Tackling your board's next big question

Burnout is taking a toll on CFOs. One person's recovery from burnout is a team sport and needs good communication, sharing the burden, and ruthless prioritization. 

There are days that are hard to get through as CFO. Long days, late nights, and grumpy board members. Work feels difficult and vacation so, so far away. These days may be unpleasant but they are temporary. 

And then there are those days that feel impossible. Fatigue. Irritability. Brain fog and physical sluggishness. The job is overwhelming and there’s no getting through it. If you have days like this more than every so often, you might be burnt out. 

In fact, there’s a good chance you are. Global CFO retirements have doubled in the last six years, with fatigue and burnout a factor in the increase, according to Russell Reynolds. 

A burnout episode can have debilitating impacts on individuals, potentially leading to lasting health problems or career challenges. Companies feel the burn too, as a sudden CFO exit can stall strategic plans for months or years.

But burnout doesn’t get fixed by a CFO simply trying harder, and it won’t get fixed with better time management. In fact, a CFO can’t fix burnout alone. To truly recover, CFOs need help from their families, coworkers, and boards. 

In part one of this two-part series, we looked at how burnout is contributing to a wave of CFO retirements. Many of the causes are structural: Expanding mandates from more demanding boards. Macro shocks that never let up. 

Today, in part two, we are exploring how CFOs and their employers can manage chronic stress to avoid CFO burnout. As structural uncertainty keeps the pressure on, these actions can help the CFO cope and thrive, rather than blowing a circuit. 

For CFOs facing burnout now, the symptoms often first show up physically. And recovery from burnouts starts with the body. Hitting the gym helps. A recent study found that regular aerobic exercise significantly reduces burnout symptoms, while at the same time improving psychological health and job satisfaction.

Wilson Meloncelli, human performance consultant at Mavericks Consulting, said he and his team have coached 12 finance leaders through burnout in the last 18 months.

In all of them, the issue wasn't work volumes but struggling to cope with increasing uncertainty, he said. “When external volatility moves faster than internal models, the nervous system registers constant threats, the system overloads, sleep is disrupted, and recovery windows are lost.”

Meloncelli and his team use heart‑rate measurement, breathwork, and other techniques to counter the physical damage and foster resilience. For example, building different recovery activities into your daily routine avoids nervous depletion. 

The firm also helps individuals reframe unhealthy beliefs that keep them on course for burnout, such as not needing breaks in an “always on” culture.

Meloncelli said he’s seen CFOs avoid burnout and stay much longer in the role from closing that loop between demand and capacity at a biological level.

But that’s the body. What about finding burnout relief within your organization?

Finance leaders say one or even two strong span breakers can be the best way to avoid overload and breakdown. But adding senior staff also comes with a different set of risks. 

“I’m seeing more CFOs saying, ‘I need two individuals—a chief accounting officer, plus someone who can translate strategy into commercial decisions, performance management and investor communications’,” said Jim McGlone, head of UK CFO practice at Russell Reynolds.

Splitting your own role can reduce stress too. Amin Muhammad, founder at CFO-led professional services firm Epicwayz Advisors, said: “If you’re [trying to place] finance, IT, HR, and M&A under one leader, you also need a COO.”

However, it’s not as simple as rubbing a genie lamp to make a COO appear and suddenly the CFO feels great. Every layer of seniority added is another degree of separation between the board and the work. Strategic context dilutes, communication gets more complex and vulnerable to error, and the org chart becomes more expensive and less agile at the same time. All problems that make the CFO’s job harder, not easier. 

Not to mention, making the case to a board with an eye on headcount costs in the AI era might not fly.  

Smart delegation is crucial too. Delegating and sharing responsibilities helps prevent burnout, even in high pressure roles… But CFOs can’t stop at “delegate more.” 

The biggest mistake stressed out CFOs make isn’t failing to delegate, it’s delegating poorly: Dumping tasks without context, micromanaging decisions, or handing off work without the necessary authority. That kind of mismanagement just passes your burnout to your team.

Effective delegation, especially when mitigating burnout, means giving people clear ownership and trusting their judgment, and then getting out of the way. Done well, delegation protects you and your team from burnout.  

“One CFO I’ve seen, in his first 18 months, did major acquisitions and divestments, and dealt with an activist investor, a cyber incident, and an accounting fraud. He looked energized because he had great people and moved between them in a rapid, structured way. That allowed him to allocate time for high-risk, high-value decisions,” said McGlone. 

That’s contrary to 90% of executives who, in trying to meet board expectations, don’t give themselves time to reflect and think deeply, he added. The relentlessness is fatiguing.

Muhammad said no thinking time is actually the earliest warning sign of burnout. “When you can’t sit with a problem for 30 minutes without ten interruptions, that’s the moment to renegotiate scope. Not six months later when the month-end close is breaking,” he said.

Alongside realistic resourcing and mandates, companies can reduce turnover by giving CFOs political safety. 

“CFO burnout builds through small accommodations that feel reasonable in the moment. Defending a number they have reservations about. Softening a concern to avoid tension with the CEO. That drains clarity and self-esteem, and many finance heads are tired of those choices,” said Julian Baldwin, CEO of Cohere Leadership Group.

Baldwin recommended that CFOs pull their leadership team into the room for the hard questions, and treat speaking up early as a real strength.

Communicating early and often helps take the sting out of potential stressors that could knock you down later.

Chris Wilmot, CFO at spend management solutions provider Medius, recommended that CFOs share collaboratively by building external advisor networks to help with issues you can’t fix in-house. The key is not to view burnout red flags as personal failings, but as a sign the finance function, and even board culture, need fixing. Or, a sign that it’s time for a fresh start somewhere else.

And, talk to other CFOs. All the CFOs we spoke to stressed the value of an external peer network too. 

“Have two or three people you can call to say ‘I’m seeing this, am I crazy?’, without it getting back to their board. Those relationships are worth more than any executive coaching program,” said Muhammad.

But not every organization has the resources, or the will, to add to the team. If there’s no help coming, eventually, you may need to walk before you break. For example, it might be time to go  if:

“Don’t try to outrun a structural problem with heroic personal effort,” said Muhammad.

Answering your board’s next big question.

Last week’s Playbook introduced a brand-new series: Building FP&A.

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