World Cup at Work™ · Burnout Edition
Are You Playing Every Position?
✉ Emails
⏰ Deadlines
📅 Meetings
📊 Reports
👥 Morale
One exhausted leader. Every role. No substitutions. Sound familiar?
Slide 2 of 7 · Burnout & Overload
When nobody rests, nobody scores.
Avg. weekly overwork
+9 hrs
Teams citing burnout
3 in 4
"When the whole team is sprinting nonstop — there are no substitutions, no half-time, no recovery."
Slide 3 of 7 · The Source
Burnout isn't weakness — it's system failure.
Tactical Board · Root Causes
Understaffed & over-allocated
Rewarding overwork, not outcomes
No role clarity
Always-on culture
Zero recovery cycles
Vague priorities
The players aren't failing. The playbook is.
Slide 4 of 7 · The World Cup Analogy
Championship teams manage energy like strategy.
🏆
Top teams rotate players
Protect key performers with planned rest — not burnout management after the fact.
📋
Coaches diagram recovery
Rest and rhythm are built into the game plan, not left to chance.
⚡
Energy is finite capital
You can sprint in bursts — but only if you've protected the reserves.
📈
They study the data
Performance dips are signals, not moral failures. Smart coaches adjust.
Slide 5 of 7 · Balanced & Energized
When leaders protect energy, everyone plays better.
Before
✕ Reactive firefighting
✕ Unclear ownership
✕ Guilt about taking breaks
✕ Hero culture rewarded
After
✓ Strategic focus time
✓ Clear roles & priorities
✓ Recovery is modeled
✓ Outcomes over hours
Same team. Different system. Night-and-day results.
Slide 6 of 7 · What You Can Do Right Now
Lead like a World Cup coach.
Run an energy audit
Where is your team's capacity actually going this week?
Set micro-boundaries
One protected hour per day — no pings, no meetings.
Protect strategic time
Block the calendar before others fill it with noise.
Model recovery publicly
Log off visibly. Take lunch. Your team watches what you do.
World Cup at Work™ · Final Whistle
World Cup Leaders Win by Design.
Not every match is won in the final sprint. The best teams pace by design, rest on purpose, and peak when it matters.