Ever feel like the shine has gone out of that sought after leadership position? Your everyday actions and decision making impact leaves you increasingly susceptible to leadership burn out. It becomes too much when the drudgery of administrative work and the stress of dealing with difficult people outweighs the balance of reward. Here is how to get your leadership back on track so that you can achieve your goals and find your passion again.
How do you know your leadership is not going well?
I found myself uttering the phrase to a new leader, “Yes, well, I’m not exactly the vision of the manager that I wanted to be”. Alright, I was in a funk that day, frustrated by some events going on around me that I could not fully control. Although to be easy on myself, who can control a pandemic?
I realized that I’m not going to enjoy every day, every week some times. But there are times that I have to take a step back and realize that overall I like my job – most days. And it’s realizing that not all days are going to be enjoyable. Some days are going to be downright hard.
It’s when it feels like the joy has gone out of your work, you are just going through the motions, and you are counting down the minutes until its time to leave for the day – it’s likely that you are experiencing leadership burn out.
What is the source of this leadership burn out?
Burn out has been added to the list of diseases by the World Health Organization. It is listed as an “occupational phenomenon” from chronic stress in the workplace that has not been successfully managed.
When it comes to getting your leadership back on track, how you go about identifying the root problem is essential. If you don’t know what the cause is, how can you fix it so that it can be managed?
Read below some of the root causes below and what you can change to start feeling passionate about leadership again.
Cognitive
Fatigue associated with overwork is the source of this cognitive burn out. For instance, I have a difficult time unplugging from work, because I am often on call. Just the knowledge that I have to keep one ear open for my phone leaves it more difficult to decompress in the evenings or weekends.
If your brain is constantly racing with work issues, it reaches its capacity. An example of this would be having a hard time sleeping because your mind is constantly focused on work challenges.
Emotional
It gets overwhelming to give, give, give to employees and get nothing back. Has anyone recently asked about how you were doing and actually meant it? Perhaps on occasion, but you have to give out a lot more energy than you will ever get in return.
Although this is a crux of servant leadership (what can I do for others), it can be draining if you are not taking care of yourself too.
Physical
Consistent high stress has physical impacts on your body. When we are constantly in a state of tension, it builds up and can cause stress related disorders such as tension migraines and upper and lower back pain.
When you are feeling over worked or burned out, lost time due to pain is only going to exacerbate your stress.
How to get your leadership back on track
Yes, there are less attractive aspects of leadership that you take in stride because they are just part of the job. Paying bills, reviewing budgets, and doing reference checks are not exactly the high flying tasks you dreamed of when you were striving towards a management position, but you accept them as part of the job.
Ideal leadership would have a balance between the undesirable tasks with enjoyable tasks. Tedious tasks, and difficult people tasks (customer service or employee) should be balanced with tasks that bring you joy or excitement. For instance, I love project planning and writing policies or updating to align with best practices. Yes, excitement is different for everyone.
When you get into leadership burn out, you need to find out how to increase the enjoyable aspects of your job. This way you can re-ignite the aspects that you found enjoyable and drew you to leadership in the first place.
Read more about how to support your team who are burned out: while you are burned out too!
Staff working exclusively at home? How to support staff who are burned out from working at home. Change is hard! Learn how to get them through.
Strategies to get your leadership back on track
You probably deep down like what you do. But sometimes we forget as tenured leaders why we signed up for this role in the first place. Try these different strategies to re-ignite your excitement for your leadership role.
SWOT analysis on your own leadership style.
A SWOT analysis, standing for: strengths, weakness, opportunities, and threats, is an assessment tool used in business. This analysis tool is used to assess high-level strategic planning to help organizations identify where they’re doing well and where they can improve. Using the spirit of this SWOT analysis – you are going to assess your own leadership skills and abilities.
A self SWOT analysis allows you to to be honest and do a check-in with yourself on the quality of your work, motivations, and future self. Getting back in touch with your motivations and future state can go a long way to re-invigorate your leadership.
Re-frame the problem
As cliche as it sounds, if you think of problems as opportunities, they seem less burdensome.
If you can shift your perspective, carrying around negative energy towards a problem will help your frame of mind and help get your leadership back on track.
There are times where we can ask ourselves, “what’s it all for?”. If you focus on a servant leadership style you can focus on the value that your work brings to supporting others.
Take a break
You may need to get away from the office for a while. Take some overdue vacation, heck, take a sabbatical!
When it comes to leadership burn out, figure out how to truly unplug. Do not be tempted to set your out of office to say that you will have “intermittent access” to email. That means that you will be checking and in some workplaces, a green light to send emails that you do not want to actually check on your vacation. Unplug already!
Talk it out with a mentor
Sometimes you just need to vent, get some advice, and hear that you are not alone.
A great mentor can share their own stories of challenges and times that they felt leadership burn out and how they coped. Plus it helps to hear reassurances that things really will get better.
Take a course to re-ignite your passion
Sometimes learning something new can help think of a solution you are experiencing at work or start a new passion project.
Try something that will actually challenge you and will actually grow your skill set. Being around other talented classmates and having conversations will spark some excitement and challenge you in a new way.
Find some fast wins
Sometimes you just need some actual completion to feel the load lighten. If you find yourself with a huge project, make sure that you break it down in to milestones – and take the time to celebrate the achievements.
Alternatively, you can sneak in some side projects or move a few other things around so that you can feel the satisfaction of scratching some things off your to-do list.
Offer up your mentorship services
Mentor someone else. Watching someone else on their leadership journey can help spark excitement again for your own career.
Sometimes watching the journey of someone else helps remind you of why you got excited about leadership in the first place. It provides opportunity for reflection on how you can get your leadership back on track with the same enthusiasm.
Go to a different team or workplace
Sometimes you need to fit the refresh button entirely. Going to a new team where you do not bring any baggage with you may be the best solution. A new challenge or project opportunities may help find your passion again.
Just be warned the grass isn’t always greener on the other side. I have found that there is the same cast of characters and types of workers everywhere I go.
By taking the time to reflect on how to get your leadership back on track, you are already taking the first step in combating leadership burn out. When you do too little of what ignites excitement, it is easy to lose interest. Instead, use these strategies to help you either ride out the rough times or find new leadership passions all together.