Article · 6 min read

How to Detach Self-Worth From Leadership Decisions

Jerry Colonna · Inc. Free Intermediate

Colonna coached a generation of VC-backed founders through breakdowns, and his whole thesis is that burnout is not caused by hard work but by enmeshing your identity with the company's results. This piece attacks the exact trap in the question: the belief that you are only as valuable as the correctness of your last decision. His fix is our fix, be proud of the quality of the decision and the effort behind it, not the outcome you did not fully control. First-hand from someone who lived the depression he writes about.

• Founder burnout comes from fusing identity with company success, not from the hours, so the cure is untangling the two, not resting harder.
• The belief that you are only as good as your last correct decision is a falsehood; judge yourself on the reasoning and effort, which you own.
• You can be proud of a decision whether or not it succeeds, because the outcome was never fully in your hands to begin with.