Founder Burnout
You're exhausted. You've been at 50–60 hours for months. You can't remember the last weekend you didn't check email. Founder burnout is exhaustion from overwork, lack of boundaries, and inability to delegate. It's the primary risk when scaling without proper infrastructure—you become the single point of failure, and your body pays. Naming it is the first step; the next is building the systems so you're not the only one who can deliver, decide, or sell.
Burnout doesn't fix itself with a vacation. A week off might help short-term, but if you come back to the same structure—every client, every decision, every deliverable flowing through you—you'll hit the wall again. The fix is structural: delegation, documentation, operational efficiency, and clear boundaries. So that growth doesn't run through your body.
Building infrastructure isn't selfish. It's what makes long-term impact possible.
What leads to it
No ceiling on hours. If "growth" means "more of my time," you'll keep adding until you break. The alternative is to grow capacity—productization, team, systems—so revenue can grow without your hours growing.
No boundaries. If you're always on—evenings, weekends, "quick" client asks—you never recover. Boundaries require backup: someone else who can handle the urgent, or a clear "we'll get to this Monday" so you're not the only release valve.
Inability to delegate. If you believe only you can do it, you'll do everything. Delegation anxiety and perfectionism keep you in the loop. The shift: your job becomes defining and holding the bar, not doing every step. That's a sustainable role.
What good looks like
You're in 35–45 hours on strategy, key relationships, and visibility. Delivery, operations, and routine client work run through documentation, SOP, and team. You have a work-life balance you can protect. Revenue can grow because the system has capacity, not because you're working more. That's sustainable growth.