Recharge to Sustain Your Impact
Leadership Reframe: Recharge to Sustain Your Impact
Remember Rambo? Before the Rocky series, Sylvester Stallone was Rambo. You might not know the plot, but you know this photo. (What a stud.)
“Every man’s got his breaking point.” – John Rambo, First Blood (1982)
Rambo wasn’t talking about corporate leadership, but he might as well have been.
Pushing past your limit isn’t a mark of toughness; it’s a liability to your mission.
Leadership fatigue shows up long before the cracks do. Ignore it, and it takes you – and your team – out of the fight.
And in today’s climate, leaders are hitting that edge more than ever.
Fatigue Is Taking Leaders Out
Look around. Even top-tier CEOs are stepping down after seasons of sustained pressure:
Linda Yaccarino — Stepped in as X’s CEO to stabilize the platform but exited in 2025 after two turbulent years marked by advertiser fallout, internal friction, and Musk’s unpredictable leadership.
Laxman Narasimhan — Left Starbucks in August 2024 after just over a year leading the company, amid sliding sales, investor pressure, and a shift toward greater work–life balance
Dave Calhoun — Announced his 2024 exit as Boeing CEO after years of safety crises, regulatory pressure, and growing calls for cultural overhaul.
Andrew Witty — Left UnitedHealth in 2024 amid mounting operational pressure – a reminder that even industry giants aren’t immune to leadership fatigue.
Susan Wojcicki — Stepped down from YouTube’s CEO role in 2023 after nine years, citing a desire to focus on personal projects and family.
These are NOT people who “couldn’t hack it.” This isn’t failure. Leaders are seeing the cracks before they fracture, and stepping off to protect mission integrity.
They’re people who recognized a truth every Veteran leader knows: Pace and capacity determine longevity.
What Drains You vs. What Fuels You
Burnout doesn’t show up in a single bad day.
It’s the slow bleed of ignoring what drains you and failing to build in what fuels you.
Sustainable leadership isn’t about grinding harder.
It’s about learning:
What drains you.
What fuels you.
Where you need to say no – before your body, mind, or team says it for you.
Veteran leaders know the drill:
You don’t run operations tempo at redline forever.
You rotate. You refit. You recover.
This means setting brutal boundaries and creating renewal rhythms:
Capacity Checks: Weekly scans of your calendar, commitments, and team load.
Energy Audits: What people, projects, or habits suck the life out of you? Which ones fire you up?
Release Valve Moments: The hard calls you avoid – like letting someone go – are often the ones keeping you stuck in burnout cycles.
The Art of Letting People Go
The hardest leadership call isn’t the strategic pivot. It’s knowing when to release people who no longer align with the mission.
In our latest #BYAT podcast drop, CEO Omar Dennis reminds us that leadership isn’t just about letting people go – it’s about building intentional rhythms, like quarterly check-ins or informal gatherings, to make sure your people are still in the right seat before problems build up.
Leaders who can’t release – toxic hires, deadweight projects, unworkable partnerships – wind up carrying burdens they were never meant to hold.
This isn’t heartless.
It’s leadership stewardship.
Leading for the Long Haul
In combat, you train to fight; but also to last.
No soldier runs full speed 24/7. You fight. You refit. You recover. You fight again.
Leadership’s no different.
If you want to make a real impact – in your company, your community, or your country – you need the guts to protect your boundaries, the discipline to build renewal rhythms, and the wisdom to know when it’s time to lay a burden down.
Because every leader’s got a breaking point.
And the wise ones don’t wait to find it.
