8 Things That Stop CEO and Leaders From Getting What They Want

[8 Things That Stop CEO and Leaders From Getting What They Want]

Over my 15 years of working as a coach I’ve frequently asked the question, ‘what stops you from getting what you want?’

If you can recognise what’s holding you back and remove or reduce its hold then forward movement is simple and often rapid.

Continuing to focus on finding the accelerator without ever releasing the breaks is a recipe for burnout.

These are some of the most frequent responses.

1. Their relationship with their mobile phone - it grabs them first thing in the morning and even sometimes at night.

Frequently checking email and slack across the day meaning they are in a constant state of urgency to the point they feel uneasy when they don’t have something productive to do.

2. They don’t have the energy - sometimes that’s ups and downs, others it’s a constantly low state, a sort of wired tiredness that causes them to resist non-urgent tasks and find home life incredibly draining.

3. They worry about all the possible things that could go wrong that have perhaps gone wrong in the past and that worry causes them to never feel like they can relax or fully delegate responsibility to others.


4. They haven’t learned to coach so they find themselves giving tips or softly advising which results in them becoming a bottleneck in the business as people keep coming back to them for advice and help.


5. They don’t have a clear and aligned idea of the home life they want, from their partnership to their parenting. This leads to conflict, resistance, confusion and stress at home meaning they almost never feel relaxed and recharged or even see work as the relaxing place to be.

6. They allow other people to dictate their diary - they say yes before getting all the details, they say “what time works for you?” They allow others to pressure them into a response before they know enough to give a genuine response and pretty soon they are committed to someone else’s agenda.


7. They don’t have a clear system for consistently creating the energy, health and rest that they need in order to manage their lives. In fact their health is at the whims of what ever is happening in the business at any given time. Much like their happiness.


8. They have no clear compass guiding their actions so they often act from feelings or rationalisations rather than from their values, purpose and beliefs. This causes them frustration, impostor syndrome or trying to convince themselves with lots of talk as well as others finding them unpredictable.



Rather than focusing on willpower, discipline, determination, accountability or goal setting to find the accelerator I simple help my clients to take off the breaks.

I find that they tend to move rapidly in the direction they want to go in once they have put down all of those things that slow them down or grind them to an absolute STOP 🛑

What about you, what slows you down or stops you from achieving what you set out to?