Rethinking Self-Care in Leadership: It's About Skill, Not Time Off
Self-care is often discussed in leadership circles, but frequently misunderstood.
Self-care is often discussed in leadership circles, but it is frequently misunderstood. It is commonly reduced to taking time off, unplugging, or stepping away from work. While rest matters, this narrow view overlooks what self-care truly means in a professional leadership context.
For leaders, self-care is not about avoidance—it is about effectiveness. Professional self-care involves strengthening the skills and systems that reduce stress by increasing clarity, organization, and control over one’s work. This includes improving time management, maintaining a disciplined calendar, creating actionable plans, using effective to-do lists, and establishing routines that prevent constant urgency.
As a supervisor of school leaders, I have observed that those who appear the most overwhelmed are often not lacking commitment or effort; they are lacking systems. Taking a day off without addressing organizational habits frequently results in returning to an even larger backlog, heightened stress, and reduced effectiveness.
True self-care for leaders also includes distributed leadership. When leaders attempt to carry everything themselves, burnout is inevitable. Developing others, delegating with intention, and building leadership capacity within the organization are not only sound leadership practices—they are essential forms of professional self-care.
Leaders who engage in this type of self-care recognize that sustainability comes from structure, not escape. They invest in the skills that allow them to lead with clarity, respond rather than react, and maintain focus amid complexity. In this sense, self-care is not something leaders do away from their work; it is how they do their work better.
