What's worse than burnout?

I've sat in 10+ quarterly planning sessions in the last month.

Before each one, I do the same thing - I talk to the leadership team individually, then a handful of employees across the business.

I want to know what's really going on with the business, and the people, before we get in a room and start planning.

And I keep hearing the same thing.

"I don't want to take on more. I'm afraid of burning out."

At first, I took it at face value. Burnout is real. I’ve certainly been a victim of it. So from experience I knew exactly what they were hesitant of. But something felt off.

So I started asking a follow-up question: "What does burnout mean to you?"

Silence. Or worse - vague answers. "You know... just too much." "Feeling overwhelmed." "Not having a life."

After about the 30th conversation like this, I realized something: most of the people saying they're afraid of burnout can't even define it. They're not running from something they've experienced. They're running from something they've been told to run from.

The people I'm describing aren't lazy. They're talented, smart, and efficient. They just don't want to work more than 20-30 hours a week. Not because they're trying to coast, but because they genuinely believe that any more than that puts them at risk.

I'm not here to tell someone they should grind 60 hours a week. That's not the point. I’ve done that as well and outside of a few periods of my life, working 60 hours a week was completely useless.

But here's what I've noticed: when I inherited these teams - teams I didn't build from scratch - I found that not everyone had the same grit and drive I saw in the people I hired myself. The ones I hired were excited to take on responsibility. They wanted to be challenged. They wanted to grow.

The teams I inherited? Some of them had already decided what "safe" meant to them.

I’m not a professional burnout researcher, but I’d say I’ve gotten a good handle on seeing it in myself and others. Think of burnout as what you probably imagine - overstimulation. Too many demands, too much energy spent, running hot until you burn out (pun intended).

Now think of the opposite - what I’ve seen called rustout.

Things that rust are either not cared for or simply not used enough. It's sitting on your potential. It's wasting your abilities on nothing meaningful. And I feel like a lot of the people in the broader workforce see that as… balance.

People who are "protecting" themselves from burnout by doing less, taking on less, caring less. And over time, they lose the edge. The passion fades. The work becomes a transaction. They show up, but they're not really there.

The irony? They end up just as exhausted - not from overwork, but from under achievement.

When I was building Pneuma, I wasn't thinking about burnout. I was thinking about survival.

I had no safety net. No fallback. I was living in a 180 square foot room in Chicago, rent was $650, and I had set this insane goal to retire by 30. There was no version of that story where I played it safe.

And the crazy thing is - I didn't burn out. Not because I worked less, but because I was working toward something that mattered to me. I was stretched fairly thin, but the excitement of what I was doing was more meaningful.

The moments I came closest to breaking weren't when I was doing too much. They were when I felt stuck. When the work felt pointless. When I lost sight of why I was doing any of it.

Working Theories

So what do you do when someone on your team says they're afraid of burning out?

You have two paths.

Path 1: Fight it.

Push for more hours. Demand more output. Wonder why engagement tanks and turnover spikes. This never works, and it misses the broader point entirely. You can’t force someone to work more if they don’t want to. At least, not in the world we’re living in now.

Path 2: Encourage it.

Ask what they actually mean by burnout. You’ll find that most people can't tell you, and that's your opening to have a real conversation with a team member.

Here's how I've approached it in the past.

1. Have a real 1:1.

Not a status update. A real conversation about who they are and what they want.

I wrote about this in a past issue, but the premise is simple: know your people so well that you can align the business with their personal goals. When their goals and the company's goals move in the same direction, the business becomes easier to run and the team becomes easier to lead.

Ask them: What are your goals for your life? What's your plan to get there? What challenges do you expect?

You'd be surprised how few leaders ever ask these questions. And you'd be surprised how much it changes the dynamic when you do.

2. Challenge their assumptions.

If someone tells you they're afraid of burnout but can't define it, don't end the conversation there. Push gently. Ask what they're actually afraid of. Ask what "balance" looks like to them. Ask if they've ever actually been burned out - or if they're just avoiding something they've been told to fear. Again, you’ll probably learn something about your people that you didn’t know before.

Most of the time, fear of burnout is really fear of discomfort.

3. Build something worth working for.

This is arguably the most important point. Build something that people enjoy working for, and are willing to push themselves into a little discomfort because it’s meaningful to them. If your team doesn't want to work hard, ask yourself: have you given them a reason to?

The companies I've seen with high-performing, hard-working teams all have one thing in common - a mission that matters. People will run through walls for something they believe in. They won't run through walls for a paycheck and a myriad of Slack channels and ClickUp workspaces.

If your team is coasting, it might not be a "them" problem. It might be a "you" problem. What are you building? Why does it matter? And have you made that clear to the people doing the work?

Working Theories: On 1:1s

I’m a big believer that most 1:1s miss the mark. Badly.

Simply put, they look more like a 30 minute call to micromanage an employee. May not be your intention, but it’s what it looks like in reality.

As mentioned above, I have a different take on 1:1s. Not only does it help me know my people better, I’m positive it’s created a better team in the process.

You can find the guide to 1:1s here, and the full guide of Working Theories here