The Question: How do I handle team burnout after a grueling quarter?

(This question is based on a post I recently came across.)

My team has just wrapped up an exhausting quarter where we had multiple high-stakes deliverables and were running at full capacity for weeks. The work got done, but now I’m noticing signs of burnout—missed deadlines, increased sick days, and a drop in engagement during meetings. Some team members expressed feeling overwhelmed, while others are just quietly disengaging.

I want to address this before it snowballs into a bigger retention or performance problem. I’ve considered giving a small break in workload, but leadership expects us to jump right into new projects. I also worry that just focusing on temporary relief won’t resolve underlying morale or motivation issues.

Have you ever faced this kind of post-crunch burnout in your team? What strategies worked for you to rebuild energy and engagement while keeping the business moving?

My Answer:

I can see how much you care about your team’s well-being and long-term success. You’re right to want to act quickly, burnout can quietly take root if the root cause isn’t addressed.

You’re also correct that short-term fixes won’t solve this. A long-term solution is key. Right now, the crunch may seem to be over, but to prevent these challenges from staying entrenched or getting worse, the way your team approaches work needs to shift.

For example, you mentioned your team was running at “full capacity” for weeks. Given the burnout you’re seeing, it’s likely the team was actually running over capacity, and that’s a sign something is wrong with how the work is being done.

Reframe your focus: Let’s focus on the root causes

Here’s the opportunity: instead of asking only “How do we recover?”, ask “How do we change how we work to avoid ending up here again?

Opportunities to move forward will become clearer when you identify the rules, assumptions, and beliefs shaping how your team tackles its work —  I call these mindset constraints. These constraints explain why your team delivered results and why they burned out doing it.

Here’s what I’ll show you next: first, how mindset constraints actually work together to create burnout; then, how shifting them opens up new ways of working; and finally, some questions you can use to start uncovering the constraints shaping your own team.

How mindset constraints combine to drive burnout

Some common examples of mindset constraints I see in workplaces include:

• “Rest comes after the work is finished.”
  
• “In-office work is higher-quality work.”
  
• “More time working leads to more productivity.”
  
• “The faster we reply to messages, the better.”
  
• “Personal needs come second to work deadlines.”

When mindset constraints like these interact, they create a work environment where the default behaviors all push in the same direction: longer hours, faster responses, fewer boundaries, and little space to recover.

That’s why burnout becomes inevitable. In work environments with these mindset constraints, the finish line keeps moving, recovery time never arrives, and people spend energy faster than they can replenish it.

Shifting mindset constraints unlock new ways of working

Shifting these constraints is what opens up new ways of working.

For example, shifting:

• “The faster we reply to messages the better”  to
• “We respond at the right time, with the right information, using the right channel”

transformed one Toronto company I worked with. By introducing new communication guidelines, they set clear expectations for email and messages ( and gave people explicit permission to unplug 🥳).

And that was just one shift. Each time you shift a constraint, new actions emerge that support the kind of workplace you envision: one where people grow, stay engaged, and thrive personally and professionally.

By surfacing and shifting your team’s mindset constraints, you can open up new ways of working where high performance doesn’t come at the cost of well-being. That’s what makes this a long-term solution.

Start discovering your team’s constraints

Some reflection questions to try with your team (or for yourself as a leader) to help uncover those mindset constraints:

• What does a “normal” workday look like for us? Why does it look that way?
• When we feel pressure, what unspoken rules shape our choices (e.g. who stays late, how quickly we respond, what gets prioritized)?
• Which of those rules actually help us succeed, and which quietly drain our energy?
• If we had to deliver the same results again, but without burning out, what would have to change in how we work?

The big picture and next steps

The burnout you are noticing doesn’t just appear, it’s the result of invisible mindset constraints driving how your team works. And unless something changes, it will most likely get worse, not better.

The good news: it is possible to design work so that the job gets done without burnout. To change the outcome, you need to change how the work gets done. And to change how the work gets done, you need to identify and shift the constraints shaping it.

That’s the path to lasting change. If you’d like to be guided through this process with your team, contact me, I’d be happy to help.