Leading with Intention: Thriving in High-Stakes Seasons

📍 Welcome to The Integrated Leader Podcast! I’m Lauren Marie, and this week we’re tackling a critical leadership challenge—leading with intention during high-stakes seasons. Too often, leaders accept stress and chaos as the price of success. Whether it’s tax season, end-of-quarter sales, or major project deadlines, we assume these times must be overwhelming. But what if they didn’t have to be? High-performing teams don’t just survive busy seasons—they design their work so they don’t become overwhelmed in the first place. In today’s episode, we’re busting the biggest myth of all: that busy seasons have to be a mess. We’ll cover: ✔️ Why most busy seasons feel chaotic (hint: it’s not the workload itself!) ✔️ How high performers structure their time for intentional productivity, not accidental busyness ✔️ The offense vs. defense approach to balancing deep work and responsiveness ✔️ Three key principles to make your busiest seasons predictable, sustainable, and repeatable 💡 Today’s Challenge: Take 5 minutes to review your calendar and ask: 🔹 When am I playing offense (deep work)? 🔹 When am I playing defense (responding/reacting)? 🔹 How can I better balance the two? 🔥 Don’t just get through busy seasons—redefine how work gets done. 📌 TOMORROW’S EPISODE: We’ll tackle one of the biggest leadership struggles: setting boundaries while staying responsive. If your day is consumed by emails, Slack messages, and last-minute requests, you won’t want to miss it! If this episode was helpful, like, subscribe, and share it with a fellow leader who needs to hear this! 🚀