Burning Bright, Not Out: Combating Founder & CEO Burnout
In the dynamic world of entrepreneurship and scaling companies, founders and CEOs are often hailed as visionaries that drive innovation and shape industries. However, behind the scenes, the relentless pursuit of success can take its toll, leading many to experience burnout. Understanding the underlying causes of burnout and implementing effective strategies to combat it is crucial for sustaining long-term success in the business world. Let's delve into the reasons why founders and CEOs experience burnout and explore practical solutions to navigate through these challenges.
Understanding the Causes of CEO and Founder Burnout:
In the pursuit of entrepreneurial success, founders and CEOs often find themselves grappling with burnout, a phenomenon fuelled by several factors inherent in the scale-up enterprise ecosystem. The relentless work demands, coupled with the pressure to perform, can create a perfect storm for exhaustion and mental fatigue. While there are many reasons accredited for burnout, such as isolation, perfectionism, and lack of boundaries, some of the most prominent root cause reasons for leader burnout lie in three main triggers:
Wearing too many hats: SME leaders tend to juggle countless roles, from product development to marketing and sales. This constant context switching can be mentally draining. The belief that ‘you must do it yourself,’ ‘you have your vision of how to succeed and that’s how it’s going to get done,’ ‘you hold the keys to success in how to get it all done,’ might be just what is creating burnout in the first place. The creation of an environment where you are the bottleneck or sole designer/approver of solutions might lead to isolation and stress.
Unrealistic expectations: The unpredictable nature of entrepreneurship coupled with the responsibility of leading a company can create immense pressure. Dealing with uncertain outcomes, financial challenges, and the weight of decision-making can contribute to burnout. The constant pressure to perform in all areas, without a team of trusted advisors around you, can lead to chronic stress and exhaustion.
Financial pressure: From funding to profitability, this is a major area of pressure for CEOs and Founders alike. There are many companies chasing revenues without looking at profitability simply because of the belief that growth is reflected in what others can see – your yearly sales turnover. This kind of stress typically happens when you don’t have the right systems in place to show you when things are not going right and when you don’t have the time to understand the numbers behind the business since you are so busy with wearing too many hats and dealing with unrealistic expectations.
Combating the Flames:
Scale-up leaders must prioritize their well-being by incorporating self-care practices that go beyond the well-known items like setting boundaries and getting adequate sleep, delegating, and taking breaks to recharge. There are two main things that can make a pivotal change to supercharge your growth and minimize your changes of burnout as the CEO or Founder of a rapidly growing and successful SME:
Wear the right hat, let others wear theirs: These solutions might sound simple, and very much the same as delegation. It is not. You must not only let go of wearing all the hats, but you must engage, empower, and entrust a leadership team of trusted advisors around you so that can deliver the things you envision as a leader. Bringing in a COO, CFO, CMO into your team might be what you need to not only allow you to breathe, accelerate growth with innovative ideas from different industries and experiences, and give you agency to see what you cannot see if you operate form a silo leadership position. Allowing others to wear their hats liberates time for you to be the visionary you need to be while still directing which solutions require attention to achieve your vision. Trusting others to manage various aspects of the business not only alleviates the workload but provides you the time to focus on the numbers and drivers that will drive success while fostering a culture of collaboration and accountability. If you do not have the budget or room for a full time C-Suite, a fractional or part-time executive can be just the answer.
Focus on progress, not perfection: Amidst the hustle of a scale-up company, it is essential to pause and celebrate milestones and achievements embedded in progress, no matter how small. Recognizing progress and acknowledging accomplishments not only boosts morale but also reinforces motivation to keep pushing forward. Celebrating successes as a team can allow your team to take pride in the collective journey towards achieving your goals. Celebrating progress will also allow you and your team to foster a growth mindset and foster the understanding that setbacks and failures are inevitable but can seen as opportunities for growth and the stepping stone to achieve progress towards the big picture milestones.
Combating burnout from the world of a scale -up leader requires a combination of self-awareness, initiative-taking measures, and a big picture mindset that allows the team and the company moving forward. Most importantly, by understanding the root cause of burnout and implementing practical strategies to address them, Founders and CEOs can navigate through the challenges of a company at fast growth while safeguarding their well-being and achieving long-term company success.