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- Is Your Calendar a Panic Attack? There's a Fix.
Is Your Calendar a Panic Attack? There's a Fix.
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You just hired a Chief of Staff. Your team thinks you're brilliant. You know the real reason. You've been in back-to-back meetings for three years straight.
Your calendar looks like a game of Tetris played by someone having a panic attack. You answer emails at 11 PM and wake up thinking about quarterly projections. Everyone calls you successful.
You call yourself exhausted. But you can't just step back. Not when the board expects growth. Not when your team looks to you for answers. Not when stepping away feels like admitting defeat.
So you do what every smart executive does. You hire a Chief of Staff. Suddenly, you're not micromanaging anymore.
You're "delegating strategically." You're not avoiding decisions. You're "empowering your team." You're not checked out during meetings. You're "thinking at a higher level." The Chief of Staff becomes your professional body double.
They attend the meetings you used to attend. They make the calls you used to make. They put out the fires you used to rush toward.
Your team sees a leader who's evolved beyond the day-to-day grind. What they don't see is someone who desperately needed a break but couldn't figure out how to take one without looking weak.
The best part? It actually works.
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Your Chief of Staff handles the operational chaos while you focus on the big picture. Or take longer lunches. Or both. The company runs smoother. Your stress levels drop.
Everyone wins. You're not the first executive to discover this. Half the C-suite has figured out that the Chief of Staff role is the perfect cover for semi-retirement. It's socially acceptable delegation on steroids.
You tell yourself you're being strategic. And maybe you are. Maybe recognizing when you need help is the smartest move you've made all year. Your Chief of Staff sends you the meeting notes.
The quarterly numbers look good. Your calendar has actual white space for the first time in months. You're still technically running everything. You're just not drowning while you do it.
And if that's not worth the salary, what is?
Sometimes the smartest executives aren't the ones working the hardest.
They're the ones who figured out how to work less while achieving more.
Your Chief of Staff just gave you permission to do exactly that.