Notes from the Field – Calodagh McCumiskey

Notes from the Field

Wellbeing, leadership and high performance

A newsletter on wellbeing, leadership and what helps people thrive under pressure - drawn from almost thirty years working with people, teams and organisations in demanding environments: first leading humanitarian operations across Africa and Asia, now with leaders in Ireland and beyond.

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Now reading: How to Have Your Cake and Eat It Too, with AI

Friday morning, 22 May 2026

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Notes from the Field

The Hidden Cost of Success

Hi,

I want to share something that has been on my mind - that I think will be useful for you.

Nine years ago, I had a conversation with a highly successful businessman.

From the outside, he had it all. A strong business. Years of hard work. A healthy bank account.

But when we spoke, he said something I have never forgotten.

He told me he did not believe it was possible to have a successful business and a good family life.

That was his belief. And because it was his belief, it shaped his life.

At the time, he was separated, under huge pressure, and carrying the weight of decisions and expectations that very few people around him could see.

He had done what so many leaders, business owners and high achievers do.

He had paid for success with the parts of his life that mattered most - his health, his peace, his family life, his ability to switch off, his capacity to actually enjoy what he had built.

And he is not alone.

The pattern I keep seeing

I see it in business owners, senior leaders, managers and professionals.

Successful, but stretched. Responsible, but depleted. Competent, but overloaded. Respected, but carrying too much.

They keep going because people depend on them.

But over time, the cost builds. Clear thinking becomes harder. Decisions get slower or more reactive. Sleep is less restorative. The mind feels full. Small things feel heavier than they should. Relationships get whatever energy is left over.

And eventually, the question arrives:

"Is this what success is supposed to feel like?"

A statistic worth sitting with

A 2023 global study by UKG found that 69% of people say their manager has the same impact on their mental health as their life partner - more than their doctor or therapist.

Read that again.

The person leading the team has the same impact on someone's mental health as the person they share a home with. That is an extraordinary responsibility for leaders - and it cuts both ways.

A leader who is overloaded and reactive shapes the inner state of the people around them. So does a leader who is clear, supported and well-resourced.

Which is why "leading under pressure" is never just a personal wellbeing issue. It is a culture issue. A performance issue. A people issue. An innovation issue. A profit issue.

What pressure really does

We tend to assume pressure only affects how we feel. It also affects how we think.

Under sustained pressure, people lose access to their best judgement. They become more reactive, more defensive, more distracted, more short-term in their thinking.

They push through. But pushing through is not the same as performing well.

You can be busy all day and still not get to what really matters. You can make decisions all day and still not feel clear. You can be surrounded by people and still feel utterly alone in the responsibility.

What 14 years in humanitarian work taught me

Before moving into wellbeing, leadership and organisational work, I spent 14 years leading humanitarian operations across Africa and Asia - through war, drought, floods, tsunamis, earthquakes and epidemics.

Those environments taught me how continued stress changes people. How it affects judgement, communications, relationships and decisions - how it affects people.

And they taught me burn out happens when demand keeps exceeding capacity, when recovery is not built in, when the system depends on constant urgency, and when people override their own needs for too long.

The corporate world looks very different from a humanitarian setting. But the human impact I am seeing is the same.

And I lived this myself

After those 14 years, I came home not just tired - but empty. The kind of depletion that sleep and a few weeks off doesn't fix.

I was exhausted. I had lost touch with parts of myself I had set aside, year after year, telling myself I would come back to them when things calmed down.

They never calmed down. I had to stop.

It took me years - not weeks, not months, years - to properly recover. To rebuild my energy, my clarity, my sense of self, my relationships and my way of working.

That experience changed how I see leadership, pressure and performance. It taught me that capability is not the same as sustainability, and that the people who look the most "fine" on the outside are often the ones carrying the most.

It is also why I do the work I do now.

If you are reading this as an HR or People leader, you will likely recognise some of these patterns in people you work alongside. Some of them in yourself.

What I see in the leaders I work with

Many of the leaders who come to me look, on paper, like they have everything.

The business. The team. The reputation. The income. The title.

But quietly, when no one else is in the room, they tell me things like:

They have forgotten how to experience joy.

They cannot remember the last time anything in the day was actually for them.

There is a low-grade numbness that no weekend, holiday or "just push through this quarter" ever seems to change.

And some of them - capable, accomplished, deeply respected people - have reached the point where they secretly - or not so secretly - want to stop. Quit. Walk away. Because they are so exhausted that walking away feels like the only way to breathe.

If any of that is remotely true for you or people around you - you are not broken, and this can be solved. It is simply what happens to good, conscientious, high-functioning people when they carry too much for too long without recovery and support built in. It is not a character flaw.

And this can be turned around. I have seen it many, many times.

The earlier you deal with it, the quicker the turnaround. But even for people who are deep in it - numb, exhausted, feeling like there is something not working - can come back. Clearer. Lighter. More themselves. And more effective than they ever were before, because they are no longer running on 'shoulds' and willpower.

It is genuinely remarkable what changes in a life, a leadership role and a business when recovery, sleep, downtime, personal growth and real life are built in rather than treated as things to fit around work.

Three resets for individuals leading under pressure

Take three conscious breaths, at least five times a day.
Before you leave the house, before a meeting, between tasks, after a difficult email, or before making a decision, pause and take three slow, deep breaths. If you can, make your exhale slightly longer than your inhale. Don't force it. Build up gently. A stressed mind reacts. A steadier mind sees more options.

Protect one non-negotiable part of your life every week.
A walk. Dinner with people you love. Meditation. Exercise. Time in nature. An early night. Put it in the diary and honour it. This is not indulgence. It is the care of the human in you.

Ask: what stress am I normalising?
What am I treating as normal that is actually costing me too much? One question. Often very revealing.

Three shifts for organisations that want sustainable performance

Build reset and thinking space into how work is done.
People should not be expected to squeeze in recovery. Build breathing room into how meetings are organised, workloads are managed, decisions are made, weeks are scheduled, and communication norms are set.

Audit what pressure has been normalised.
Constant urgency. Back-to-back meetings. Always-on availability. After-hours messaging. These erode clarity, trust and performance. Naming them is the first step to changing them.

Develop your leaders as humans, not just as performers.
Research has found that managers can affect people's mental health as much as their life partner does. That should make us pause. Leadership development cannot only focus on performance, targets and delivery. Leaders also need the awareness, skills and support to understand pressure, communicate well, create trust, manage themselves, and notice when people are struggling. Wellbeing-aware leadership is not simply a "nice to have." It is one of the highest-leverage investments an organisation can make.

A simple exercise

Write down the five most important things in your life.

The five things that truly matter to you - your health, your family, a significant relationship, your dog, your sense of purpose, your peace of mind, your home, your future self, your work.

Then ask honestly: am I giving time, energy and attention to what I believe matters most?

Not perfectly. But consistently.

Because your life is shaped by where your time, energy and attention go.

The leader matters too

Many leaders are excellent at supporting everyone else and quietly leave themselves out of the equation.

That does not work forever. You are part of the system you are leading.

Looking after yourself is not selfish. It is responsible leadership.

If you would like to take this further

Whether you are noticing the early signs of stress in yourself or your people - or you are deep in it, there is a way through.

For HR and People leaders - if you are seeing some of these patterns in your senior team or your culture, I'd be glad to have an exploratory conversation about what might help.

Book a Meeting

A few other ways we could work together:

Leadership team sessions - strategy and leadership days, team resets, Wellbeing by Design consultancy, training and speaking. Learn more

1:1 coaching - for leaders and senior professionals who want a clearer mind, a steadier nervous system and a more sustainable way of leading and living. Book a discovery call

Leading Under Pressure with Carlow Kilkenny Skillnet - a practical half-day for SME leaders and business owners. Find out more

If any of these feel like the right next step, simply reply to this email and tell me a little about what is going on for you - or email me directly at hello@calodagh.com. I read every message personally.

You can also follow me on LinkedIn for more reflections like this.

Because success should not cost you or your people the life you are trying to build.

Warmly,
Calodagh

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Calodagh McCumiskey

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Friday morning, 5 June 2026

Full edition — shown as it appears by email

How to have your cake and eat it too, with AI

AI arrived promising to give us time back.

For some people I work with, it has done the opposite.

This is the reality of what happens when exhausted people use an inexhaustible tool.

Dear [Name],

The possibilities are real and remarkable. A researcher can now analyse years of data in hours. An entrepreneur can build, brand and launch a product in a week. Used well, AI gives back time - for the work that matters, for your health, and for the people you care about.

I use it myself for certain types of tasks, and I find it very helpful.

But I have also noticed something. AI is most useful to me when I am at my sharpest. When I am tired, it can slow me down and cost me time and energy. I have discussed this with clients and others in business, and they find the same. The conclusion is simple: AI is only as good as the person using it. And that person needs to be able to manage it well.

I have spent nearly thirty years watching what sustained pressure does to people - from humanitarian crises in Africa and Asia to leadership teams and organisations across Ireland. Always with the same question: what is draining people, what is sustaining them, and what needs to change before the cost becomes too high - and before we lose our capacity to think, connect and grow as human beings.

People were already stretched before AI use became widespread. The pace of work had already increased. Expectations had already increased. The volume of communication had already increased. Already, 57% of adults cite the rise of AI as a source of stress. It has arrived into an increasingly stressed world and accelerated the pace of change even more.

Used well, it will take pressure out of the system - reduce friction, simplify processes, and give people back time and attention.

Used badly, it will do the opposite - increase volume, weaken judgement and intellect, and create more overload for people who were already overloaded.

Used well, AI can elevate humanity in extraordinary ways. Used badly, it can erode the best of what it means to be human.

So what is really going on? And how can we get the upside without the downside?

AI has no intelligence.

It is a large language model that studies vast amounts of human language and learns to predict what words we are likely to find useful, convincing or satisfying. It does not think. It does not understand. It does not have lived experience, values, judgement or wisdom. It produces language that sounds right because that is what it was designed to do.

That is why it can say a lot while saying very little of value.

And the evidence is beginning to catch up with what many are sensing.

AI can provide a temporary sense of companionship, but will increase social isolation over time. It can improve the output, while the person's own ability to think, write, learn and reason declines. There is no clear evidence that AI improves mental health outcomes. There is some evidence that, used 'badly', it can harm them.

There is a big difference between using AI as a tool and allowing it to do the work that is meant to keep us engaged, thinking and developing. That is where the real human cost begins - not in the technology itself, but in the habits we build around it and the capacities we stop developing.

Think about it this way. Nobody wants to read an email that was clearly written by AI. It does not inspire trust or respect. It does the opposite. At the end of the day, business is built on relationships - and relationships are built on people being human and showing up as themselves.

Whatever you want to be good at - do not outsource it to AI.

There is no shortage of advice on how to use AI better: better prompts, better workflows, better tools. And much of that is useful.

But most of it starts with the tool.

My work starts with the human being using it - and with the human beings affected by it.

Because AI can make one person's job easier while adding pressure somewhere else. The time saved at one end of the chain often reappears at the other - as under-thought output that someone else now has to check, interpret, correct, and take responsibility for.

This is not an argument for rejecting AI. It is an argument for using it more consciously.

The organisations that get this right will not necessarily be the ones using AI the most. They will be the ones using it to reduce unnecessary pressure, protect human judgement and growth, and create better ways of working - offloading what drains them, protecting what defines them, and staying fully human in the places that matter.

That is a skill. And like all skills, it takes effort, focus and practice.

In my talk, AI and the Human Cost of Getting It Wrong, I go much deeper into this - the evidence, the risks, the opportunities, and what conscious use of AI actually looks like in practice.

How to harness what AI offers without losing our hearts.

If you would like to explore this theme at your event, with your team or within your organisation, get in touch at hello@calodagh.com, or simply reply here.