How to Overcome Decision Fatigue in Leadership

By James Fleming, Managing Director of The Power Within Training

It usually starts with a coffee. Strong, early, and hopeful. But then the pings begin. A client wants a callback. Your account manager needs a decision. The team group chat is blowing up. Your inbox has gone from “manageable” to “absolutely not.” Before you’ve finished that first mug, you’ve made more decisions than some people make in a day.

Welcome to leadership.

Now, don’t get me wrong, I love leading. Building The Power Within Training from the ground up has been the most fulfilling (and exhausting) thing I’ve ever done. But here’s the thing they don’t tell you when you start a business or take on a leadership role: you will have to make hundreds of decisions every week. Some big, some small, some so ridiculous you wonder how it ended up on your desk in the first place (yes, Barry, we do need another quote for the printer ink).

And eventually, it hits you: decision fatigue.

I didn’t know the term when I first experienced it, but I felt it in my bones. That mental lag, the irritability, the sudden struggle to choose between emails or lunch. When you’re drained, even “chicken or tuna” feels like a strategic dilemma. And in leadership, that kind of fatigue doesn’t just mess with your lunch order, it messes with your judgment, your focus, and your business growth.

What I Did to Fix It

It didn’t happen overnight. But I started shifting. The biggest change was that I let go of the illusion that I had to do it all.

I brought in a marketing manager and a sales director. Not to dump work, but to give ownership. I started asking: “Does this decision really need me?” Turns out, it often doesn’t. When I trusted the team, they stepped up. And I stopped waking up at 1am wondering about email subject lines or invoice wording.

I also gave our coaches and trainers more authority. We built trust. We empowered them to make the calls they were more than capable of making. And guess what? Not only did it ease my mental load, but the business actually grew faster.

Morning Clarity, Afternoon Chaos

One small trick I swear by is to make your hardest decisions early. I protect my mornings like gold. That first hour after a walk and coffee, that’s when the big thinking happens.

That’s something we teach at The Power Within Training. Your schedule isn’t just about time, it’s about energy. If you’re making strategy decisions when your brain is already fried, you’re doing yourself (and your team) a disservice.

Decision Frameworks, Not Freestyle

When every decision is a freestyle event, you burn out. So we use frameworks. At The Power Within Training, we teach our clients how to use structured decision-making tools.

Simple ones like:

• Context: What are we really solving?
• Options: What are 2-3 viable choices?
• Impact: What are the short and long-term consequences?

This turns decision-making from a stress-fest into a process. One you can teach. One your team can follow. One that doesn’t require your emotional energy every single time.

Daily Must-Do’s and HPAs

One of our favourite tools is the ‘Must-Do List’. It’s easy to react to whatever screams the loudest instead of leading with purpose. So, I set my goals annually. Then I break them down into monthly and weekly chunks. Each day, I write my High-Payoff Activities (HPAs).

These aren’t just tasks. These are the needle-movers. The calls, meetings, and actions that grow the business and empower my people. It’s not always easy, but it works. And it’s exactly what we coach our clients on.

Build a Culture That Doesn’t Rely on You

This is the big one. If every decision has to pass through you, you’re not leading, you’re babysitting a system you built to fail.

With Motivational Intelligence, we help leaders empower teams to think, decide, and act. That’s the magic. That’s when things scale. And that’s when you start enjoying your business again.

You’ll never eliminate decisions. But you can free yourself from the fatigue by focusing your energy where it matters most.

The Power Within Approach

Whether it’s our Leading with Motivational Intelligence programme, our Business Growth Academy, or our bespoke coaching work, we help you:

• Stop firefighting and start scaling
• Make better, faster decisions
• Empower your team to lead
• Build momentum, not burnout

This isn’t theory. It’s what we do. It’s what’s helped thousands of leaders across industries, from construction firms to service-based businesses, to stop spinning and start building.

So here’s the bottom line: if decision fatigue is draining the joy (and the growth) out of your leadership, it’s time to do something about it. You don’t need to carry it all. You don’t need to have every answer. And you’re not meant to do this alone.

At The Power Within Training, we’ve helped thousands of leaders just like you break the cycle, build confidence in their teams, and finally get back to the work that really moves the needle.

Struggling to see the wood for the to-do list? Let’s have a chat.

Drop us a message. We’ll help you lead with less stress, more strategy, and no more decision fatigue.

James Fleming
The Power Within Training
The Motivational Intelligence Company
james@tpwtd.com