It’s not the kind of tired that disappears after a long weekend or a lighter day. It’s the kind that lingers in the background and quietly reshapes how you work. Decisions take longer. Patience runs thinner. Even routine tasks feel heavier than they should, and the pace that once felt manageable now feels like a constant push.
And if you pause for a moment, you’ll likely see that this isn’t just about your team.
You’re carrying it, too.
The weight of ongoing decisions without clear answers. The emotional energy required to support students and staff. The pressure to keep things moving forward in an environment that keeps adding expectations without creating space. The constant pressure to make the case for career over and over again. And over time, that combination catches up with even the most capable leaders.
This is the point in the year where I’ve consistently seen it peak.
And in coaching sessions, I hear it directly.
Leaders walk in with what feels like a never-ending challenge—something that has been sitting on their shoulders for weeks, sometimes months. In my group coaching program, the Career Services Accelerator, those moments surface quickly. People share openly, others nod immediately, and within minutes it becomes clear this isn’t an isolated issue.
It’s collective.
There’s something powerful about that—realizing you’re not the only one holding all of this together with duct tape and determination.
(And let’s be honest, sometimes caffeine and sheer willpower.)
When exhaustion starts shaping your leadership
Burnout has a way of moving quietly from a personal experience into an organizational one. It doesn’t announce itself in a single moment. Instead, it shows up in patterns—how decisions get made, how priorities are set, and how people show up to their work each day.
At the leadership level, it often looks like decision fatigue, hesitation, or an increased need to control variables that feel uncertain. You may find yourself staying closer to the details because it feels easier than stepping back and making bigger calls. Strategic thinking starts to feel like something you’ll get to “when things calm down,” which… rarely happens.
Across your team, the signals are just as real. Engagement dips. Collaboration becomes more transactional. People begin to withdraw slightly, doing what is asked but not bringing the same level of energy or creativity to the work. Over time, performance doesn’t collapse—but it flattens.
And flat is dangerous.
Because from the outside, it can look like everything is fine. Until it’s not.
A moment to check in with yourself
Before making changes for your team, it’s worth taking a step back to understand your own state.
Where is your energy lowest right now? Is it tied to the volume of decisions you’re carrying, the complexity of your environment, or the emotional demands of the work? Are there areas where you feel stuck, or places where you’ve been delaying decisions because everything feels equally important?
You might also notice how that fatigue is showing up in your behavior. Maybe you’re pushing harder and expecting more. Maybe your tolerance for ambiguity has dropped significantly. Maybe you’ve opened your inbox, stared at it, and thought, “I cannot make one more decision today.”
That counts.
There’s no judgment here.
But there is a pattern worth noticing.
Because your team is operating within the conditions you create—especially during periods like this. The pace you set, the boundaries you hold (or don’t), and the clarity you provide all shape how they experience their work.
What’s actually driving the exhaustion
At this stage, the issue rarely comes down to effort or commitment. Most teams in this space are already working hard and deeply invested in what they do. The challenge comes from the accumulation of competing priorities, unclear expectations, and work that continues without being reevaluated.
Over time, more gets added. New initiatives, new requests, new expectations. Very little gets removed. Even meaningful work begins to feel disconnected when it isn’t clearly tied to outcomes or when progress becomes difficult to see.
That combination creates a kind of sustained pressure. People continue to produce, but it requires more energy. Confidence begins to dip. Work becomes more about keeping up than moving forward.
It’s like running on a treadmill that someone keeps quietly increasing the speed on.
At some point, you’re not building endurance. You’re just trying not to fall off.
3 moves when your team is drained
1. Reset what matters in the near term
One of the most effective ways to reduce pressure is to narrow the field of focus. Instead of trying to hold everything at once, define what truly matters over the next 30 to 45 days and make that visible to your team.
This requires real choice. Identifying three priorities means acknowledging that other important work will not receive the same level of attention right now. It requires clarity about what is essential in this moment and what can wait without significant consequence.
🎯 That level of direction creates immediate relief. When people understand what deserves their energy, they move with more confidence. They spend less time second-guessing and more time making progress where it counts.
And yes, this may mean disappointing someone.
Welcome to leadership.🎉
2. Surface and reduce invisible work
A significant portion of exhaustion comes from work that continues without being questioned. These are the standing commitments, processes, and expectations that have accumulated over time and are rarely revisited.
They often feel small in isolation, but together they create a constant drain on attention and capacity. Because no one has explicitly named them as optional, they persist.
Creating space requires bringing this work into the open. Asking your team what could stop without meaningful impact often reveals more than expected. Many people have a clear sense of where time is being spent without corresponding value—they’ve just been quietly assuming it has to stay.
Spoiler: it doesn’t.
This is also where your own behavior plays a critical role. The way you manage your time, communicate boundaries, and respond to demands sets a standard. Your team watches closely and adjusts accordingly, especially in moments when expectations feel unclear.
If you’re answering emails at 10:30 p.m., they notice.
Even if you say, “No pressure to respond.”
They’ve heard that one before.
3. Reconnect the work to purpose and progress
As exhaustion builds, one of the first things to fade is a clear sense of impact. Work continues, but the connection to why it matters becomes less visible. Progress feels slower, and accomplishments are less noticeable.
Re-establishing that connection can shift energy in a meaningful way. Taking time to articulate how current priorities support students, institutional goals, or long-term outcomes helps ground the work in something larger than the day-to-day.
Alongside that, identifying one priority and moving it forward in a visible way can rebuild momentum. When progress is clear and tangible, it changes how the work feels. It also reinforces to others that movement is happening, even in a challenging moment.
Momentum has a funny way of making things feel more manageable.
Even when the workload hasn’t changed all that much.
Action to take this week
Set aside 30 minutes and treat it as protected time. Step away from immediate demands and focus on recalibrating.
Use that time to clarify your top priorities for the next month, identify what can be paused or stopped, and consider how your current approach may be contributing to overload. Think about where you can create clearer connections between your team’s work and meaningful outcomes.
Then communicate it.
Simply. Directly. More than once. In multiple formats.
Clarity is one of the most generous things you can give your team right now.
Final thought
Leadership during periods of exhaustion calls for a different kind of discipline. It requires the ability to slow down just enough to see clearly, even when everything feels urgent.
The goal isn’t to power through at the same pace. It’s to make sharper decisions about where time and energy go, and to create conditions where your team can operate with focus and purpose.
This is something I see play out every week in my work. Leaders come in carrying more than they should, often assuming they just need to push a little harder. With a few intentional shifts, the picture changes. Work becomes more aligned. Energy starts to return. Progress feels possible again.
It doesn’t require a complete overhaul. It starts with a few clear decisions, made at the right moment.
