work matters, becoming consumed by tactical, feeling impact is minimal. Reconnect with purpose: time with customers seeing impact, revisiting mission and vision, celebrating wins and progress, remembering original motivation. Meaning provides: resilience during hard times, energy when tired, perspective on setbacks. Tactics without purpose breeds burnout. Purpose sustains through difficulty.

Individual resilience matters, but systemic issues require systemic fixes. Address: unrealistic workload, chronic understaffing, poor delegation, reactive culture, lack of decision authority. Organization can't wellness-program its way out of burnout if work design is broken. Fix: workload, processes, staffing, culture. Putting all responsibility on individual to cope with broken system is abdication. Healthy people require healthy systems.

Burnout is easier to prevent than recover from. Early intervention: take time off, delegate more, adjust commitments, seek support, address root causes. Waiting until breakdown requires: extended recovery, potential health damage, leadership transition, rebuilding relationships. Pride or "too busy" delays help. Early action prevents: catastrophic outcomes, long recovery, collateral damage. Small course corrections beat major overhauls. Prevention is always cheaper than recovery.