Latest / Daily Influence / 745. The Leadership Fatigue Nobody Talks About: Why Good Leaders Feel Exhausted Before Burnout Shows Up

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745. The Leadership Fatigue Nobody Talks About: Why Good Leaders Feel Exhausted Before Burnout Shows Up · Daily Influence

• 0:10
  [SPEAKER_01]: Welcome to Daily Influence, your daily dose of positive influence.
• 0:14
  [SPEAKER_01]: I'm Brian Smith founder of IA Business Advisors and co-author of the Iain team series.
• 0:19
  [SPEAKER_01]: Each day we share stories and insights to help you find be and build your influence in a positive and responsible way.
• 0:27
  [SPEAKER_00]: And I'm Greg Clino, partner at IA Business Advisors, and co-host of Daily Influence.
• 0:32
  [SPEAKER_00]: Be sure to follow, subscribe, and share Daily Influence with someone who could use a little extra positivity today.
• 0:38
  [SPEAKER_00]: And make us part of your daily routine, whether it's during your commute on a walk or an quiet moment just for you, because you're influenced matters.
• 0:48
  [SPEAKER_01]: Hey, Brian Smith here with the I&D and your Daily Influence.
• 0:52
  [SPEAKER_01]: And today I'm going to spend a few minutes talking about something I believe.
• 0:58
  [SPEAKER_01]: Many leaders are feeling right now, but very you are really openly discussing maybe what that is is leadership fatigue and not being tired because you worked along day, not needed in vacation I'm talking about the deeper fatigue that comes from a period of responsibility over time.
• 1:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: The fatigue that builds when everyone around you meets answers, they need clarity, they need decisions,
• 1:24
  [SPEAKER_01]: they need reassurance and you become the person expected to provide all of it.
• 1:30
  [SPEAKER_01]: Leadership can be deeply meaningful, but leadership can also be emotionally heavy work and oftentimes people carry in the weight for the most weight are the least likely to admit how heavy it feels or even how alone it can feel because leaders are conditioned to keep
• 1:53
  [SPEAKER_01]: protect ourselves in our team and to solve the next problems and to be a part of solutions all the time.
• 2:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: And often, while doing all of that, they forget to check themselves.
• 2:06
  [SPEAKER_01]: The danger isn't always burnout in the dramatic sense.
• 2:11
  [SPEAKER_01]: Sometimes the danger is much quieter than that.
• 2:13
  [SPEAKER_01]: Fatigue starts changing how you lead before you even realize that you're being influenced by that fatigue.
• 2:23
  [SPEAKER_01]: Because leadership does require constant decision-making.
• 2:27
  [SPEAKER_01]: One thing people underestimate about leadership is how much mental energy decision-making actually requires.
• 2:35
  [SPEAKER_01]: Some decisions are large, many are small, but all of them come at the cost of having to pay attention.
• 2:42
  [SPEAKER_01]: And leaders often don't get relief from it.
• 2:46
  [SPEAKER_01]: You're deciding priorities, you're deciding timing, you're deciding what gets addressed now versus later.
• 2:52
  [SPEAKER_01]: You decide where money goes, where people go, what to say, what not to say, what tone to use, how direct to be or how fast to move.
• 3:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: That's a lot.
• 3:02
  [SPEAKER_01]: Even when you leave the office, many of those decisions keep running in your mind.
• 3:07
  [SPEAKER_01]: been over time, decision fatigue starts to influence our judgment.
• 3:12
  [SPEAKER_01]: It shortens our patience and reduces creativity.
• 3:15
  [SPEAKER_01]: It makes us more reactive as leaders, not because we're bad leaders, but because we're human and we become even unconsciously mentally fall-arloaded.
• 3:26
  [SPEAKER_01]: There's emotional labor and leadership people rarely acknowledge.
• 3:31
  [SPEAKER_01]: Leadership isn't just operational, it's deeply emotional.
• 3:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: leaders often carry the emotional weight of the room and they carry it inside.
• 3:42
  [SPEAKER_01]: They absorb frustration from clients, concerns from our team, conflict between departments, fear about finances, uncertainty about growth, pressure around performance, and often they carry it extremely internalized quietly.
• 3:58
  [SPEAKER_01]: They become the stabilizer, the translator, the encourager, the one trying to hold
• 4:08
  [SPEAKER_01]: That emotional later is real work and there's a real cost to it and it's exhausting, especially when leaders are supporting others while privately carrying their own concerns at the exact same time.
• 4:21
  [SPEAKER_01]: So look responsibility often feels invisible from the outside.
• 4:27
  [SPEAKER_01]: One of the lower parts of leadership is that much of the way is invisible.
• 4:32
  [SPEAKER_01]: Most people see outcomes.
• 4:37
  [SPEAKER_01]: They see the email, they see the results.
• 4:39
  [SPEAKER_01]: What they don't see is what happened before that moment.
• 4:43
  [SPEAKER_01]: The time it took to create the thought that went into those things.
• 4:47
  [SPEAKER_01]: The financial or emotional pressure, the risk analysis, the second guessing, the responsibility attached to the consequences.
• 4:57
  [SPEAKER_01]: Leadership often looks calm externally.
• 5:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: While internally, Gary enormous weight.
• 5:04
  [SPEAKER_01]: And because many leaders are able to be under pressure, the people around them assume they're fine.
• 5:10
  [SPEAKER_01]: Meanwhile, they may be running in a pace.
• 5:13
  [SPEAKER_01]: That's difficult to sustain.
• 5:16
  [SPEAKER_01]: So look at changes our behavior before it becomes burnout.
• 5:20
  [SPEAKER_01]: Also, burnout usually doesn't arrive all at once.
• 5:23
  [SPEAKER_01]: It's not overnight.
• 5:24
  [SPEAKER_01]: It leaks into the egg.
• 5:26
  [SPEAKER_01]: And leaders need to watch for that.
• 5:31
  [SPEAKER_01]: short responses, delayed communication, avoiding decisions over controlling details, promotional reactions that feel bigger than the situation, losing curiosity, becoming cynical, withdrawing from people, or simply not feeling like yourself.
• 5:51
  [SPEAKER_01]: That's why awareness matters because if we don't recognize between early, we start leading from depletion instead of
• 6:02
  [SPEAKER_01]: Culture feels that, families at home feel that, clients feel it, even if they can't name it.
• 6:09
  [SPEAKER_01]: So protecting clarity is part of our leadership responsibility.
• 6:15
  [SPEAKER_01]: In smart management, we often talk about clarity.
• 6:19
  [SPEAKER_01]: Clarity in our goals, clarity in our communication, clarity in accountability.
• 6:25
  [SPEAKER_01]: But clarity also has to exist internally.
• 6:31
  [SPEAKER_01]: That means slowing down enough to think.
• 6:35
  [SPEAKER_01]: Stepping away from reacting, re-centering before responding, delegating wear appropriate and allowing space for recovery, creating margin for strategic thought, creating those deep moments for us to get internalized in pink apart those things that are causing us the most conserved.
• 6:55
  [SPEAKER_01]: Sometimes it pause is the discipline.
• 7:02
  [SPEAKER_01]: better leadership to actually step forward.
• 7:05
  [SPEAKER_01]: The strongest leaders I know are not the ones who run the hardest and the longest.
• 7:10
  [SPEAKER_01]: They're the ones who, you know, how to remain clear while carrying pressure.
• 7:14
  [SPEAKER_01]: It's a learned discipline, and it does matter.
• 7:17
  [SPEAKER_01]: Leadership is responsibility and responsibility has weight.
• 7:22
  [SPEAKER_01]: If you've been feeling tired lately, not physically, but mentally, emotionally, even relationally.
• 7:29
  [SPEAKER_01]: Pay attention to that.
• 7:31
  [SPEAKER_01]: But with awareness, fatigue does not mean weakness.
• 7:35
  [SPEAKER_01]: It often means you've been carrying a lot.
• 7:39
  [SPEAKER_01]: But awareness gives you a choice.
• 7:41
  [SPEAKER_01]: And choice allows you to reset before a exhaustion begins making decisions for you.
• 7:47
  [SPEAKER_01]: Protect your clarity, protect your thinking, protect your pace, because leadership is not about how well you carry others.
• 7:55
  [SPEAKER_01]: It's about how responsibly you carry yourself while doing it.
• 7:59
  [SPEAKER_01]: And that influence matters.
• 8:01
  [SPEAKER_01]: Thanks for joining us today on Daily Influence.
• 8:04
  [SPEAKER_01]: I hope we'll see you again tomorrow.
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  [SPEAKER_01]: Have a great day.