With 2024 seeing an all-time high rate of burnout, what if we did things differently in 2025?
Our brains are not naturally wired to thrive amidst constant change and uncertainty but that’s where we find ourselves coming into the new year. To maintain peak performance through this volatility is the challenge of 2025 — thankfully, our productivity and performance experts are here to help you sustain healthy high performance and keep productivity high and burnout at bay this year.
To set you up for success in 2025, we’re publishing a three-part series exploring “trends to watch” in the year ahead. First up, optimizing performance. We often enter the new year with renewed energy — we’re refreshed, recharged, and motivated! So, we asked our expert speakers, how can we sustain that energy throughout the year for consistent performance and avoid burnout and fatigue.
From Olympic champions to coaches and evolutionary anthropologists, our experts reveal game-changing strategies to sustain your energy and drive throughout the year. Dive into their advice below and discover what you need to perform at your peak in 2025.
Embrace Strategic Laziness

Sarah Wells
Olympian | Expert on Individual and Organizational Excellence
Let’s talk about a game-changer for 2025 — strategic laziness. In today’s high-paced culture, the relentless push to set and achieve more goals can lead to burnout and inconsistent performance. But imagine setting goals, when you can, around being lazy?
Through my Olympic pursuit, I realized that managing my energy was crucial to crushing each workout. Instead of trying to do everything, I chose to be intentionally lazy in other aspects of my life. For example, I stopped cooking meals and started using a healthy meal delivery service. This simple shift freed up valuable time and energy, allowing me to focus on what truly mattered — my training.
Strategic laziness isn’t about avoiding work, it’s about prioritizing your energy. By thoughtfully deciding where to conserve effort, you can sustain high performance and achieve your most important goals without burning out. Performance isn’t about doing more; it’s about doing what matters most.
Sarah Wells inspires audiences to embrace excellence without limits. With more than a decade of competition at the highest level, along with a master’s degree in leadership and innovation from Smith School of Business, she provides engaging, research-backed insights to help audiences unlock potential both personally and professionally.
Micro Actions, Recovery, and Purpose

Dr. Ivan Joseph
Award-Winning Performance Coach | Leadership and Cultural Transformation Expert
The start of the year is like the first whistle of a soccer match — filled with energy, focus, and determination. But as the year progresses, keeping that momentum requires a game plan. Here’s how you can sustain energy and perform consistently in 2025:
- Start with micro actions: You don’t have to do everything all at once. Completing simple small steps fuels motivation and can keep you focused and energized for the long run.
- Invest in recovery: High performers understand that rest is as important as effort. Build non-negotiable breaks into your schedule — from daily mindfulness moments to quarterly time-offs. Rest isn’t a weakness; it’s a performance strategy.
- Anchor in purpose: Burnout often stems from feeling disconnected. Regularly reconnect with your “why” — whether that’s the impact of your work, the people you serve, or personal growth. Purpose is a renewable energy source.
And most importantly when you’re not perfect — and no one is… BEGIN AGAIN!
Dr. Ivan Joseph has spent his career leading cultural transformation and building cohesive teams. His research has focused on understanding how self-confidence drives performance and now, as an internationally renowned speaker, he shares this knowledge to help leaders cultivate inclusive, high-performing workplace cultures.
Know When to Prioritize Optimal Sleep vs. Paleo Sleep

David R. Samson
Professor of Evolutionary Anthropology | Bestselling Author of Our Tribal Future
The secret to unlocking consistent energy and avoiding burnout lies in channeling rhythms honed over half a billion years. Life evolved to predict and optimize energy use, and we can do the same by aligning modern demands with ancient biology. Sleep, the cornerstone of wellness, operates in two dynamic “gears”:
- Optimal sleep gear: Recharge with disciplined routines. Prioritize consistent bedtimes, a minimalist sleep environment, and mindful timing of meals, exercise, and screens to sustain long-term focus, productivity, and resilience.
- Paleo sleep gear: Adapt during life’s unpredictable moments. Use shorter, flexible sleep to nurture social bonds or handle urgent demands without derailing overall well-being.
Strategically switching between these gears is the key to balance. Lean on optimal sleep for high-stakes periods and shift to paleo sleep when opportunities arise. Mastering this adaptive approach ensures consistent energy, peak performance, and resilience throughout the year.
One of the greatest challenges we face as a species is that we’ve evolved for how things were — not how they are. Evolutionary anthropologist David R. Samson skillfully demonstrates how to tap into human nature and bridge the gap between past and present to enhance team unity, optimize wellness and performance, and embrace embodied leadership.
Build in Messi-Style Strolls and LeBron-Worthy Timeouts

Jhanelle Peters
Mental Health and Workplace Wellness Expert
There’s a reason why names like LeBron James and Lionel Messi come up every time we talk about the best of the best in sports. These legends have lasted — season after season — because they’ve mastered the art of taking breaks. Sure, there are built-in ones like timeouts and half-times, but the real magic lies in the breaks they create for themselves.
Take Messi, for instance. He’s known for strolling around the field more than most players. Is he slacking off? Nope! He’s conserving energy so when it’s go-time, he can bolt like a rocket and outplay everyone. LeBron, Messi, and even entire sports understand this crucial point: breaks aren’t a weakness; they’re a secret weapon.
So, how are you setting yourself up to include breaks this year? Because here’s the thing — burnout happens when you try to be superhuman for too long. And the best humans know the power of a good pause.
Living and working within constant change and uncertainty makes it difficult for high-performing individuals to maintain their overall well-being. A registered psychotherapist, Jhanelle Peters helps to bridge that gap, simplifying life’s most complex challenges to leave audiences empowered to embrace change while rediscovering their limitless potential.
The Six-Factor Antidote to Burnout

Chris Bailey
Productivity and Performance Expert | Bestselling Author
The science of performance tells us something remarkable: there are six variables that keep us engaged at work over the long run. First, our workload must be manageable — reducing workload is the most common burnout intervention — and we must feel in control of our work and have the autonomy and resources to do it well. We also need to feel rewarded (financially and socially) and have a sense of community with those we work alongside. Lastly, we must feel as though we’re treated fairly and that our work aligns with our values — that we can express who we are through our work.
Curiously, these exact same factors are what lead us to burnout. Engagement and burnout are polar opposites. When these six factors are out of whack, we feel fatigued and can reach a point of burnout. We don’t always have control over them. But where we do, we must push to mold our job around them — after all, they keep us engaged.
And a final note for the leaders among us: these six variables are the key to leading a high-performance team as well!
Over the past decade, Chris Bailey has personally experimented with pretty much every productivity hack to separate what works from what doesn’t, publishing three bestselling books on the topic. His practical time-saving advice combined with his infectious enthusiasm for the topic, transforms how audiences view productivity at home and work.
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