Why your high performers don’t switch off - and what that’s really costing the business
Hello Reader
If I’m honest -
I didn’t struggle to switch off because I didn’t know I should.
I struggled because my head never stopped.
I was either:
worrying about how I was going to deliver the work in front of me
or thinking about where the next piece of work was coming from
That constant shift between pressure and uncertainty…
Is something I saw a lot in employment law.
And it’s something I now see across many areas of business.
Even when the workload changes the thinking doesn’t.
And from the outside?
They still look like your strongest people.
Reliable.
Delivering.
Performing.
Which is exactly why this gets missed.
And this is where it becomes a business risk.
Because people who aren’t switching off:
don’t fully recover
make slower, more cautious decisions
become less commercially effective
and often carry that pressure into their teams
Performance doesn’t suddenly drop.
It erodes - and it’s often not visible until it’s already costing you.
This is something I now see consistently in the organisations I work with.
Particularly at this point in the year.
After promotions.
After year-end pressure.
As firms start to look ahead to summer.
Because while firms expect things to ease…
But for many high performers…
nothing has really switched off.
Their workload might have shifted.
But the responsibility hasn’t.
The pressure hasn’t.
The thinking hasn’t.
Which is why this point in the year matters more than it might first appear.
Are your people actually recovering…
or just carrying pressure more quietly?
Because if performance still looks “good”,
it’s very easy to assume everything is fine.
That’s exactly where this gets missed.
And that’s exactly where I now spend a lot of time with firms - helping individuals and leaders recognise these patterns earlier, while performance is still strong.
And when performance is 'good' - this is the opportunity to get the most return from any investment made into your people.
If this is something you’re starting to notice in your team, it’s worth paying attention to now - before it becomes something more visible later in the year.
Best wishes
Vikki
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