“You have to be right with yourself first before you get other people involved in this calculus.”
Vince’s words were a bit of a gut-punch. Like so many founders, I have often fallen into the trap of believing that what I have built will collapse if I step away. Or that I am somehow letting my team down if I take time for rest, even as I push them to take that time themselves. But the problem that causes so many of us – myself included – to overwork ourselves and burn out is often not something external; it’s almost always our own fear of what will happen if we leave.
But isn’t that undervaluing what you have built? Expecting too little of the other people on your team?
These questions all came up during a conversation that I had recently with Vince Peterson, Founder and Artistic Director of Choral Chameleon as we reflected upon his recent, six-month sabbatical.
So many of our clients are organizations with passionate, dedicated, and overworked founders at the helm. Being a founder can be a lonely position, especially in a small organization with little other staff or Board support. So while our contracts say we are there to help fundraise or support administratively, I have found over the past ten years that some of the most important work BA consultants do is to be a partner to the founder, an ear for them when they simply need someone to talk to.
Many founders begin to marry themselves with their work, and the people associated with their organizations do, too. (This can be especially difficult when you name your company after yourself – ahem). Their own identity is so wrapped up in the work, their sense of meaning so tied to this beautiful thing that they have built. But years of working like that wears on a person. As Vince said when we spoke:
“It sometimes feels like you’re under a magnifying glass microscope all the time. You are expected to be super human at times when you’re just caving inside.”
Most of the founders I know feel like this at some point. Which is why we’ve begun focusing on the importance of the sabbatical when in conversation with them.
You may have read about the importance of sabbaticals in many of the resources accumulating online. But just because you know you should take time away does not mean that you feel prepared to do so. For many of our founder clients, as the company grows, they do not have the time or resources to remove themselves from the central day-to-day. And while that is a difficult transition to make, it’s, at the core, an operational one. A practical one that can be solved with practical planning. Much harder is the deeper question many of us struggle to answer: what will we do, who will we be, if we take time away?
It was here that Vince began to ask himself an important question: Do I trust who I am and do I trust the integrity of what I’ve built?
Over a year ago, when Vince began planning for a sabbatical, he asked himself that question and began shifting things accordingly. He found that, yes, he had to ensure that interim support staff was in place, that decision-making processes were clear, and that points of contact were transitioned. But he also had to look closely at the things he had held tight to, that perhaps were not so precious. He also realized that the way his community saw him only reinforced this sense of responsibility:
“I think that there were a lot of people who thought that I wouldn’t be able to let go of control. I think people see you as a leader. People see you in a really different way than it actually is.”
While the first tactical step to a sabbatical is absolutely ensuring that your staff has what they need, practically, to cover time without you, the hardest step may be changing the way you are viewed by others in your organization–and how you view yourself.
Many of us feel this without naming it. Two years ago, I had a fairly enormous crash myself. It had been building for some time, but the thing that finally pushed me over the edge was the amount of questions I was getting from team members on Slack every day. We were understaffed because of a delayed hiring, and yet we had more people on the team than ever before. I had not made the operational shifts needed to match that, and was still the person doing the hiring, onboarding, and a significant amount of the training. The structure of our company had not matched our rapid personnel growth, and I had unintentionally reinforced to everyone on the team that I was the person to go to with questions and problems, even though there were plenty of team members who had been around for years and had the answers the newbies sought.
I am not proud of myself, but I – indelicately – told our Deputy Director that everyone had to stop talking to me for a week. She dutifully passed the message on to the team, but later ensured we talked about how to truly fix the challenge. (Perhaps step 0 of taking a sabbatical is finding an outstanding deputy or partner?)
The solution took time, but was both structural and cultural. First, we changed the titles of many of the staff who had been around for at least a couple of years and created a leadership team with a clearer (but still not totally clear) reporting structure. This ended up distributing questions amongst more of the team. Second, we made small shifts to encourage the team to support each other: Slack channels dedicated to questions (which I did not join), a Notion board with various tips and tricks shared by the team, and virtual coworking sessions where our international team could work together over video call (which, again, I do not typically join).
Heading into his sabbatical, Vince went on a similar journey with his staff, assigning responsibilities, defining clear lines of communication – but also ensuring the chorus and staff that he was there for them, believed them, and that they were as much Choral Chameleon as he was. He had hired good people, and those people had built good systems with him. The Chorus had not been built in six months; he trusted that it would not fail if he stepped away for six months.
As he worked on these elements, he also had open conversations with various folks. A deeper fear he had was that, in leaving, some may feel he was letting them down. But the opposite happened:
“…many of our members proactively approached me and told me how much respect they had for my decision to take the sabbatical. At first, I thought it would be an ‘absence makes the heart grow fonder’ thing with the singers. To my surprise, it was not that they ‘missed me’ per se, but rather that they increased their trust and respect for me based on my willingness to let go of control and trust THEM in my absence. They also expressed how influential it was for them to see me make a decision that was clearly a ‘self care’ one.”
So with a bit of nerves, but also excitement, Vince stepped away. From January through June, 2025, he took time away from this organization that he had spent 15 years building. And what did he do during that time?
“I wrote music. I started writing a book. I think I really forgot who I was as a musician before Choral Chameleon and I realized that if I didn’t find him and reclaim him and revive him that there would be no future for my work with Choral Chameleon or anything else for that matter.”
For so many leaders, a sabbatical is a time for personal return. It’s a time to remember who you are, what you love, how you create. It’s about letting go and trusting the people you’ve chosen and knowing that you’ll come back with so much more than you left with. In the aftermath of rest is clarity. (Thank you to Candace Feldman for that phrase!)
A sabbatical helped Vince remember what it was to be an artist. It was a time for him to return to his own music and creativity. But it was also about learning to let go. And because he prepared both the team and himself, the time away also brought a new element to Choral Chameleon’s work. Now the musicians and audience and Vince alike know that what he built doesn’t just belong to him.
Sabbaticals are not only about leaving; they are about returning. Returning as your full self, more inspired and excited than you’ve been in a long time. It’s about choosing this work, and demonstrating to yourself that there is an entire team of people who are putting their hearts and souls into it, too. We are better leaders when we are able to remember who we are. Give yourself time to find that person again.
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Need help planning for a sabbatical? Here are some resources we’ve found online, but please also reach out for a FREE 30-minute consultation to speak further.
https://o2sabbatical.org/resources/
https://www.nonprofitadvancement.org/2025/07/21/the-case-for-sabbaticals-in-the-nonprofit-sector/
https://cep.org/blog/invest-in-rest-funding-sabbaticals/
