Pacing the Pause in leadership
I find myself in an unusual stage of life. After ten years of founding and building a business, I rewarded myself with the first Long Service Leave that I have been able to take in nearly 35 years of work. This is really only possible because I have an exceptional team working with me at HCA, who insisted that I would benefit from a break, (and did initially disconnect me from Microsoft teams!). I also have a very supportive partner who is a Director of our company and encouraged me to pause. The challenge has been in finding my own daily pace and rhythms in this time of leave. I am a driver. As a leader, I recognise that I am driven to serve others, however, I also drive those around me to work at a consistently fast pace. I have recently become acutely aware of this. I have always lived my life at a fast pace, wearing multiple hats and being competitive in achieving a range of goals. However, in the intention, aspiration and purpose around building a company, (and restoring a historic property), the ability to enjoy the fruits of labours has largely escaped me, as I rapidly move on to finish the next task.
The first few clear calendar days post Christmas/New year business saw me return to my familiar routine…of engaging with work. The projects and business were all continuing on around me, and yet I could not seem to break from entrenched patterns of completing jobs, and creating more tasks. My colleague provided me with a lovely diary to write all my ideas down, now that my brain had some space, but it is as if I cannot settle into anything and instead, flit between social media, jigsaw puzzles, clearing, cleaning and sorting, and re-engaging with cooking and baking strange slices. I wondered if I needed to officially give myself permission to rest, and this was part of the problem? In the words of the American author Cady North “it can be difficult to unlearn busyness”.
I have read a number of different books addressing the value of finding time for self-reflection and the action of intentionally pressing the pause button in life. I lean towards explicitly reframing pause as a leadership practice rather than an absence of productivity. In a discussion with ChatGPT about my thinking at this time: it helpfully summarised the stages I may be feeling and working through during my leave.
1. Shock/Disorientation — the sudden quiet feels unsettling.
2. Resistance — equating stillness with losing identity or momentum.
3. Reflection — confronting narratives about worth tied to busyness.
4. Reframing — seeing pause as a strategic leadership skill.
5. Reintegration — bringing new clarity about priorities, purpose, and rhythm back into work or life
Finding the joy in a slower pace during leave, is a key focus. Resisting the need to fill each day with a list of jobs is crucial for me. Being comfortable when my friends and colleagues ask me what I am going to do with my LSL, to simply reply: “I have no clear plans” and that is OK. I think I am probably sitting somewhere between stage 3 & 4.
Perhaps the deeper work of this leave is not learning how to stop, but learning how to pace the pause. Not as a withdrawal from leadership, nor as something to be justified, but as a deliberate recalibration of rhythm. For leaders who are wired to build, serve and drive, pause can feel strangely destabilising. Yet it may be precisely this discomfort that signals meaningful change is underway.
I am coming to understand that rest does not arrive on command, nor does insight always follow immediately from stillness. There is a kind of patience required — with time, with self, and with the untidy middle stages of transition. The pause is not empty; it is formative. It reshapes how attention is held, how value is measured, and how leadership presence is sustained over the long arc of a career.
If I return to my work carrying anything new, I hope it is not simply renewed energy, but a deeper respect for cadence — knowing when to accelerate, when to hold steady, and when to step back without guilt. For organisations and leaders alike, the art is not in constant motion, but in learning how to move well. Perhaps this is the real leadership challenge of extended leave: not proving we can step away, but discovering how we might lead differently because we did.
Fiona Hutton, Founder & Director of Hutton Consulting Australia