#81 - Breaking the leadership death spiral!
1 Oct 25
Many leaders find themselves trapped in a destructive cycle: overloaded schedules, teams that defer too much, and work that drags them deeper into the weeds.
The result is a downward spiral where there’s no time, energy, or mental capacity to create the space required to change what's wrong.
Breaking free is possible, but it requires courage, reframing and deliberate action.
What?
On the surface, these leaders look busy and indispensable. Their calendars are full. Their inboxes overflow. Their people constantly seek their input.
But beneath that apparent productivity lies a dangerous dynamic:
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The leader’s schedule is crammed, leaving no time to think.
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The team defers too much, relying on the leader for answers.
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The leader dives deeper into tasks, firefighting instead of steering.
It feels like control. In reality, it’s fragility. The leader becomes the bottleneck, the team loses initiative, and both performance and morale begin to erode.
This is the death spiral: the more the leader tries to keep up, the more the system drags them down.
Why?
Leaders rarely end up here because of incompetence or laziness. Quite the opposite; it’s usually their capability, reliability and drive that create the trap.
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Competence breeds dependence. Teams trust the leader so much they defer decisions upward.
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Busyness masquerades as progress. A packed schedule feels productive, even when it prevents reflection.
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Urgency displaces importance. The noise of immediate demands drowns out the signal of long-term needs.
The danger is that this spiral doesn’t just burn out the leader, it stalls the team. The leader loses perspective, the team loses empowerment, and blind spots grow until a crisis exposes them.
How?
Escaping the spiral isn’t about time hacks or working harder, it’s about system-level leadership choices:
1. Create Space
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Audit your calendar and remove what only you think you must do.
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Protect blocks of time for reflection and system-level thinking.
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Remember: if your schedule is 100% operational, your leadership is accidental.
2. Transfer Ownership
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Stop delegating just tasks, delegate outcomes.
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Empower team members to decide, not just to do.
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Establish trust through clarity: clear intent, clear boundaries, clear accountability.
3. Redefine Success
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Success isn’t about being the busiest, it’s about building capacity in others.
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Shift the metric: from 'I got it done' → 'the team delivered without me.'
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Celebrate independence, not dependence.
In Summary
The leadership death spiral is insidious because it feels like hard work, responsibility and commitment. But left unchecked, it erodes both leader and team.
The way out isn’t more effort, it’s different effort:
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Carving out space.
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Sharing authority.
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Redefining what leadership looks like.
Leaders don’t break this cycle by accident. They break it by choosing to stop, step back and rebuild the system before it breaks them.
Have a great week!
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