Municipal Leaders: Develop Faster, Lead Stronger, Build Better
Every week, you’ll get insights and actionable steps to help you navigate personal growth and professional success.
This week in the Municipal Leadership Development Circle (MLDC), we’re exploring “The Burnout Epidemic: The Rise of Chronic Stress and How We Can Fix It” by Jennifer Moss. And if you’re a city manager, county administrator, or department head watching your best people burn out despite every wellness initiative you’ve tried, this book is going to challenge everything you thought you knew.
Jennifer Moss wrote this during the pandemic while experiencing burnout herself. And her research reveals something uncomfortable: burnout isn’t a personal problem your staff can yoga their way out of. It’s an organizational design flaw. The World Health Organization officially declared it an “occupational phenomenon” in 2019, as workplace stress left unmanaged.
Those wellness programs you’ve been adding? They’re treating symptoms while ignoring the disease.
Inside the MLDC, we’re breaking down Moss’s six root causes of burnout through the specific lens of local government leadership:
Unsustainable workload and why “do more with less” eventually breaks people
Lack of control and how political oversight compounds micromanagement
Insufficient recognition when elected officials take credit and staff take blame
Poor workplace relationships that the pandemic destroyed and you haven’t rebuilt
Lack of fairness (the #1 contributor) when advancement feels political not merit-based
Values mismatch between public service ideals and political reality
Each day this week, we’ll examine one of these causes with composite scenarios you’ll recognize from your own organization. We’ll talk about the post-pandemic workplace crisis. We’ll address why hybrid work fractured teams in ways you’re still trying to understand.
And on Friday, we’ll get practical about what you can actually do, not another grand initiative that will fail, but one specific change that addresses one root cause and starts building trust.
You’re probably watching good people leave. You’re frustrated that wellness programs aren’t working. You’re wondering how to keep your team intact when you can’t control the budget, can’t eliminate political pressure, and can’t change the fundamental constraints of government work.
This book won’t give you magic solutions. But it will give you a different framework for understanding what’s actually happening and practical steps you can take within the constraints you’re facing.
Ready to shift from “what’s wrong with our people” to “what’s wrong with our systems”?
Learn more about the Municipal Leadership Development Circle at HaltingWinter.com/MLDC.
The work you’re doing matters. The question is whether your organizational systems support that work or undermine it.
The Municipal Leadership Development Circle (MLDC) is a professional growth community exclusively for city/county managers, administrators, and local government leaders. Each week, we explore insights from transformative books and apply them specifically to the unique challenges of municipal leadership. Join Seth Winterhalter, President of HaltingWinter Municipal Solutions, and leaders from across North America to build stronger cities through stronger leaders. Learn more at HaltingWinter.com/MLDC.
