Feeling exhausted and overwhelmed with your professional position as a leader?
Between inspiring entire teams, making business-critical decisions, and setting a clear vision for the company, leadership burnout coupled with disengagement is reportedly widespread – and on the rise.
According to figures from DDI’s Global Leadership Forecast 2025, which surveyed over 10,000 leaders from different industries across the world, 71% reported significantly higher stress levels since stepping into their current roles.
Add to this the findings from Kahoot’s 2025 Workplace Engagement Report – where only 47% of leaders currently consider themselves “fully engaged” in their work, and 46% say they would give up their title if it meant regaining a sense of engagement – taking up a leadership position starts to look like a rather unattractive proposition.
These staggering – and deeply revealing – statistics highlight the importance of developing workplace resilience and implementing methods of safeguarding your professional performance.
As an influential leadership authority operating in the elite level sport, education, and business space,
Drew Povey explains his new playbook for re-energising yourself and your teams.
Why does it matter when the leaders lose their spark?
Burnout and disengagement are connected, but they are not the same.
While burnout is exhaustion, often driven by constant pressure and decision fatigue, disengagement is detachment fuelled by a loss of connection, purpose, and enthusiasm for the vision that once motivated every decision.
Of course, feeling disengaged and burnt-out at the same time can have a profound impact on your individual professional output as well as your personal life. But when leaders lose their spark, teams lose their light, too.
Instead of being confined to the performance of just one member of the team, the effects of burnout radiate across teams, and in some cases, entire businesses as they quietly drain energy, creativity, and culture from the inside out.
It’s the leadership paradox of our time: the more responsibility we carry, the less space we create for our own renewal.
The remedy? Crucially, it’s not about working harder. It’s about leading differently.
The five leadership levers to reignite engagement
Recharge yourself first
The oxygen mask principle applies – if you can’t breathe, you can’t lead.
Building rest periods, moments of reflection, and firm boundaries into your routine isn’t self-indulgence; it’s self-preservation that will ultimately support the entire team’s success.
Reconnect people with purpose
Engagement thrives when people know why they do what they do. Clarity, context, and connection are leadership fuel.
Great leaders, particularly in the age of AI and automation, don’t just tell people what to do, they offer meaning behind the tasks, reminding the whole team why their work really matters.
Reignite growth and learning
Disengagement often comes from stagnation. When work stops stretching us, it starts draining us.
By creating space for curiosity, learning, and development, both for your team and for yourself, you can promote performance-boosting growth and learning.
Lead with emotional intelligence
Empathy, active listening, and psychological safety are no longer optional soft skills that, under the right circumstances, are ‘nice to have’.
All these skills are indicative of a leader with strong emotional intelligence. And these individuals are adept at creating teams that feel seen, supported, and safe enough to bring their best to the table.
Celebrate progress, not just perfection
Recognition is the antidote to disengagement. The smallest “I saw that” or “well done” moment can reignite motivation more than any grand strategy. When people feel valued, they bring value.
Focusing on presence, not performance
Burnout and disengagement are stark reminders that leadership, at its core, is incredibly emotional, energetic, and deeply personal.
Yes, the data tells a worrying story right now, but it also reveals an opportunity: an opportunity for leadership to shift away from performance obsession and towards presence intention.
With speed, scale, and stress dominating the workplace, the most effective leaders will be those who can listen deeply, think clearly, and act intentionally amid pressure.
By adopting a more aware, empathetic, and human approach to leadership, we create space to look inward and ask:
“Am I still connected to what makes me come alive?”
Because when leaders rediscover that spark, everyone else can feel the warmth.