Checking Your Leadership Dashboard: Spotting the Warning Lights Before Burnout
Checking Your Leadership Dashboard: Spotting the Warning Lights Before Burnout
Before take-off, a pilot scans the dashboard — checking every signal, every gauge. Each light tells a story: fuel, altitude, pressure, balance. Ignoring even one could cause problems later in the flight.
Leadership is much the same. We all have an internal dashboard that gives us signals when things aren’t running smoothly. The trouble is, we’re often so focused on helping others reach their destination that we miss our own warning lights.
The other morning, a small light appeared on my car’s dashboard. It wasn’t dramatic — just quietly glowing, reminding me something needed attention. Our inner systems work the same way. Fatigue, frustration, or disconnection are early signs, softly signalling us to slow down and check in — before those quiet warnings turn into a mayday call.
What Burnout Really Is
Burnout is not just being tired or having a busy season. The World Health Organisation defines burnout as a syndrome that results from chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully managed. It has three key features:
Exhaustion: feeling completely drained, emotionally and physically.
Cynicism or detachment: losing connection to the work or the people we serve.
Reduced effectiveness: struggling to perform tasks that once came easily.
In Aotearoa, this is becoming increasingly common. A 2024 Massey University study found that 57 percent of workers were at high risk of burnout, more than double the figure just months earlier. The Wellness at Work Report 2024 reported that 61 percent of employees had felt burnout in the past three months, with the number climbing to 70 percent for Gen Z workers.
These are not just statistics. They are a mirror showing us how easy it is to drive on empty without noticing until the engine begins to fail.
Checking Your Dashboard
So what should we be looking for on our personal dashboards? Here are some of the most common warning lights:
Energy gauge: You wake up tired, even after a full night of sleep. Coffee no longer cuts it.
Focus indicator: You are forgetting things, struggling to concentrate, or procrastinating on tasks you would normally handle with ease.
Mood sensor: You find yourself irritable, snapping at small things, or feeling flat and disconnected.
Connection signal: You avoid people, dread meetings, or feel detached from your team.
Meaning meter: The purpose behind your work feels distant, and what once inspired you now feels like a burden.
Body alerts: Headaches, muscle tension, or ongoing health niggles. The body keeps the score of ongoing stress.
These are not signs of failure. They are data. They are your dashboard showing you it is time to pull over and reset.
Catching Ourselves Early
The (somewhat) good news is that burnout doesn’t arrive without warning — it builds gradually, light by light. Which means we can catch it early. Taking a micro-pause to ask, How’s my dashboard looking today? helps us notice when we’re running low on fuel or flying through turbulence.
Small resets — stepping outside for air, breathing deeply, reaching out for connection — act like quick maintenance checks. They steady our systems and keep us flight-ready.
Leaders who tune in to their own dashboards don’t just protect their wellbeing; they model a culture where others feel permission to do the same.
Reflection Prompts
If I looked honestly at my dashboard today, what warning lights are glowing?
Which part of my dashboard; energy, focus, mood, connection, meaning, body, needs the most attention right now?
What small action could I take this week to reset before I hit empty?
Go well this week
Mary-Anne