Don't let chaos win. Here's how.

At 8:47 a.m., the Teams messages were already stacking up. Emails were landing like rain. New requests were coming in like an avalanche. No one was saying “no."

A customer escalation. A last‑minute ask from leadership. A policy update that needed communication right now. Another fire, then another.

Sound familiar?

Many years ago, I managed a small team—six smart, capable staff alongside a dozen professional service vendors—responsible for critical operations inside a growing Microsoft organization. On paper, the structure made sense. In reality, people were drowning.

Days stretched to 10, 12, sometimes 16 hours. One‑on‑ones were rescheduled or skipped. Energy was low. Morale was slipping. One person started looking for another job. Others stayed because paychecks pay the mortgage. And the finance team representative informed me, with a smirk, there was no budget to hire more staff.

So, when someone suggested taking time to build a strategy, the idea felt ludicrous.

Strategy? With what time?

Here’s the twist: The lack of strategy was the reason they were drowning.

Most teams believe they don’t have time for strategy, but its absence is exactly why they’re overwhelmed.

The trap most teams fall into

You already know this, but I’ll say it anyway: When work feels overwhelming, it’s easy to assume everything is important. Every task is urgent. Every request feels non-negotiable. Every fire demands attention.

But not everything actually moves the organization forward or helps end customers.

Without a clear strategy, teams default to reacting instead of deciding. Work expands. Priorities blur. And slowly, the day‑to‑day grind becomes the system. The result? Long hours. Constant stress. Very little sense of progress.

Recognize this place? We've all been there.

Poll: What most prevents your team from taking the time to create a strategy?

• We're too busy with daily fires.
• Priorities aren't clear, so everything feels urgent.
• The culture doesn't support stepping back with time to think
• People don't feel empowered to say "no."

The shift that changes everything

The breakthrough doesn’t come from working harder. It comes from creating space. And yes, I admit it, that sounds impossible (!) when you’re underwater. But here's the tough love/hard truth: t’s not. Push a few things aside and try this with your team.

The first step is deceptively simple: See your work clearly.

"You do not rise to the level of your goals. You fall to the level of your systems."

James Clear, author of "Atomic Habits"

Here’s how overwhelmed teams start to reclaim time and space:

1. Capture everything.

Use a work tracker or even a simple spreadsheet. List every project, program, and recurring

task. Most teams are shocked by how long the list really is. Keep it simple with initiative names, owners, priorities, relative effort level, and target dates. Don't overcomplicate it. Delegate by asking your staff or teammates to capture the work they're doing in a shared tool.

2. Live and breathe the 80:20 Rule.

Plan for only 80% of your actual capacity. The remaining 20% is reserved for the inevitable fires. Without this buffer, chaos wins. Don’t let chaos win.

3. Set realistic target dates.

Ambition is good. Fantasy timelines are not. Dates should reflect real capacity, not wishful thinking.

4. Prioritize. Ruthlessly.

Use simple priority categories:

• P0: Must be done or things break

• P1: High impact, not urgent

• P2: Important, but can wait

• P3: Nice to have someday

Again, keep it simple. When in doubt, prioritize based on impact to the end customer. Everything else is noise.

5. Size the work.

Even rough estimates (small, medium, large, extra‑large) help reveal what’s manageable and what isn’t. Define sizes in relative terms based on the normal work your team or organization does, excluding outlier projects.

6. Cut, pause, or push.

This is the turning point. During a 4 to 8-week strategy development period:

• Target dates get pushed back 4 to 8 weeks.

• P2s and P3s get paused or cut.

• Unrealistic timelines get corrected.

• Oversized initiatives get broken down into smaller ones.

• Legitimate opportunities to shift work to other teams are identified.

Doing this as a team, rather than solo, adds insight, inclusion, and boosts morale (people feel seen and heard). Ultimately, this helps you, as a leader, achieve buy-in.

What happens next

Most teams expect this exercise to confirm how overloaded they are. Instead, something surprising happens: They find time.

Not huge amounts of time, but often 3 to 5 hours a week. Time that was previously buried under misaligned priorities and reactive work. More importantly, they gain bandwidth: time + energy + mental clarity.

Sustain that for eight weeks and something new becomes possible: Strategy development.

The payoff

When my overwhelmed team did everything mentioned about and finally stepped back to build a strategy, the shift wasn’t instant, but it was undeniable: Work became more focused. Energy returned. Small wins turned into visible progress. Morale improved. People showed up differently. Leadership noticed and my team was recognized and rewarded.

Nothing magical happened. No new hires. No reduced expectations. They simply got intentional about what mattered, what didn’t, and how to move forward using a roadmap that provided clarity and defined success.

A different way to think about strategy

Strategy development isn’t a luxury reserved for when things slow down. Rather, it’s the tool that keeps things from spinning out of control in the first place. So, if it feels like there’s no time to step back and think — that’s usually the clearest sign that it’s time.

What have your experiences been like? Let me know in comments.