Every leadership team we speak to is feeling it. The creeping sense that there’s just too much on everyone’s plate.
Too many meetings. Too many demands. Too little time to think. At our recent Hidden Growth Engine event, the data was clear: 79% of leaders said overwhelm is draining productivity. 42% said it’s already affecting client outcomes.
This isn’t about individual time management or resilience. This is about systems. It’s about culture.
And here’s the truth many leaders are starting to face: overwhelm isn’t happening to us — we are creating it. Through unchecked complexity. Through layers of priorities that compete rather than align. Through cultures that value pace over clarity, and activity over impact.
Most participants reported spending 70% to 90% of their time managing — not leading. That means time spent tracking progress, chasing deadlines, delivering to plan. It’s necessary, but it’s not sufficient. Leadership isn’t just about keeping the wheels turning. It’s about setting direction, inspiring teams, and building capacity for change.
So where does culture fit in?
Too often, culture is treated as a side project — a set of values on the wall or a pulse survey in the calendar. But culture is not an add-on. It’s the operating system of the organisation. It shapes how people behave, how decisions are made, and what gets rewarded.
When culture and strategy are aligned, change feels possible. When they are out of sync, leaders burn out and teams disengage.
One of the most striking insights from the session came from a simple question: what would happen if we removed 20% of our current workload?
It’s a confronting idea. But it’s also a revealing one. Because most people said — not much would fall apart. What would change is the quality of attention, the ability to listen, and the capacity to lead.
That is the hidden growth engine.
Culture is not the soft stuff. It’s the smart stuff. It’s the system that enables people to do their best work, together.
If you’re leading in today’s environment, it’s time to put culture on equal footing with strategy.
That means developing a culture strategy map, investing in leadership capability across all levels, and creating forums where truth can be heard — not just from the top, but from every layer of the organisation.
The next phase of growth won’t come from doing more. It will come from doing differently. Less noise. More clarity. Less control. More connection.
Start by asking: what are we choosing to prioritise? And what are we willing to let go of?
Because sustainable transformation doesn’t begin with strategy. It begins with culture.
If your team is overwhelmed, if innovation is stalling, if the weight of responsibility is growing — the Hidden Growth Engine resource below is for you.
