Leadership burnout: when caring turns into carrying
Edge of Possibilities | Liz Murray | Exceptional Leadership
Reading time, 4 minutes
Leadership burnout: when caring turns into carrying
I used to dream about work every night, and the strange part is I thought I was doing a great job. My team was happy, and I was the one in the background running on empty. In this episode I share my own story of carrying everyone as a new leader, what it cost me at home, and the shift that let me hand it back so my team could grow.
And if you're heading into the end of the year feeling a bit stretched, join me live on Thursday 19 November.
Key takeaways: A happy team can hide a leader who's running on empty. From the outside, it looked like it was working. Caring leaders often step in and take the pressure off everyone else, then do their own work late at night. The cost showed up at home first. I was there for my toddler and my partner, but my head was somewhere else. My job was to share the vision, show people broadly how things could be done, let them find their own way and champion them while they did it. When I stepped back, the team got more excited, started challenging themselves and solved problems on their own. I started time blocking and the night work stopped. Try this: next time someone brings you a problem, pause and ask, "What do you think we should do?" Then let them have a go.
Timestamps:
0:00 β Dreaming about work every night
0:46 β A new role and a brand new team
1:31 β What carrying everyone cost me at home
2:19 β My job was not to carry everyone else 2:49 β Stepping back and what the team did next
3:37 β One thing to try this week
4:01 β Join me live on 19 November
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PUBLISH DATE: Monday 9 November 2026 at 6:00am Sydney time EPISODE LENGTH: 4 minutes 29 seconds
THUMBNAIL: Leadership burnout: when caring turns into carrying cover, Liz in the pink jacket on navy, "When caring turns into carrying. I thought I was doing a great job."
Full transcript I used to dream about work every night. I would solve problems in my sleep and then I'd wake up feeling tired and not able to think straight. Sound familiar? The strange part about all of it was that I thought at the time that I was doing a great job. My team was all really happy. Everyone was getting along really well with one another. And I was the one in the background quietly running on empty. Last week we talked about what happens when your head takes over. This week is the other side of that, when your heart takes over and you end up carrying everyone else. In the next five minutes I'm going to share what it cost me and the shift that changed everything. I'd stepped into a new leadership role. I had a lot of responsibility and it all happened pretty much overnight. And not long into the role I had a brand new team, and I needed to train them up on my vision and help them understand what we were working toward. So I did what a lot of caring leaders do. I ran around like a chook with my head cut off. I was someone who just got in there. If someone was stressed, I would take it on. If the pressure was building, I would step in and I would take that pressure off them. Then I'd go home, have a short break and do my own work later at night. And I felt like I was on top of everything. The team was happy and positive, and from the outside it looked like it was working. Then I fell pregnant with my second baby. I had a toddler at home and I wasn't sleeping very well. I was stretched between being a good mum for my toddler, trying to rest being pregnant, and maintaining the high standards that I wanted to maintain at work. I put on a happy face every day, but I was worn out and I wasn't showing up in the way that I wanted to. I'd be working late at night and I'd solve problems throughout the night in my sleep, and then in the morning I'd wake up tired and foggy. And the part that constantly missed out was home. I wasn't present for my toddler and I wasn't present for my partner. I was there, but my head was somewhere else all the time, and I just wasn't being who I planned to be for them. So I started reading Jack Canfield, Jim Rohn, Stephen Covey, Brian Tracy and all the rest, and I slowly worked through it and found that something clicked. My job was not to carry everyone else. My job was to share the vision and show people broadly how things could be done, and then let them find their own way. That was a real aha for me. My job was to champion them while they did it, not carry it for them. So eventually I started stepping back bit by bit, and over time my energy shifted from constantly feeling the pressure of supporting to feeling a sense of lightness, where I was asking more questions and championing more. What surprised me most was the team. They got more excited and started challenging themselves. You could see how proud they were of the conversations they'd been having and the problems that they'd been solving on their own. And me? I got my work done during the day. I started time blocking and the night work stopped. Finally I felt like I had that balance, the harmony between work life and home life. Finally I was showing up in both as the version of myself that I had wanted to be all along. Next time someone brings you a problem, before you jump in, pause and ask them, "What do you think we should do?" Then let them have a go. It'll feel slower at first, and that's okay. Every time you hand it back, you're building their confidence and giving yourself a bit of room to breathe. That's the job. If this is landing for you and you're heading into the end of the year feeling a bit stretched, come and join me live. I'm running a webinar called Finish the Year Without Running on Empty on Thursday the 19th of November, at 12 to 1 Sydney time on Zoom. So the link to save your spot is in the description below. And I also would love to hear in the comments: what's one thing that you're still carrying for your team that you could hand back to them? Transcript tidied for punctuation, capitalisation and paragraph breaks from the recording, wording kept as spoken. No wording changes made beyond tidying.