Chief Change Officer
#209 Michael Levitt’s Wake-Up Call: Burned Out, Broke, and Back Again
Sun, 2 Mar 2025
Michael Levitt didn’t just hit rock bottom—he crash-landed, lost his job, his car, his home, and survived a heart attack, all within a single year. Talk about a wake-up call. Now, as the Chief Burnout Officer and Founder of Breakfast Leadership Network, he’s on a mission to make sure others don’t follow in his burned-out footsteps. With a career spanning finance, IT, and healthcare, plus a Top 200 podcast and his book Burnout Proof, Michael dishes out real talk on stress, resilience, and why your morning routine might just save your life.Key Highlights of Our Interview:Turning Pain into Purpose“Burnout gave me the business idea I never wanted but absolutely needed. Now, I help others dodge the burnout bullet. It’s fulfilling work, though I wouldn’t mind a world where burnout is just a myth.”Reboot, Don’t Overhaul“Burnout recovery doesn’t require burning your whole life down. Most people don’t need a dramatic reinvention—they just need a couple of tweaks. Think of it as upgrading your OS, not switching to a whole new system.”Secrets of the C-Suite“Burnout among executives is a taboo topic. Publicly traded CEOs can’t just say, ‘I’m burnt out,’ without sending their stock into a tailspin. My job? Help them recover in secret, like the James Bond of workplace wellness.”Sleep: The Real Magic Pill“Forget apps and quick fixes—good sleep is the ultimate burnout buster. Invest in a killer mattress, toss your phone out of the bedroom, and let your body do its thing. Pro tip: A real alarm clock beats your buzzing smartphone every time.”Food Matters (And Yes, That Includes the Red Page)“Turns out, your body might hate your favorite foods. A food intolerance test revealed my love for certain snacks wasn’t mutual. Now, I dodge the red-listed foods like a ninja and feel way better for it.”_________________________Connect with Us:Host: Vince Chan | Guest: Michael Levitt______________________--**Chief Change Officer**--Change Ambitiously. Outgrow Yourself.Open a World of Deep Human Intelligence for Growth Progressives, Visionary Underdogs,Transformation Gurus & Bold Hearts.6 Million+ All-Time Downloads.Reaching 80+ Countries Daily.Global Top 3% Podcast.Top 10 US Business.Top 1 US Careers.100,000+ subscribers are outgrowing. Act Today. --Chief Change Officer--Change Ambitiously. Outgrow Yourself.Open a World of Expansive Human Intelligencefor Transformation Gurus, Black Sheep,Unsung Visionaries & Bold Hearts.12 Million+ All-Time Downloads.Reaching 80+ Countries Daily.Global Top 3% Podcast.Top 10 US Business.Top 1 US Careers.>>>140,000+ are outgrowing. Act Today.<<<
Chapter 1: What is burnout and why is it a universal issue?
We're all facing different challenges in today's world, but regardless of your age, generation, gender, cultural, and family background, there's one enemy that unites us, burnout. Believe me, I've been there once, twice, and more than twice. Today, we're joined by a fellow burnout survivor and a self-proclaimed chief burnout officer, Michael Levick, from the Breakfast Leadership Network.
Michael turned his personal experience into a powerful force for change, helping individuals and organizations overcome burnout and rebound stronger. We had a great conversation on his show, and now he's here to share his insights and strategies with you. Get ready for a conversation between your chief change officer and chief burnout officer.
Let's dive deep into Michael's journey and learn how to fight burnout for good. Welcome, Michael. Thank you for coming to my podcast.
Chapter 2: How did Michael Levitt's personal experience shape his mission against burnout?
Thank you. It's always good to speak with you. I'm thrilled that you launched your own show too. I always encourage people if they even want to test it out, go for it because your voice and your opinions and your insights are unique to you and the world needs as many insights on things as possible. So congratulations on the launch of your show.
Thank you so much. My show is called Chief Change Officer because this podcast is my 18th career transition in the past 36 years. I always believe that change opens up opportunities, drives personal growth, and innovates society for good. So far, I've invited quite a number of C-level leaders to my podcast, but you are the first ever Chief Burnout Officer. Can you explain to me why this title?
How did you come up with this title?
Chapter 3: Why is the title 'Chief Burnout Officer' significant?
First, it came to me in the shower, as a lot of good ideas do. That's why it's always good to invest in those markers you can write on a wall in the shower, because a lot of times you're just thinking about different things while you're getting cleaned up. And that title came out to me because... I've been dealing with the burnout space since my own personal journey with burnout back in 2009.
But basically 2014 is when it started to bounce around in my head anyways. And the title of Chief Burnout Officer, as far as they know, I'm the only person that has it. I don't have a trademark. So just basically, if any organization wants to use it,
by all means, because if you're going to use that title, what that means is you are focused full center on preventing burnout in your organization and yourself, as well as if someone is burned out, to give them the space and the tools that they need to recover from it, and then eventually prevent it from ever happening again to them. That's where the title came from.
It's something that I strongly believe in because I don't like burnout at all. And I hate what it robs from all of us when people and teams and organizations are burned out.
just mentioned in your life, in your career, you've experienced burnout badly. Share with us about your experience back then and how this pain got transformed into a positive force for change and eventually turned into a business today.
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Chapter 4: How did burnout lead to life-altering consequences for Michael Levitt?
Of course, back in 2007, I was hired as a healthcare executive. I was working some absolute insane hours and building up this brand new clinic in a community that was under service that we just didn't have enough doctors in the community to meet the demand of the patients and people in that town. So.
I was working some long hours, recruiting physicians, hiring staff, understanding the health care system because I had never worked in health care before. I had a lot of startup experience, but I'd never worked in health care before. So it was a steep learning curve for me, but it was one that I took on.
I look back at it was a mistake is this is one of those things that happens to people when they burn out is it looks like a good idea to take everything on your shoulders and say, look, I'm going to treat this as if it's my own company and I'm going to build it. It wasn't my own company, but I acted like it was.
So as entrepreneurs know, and as when the multiple careers that you've had in your life, there are times where you just pick up the load and you go, you know, like, okay, we're just going to get this done. But I did that for a solid two plus years. And it caught up with me in the spring of 2009, where over a period of 369 days, so just over a year from May 2009 to May 2010, This happened to me.
I had a heart attack that should have killed me. 17 weeks later, I was laid off during the Great Recession. A few months later, because I was on heart medication that cost me $1,000 a month out of pocket, had to feed my family and all of that while still looking for a job and not having a lot of income coming in.
The bank decided to repossess our family vehicle because we didn't have enough money to pay our bills. And then after that happened, we moved to Toronto because they found a work opportunity in Toronto. And then a couple of weeks into it, or actually it was six weeks, after six weeks of working up here, moved the family up here, was getting ready to sell our house back where we had left.
And I went back there the following weekend after I moved to grab whatever else we forgot. And there was a note on the door and a huge padlock that said foreclosed. So in a year, I had a heart attack, job loss, car repossession, home foreclosure, all in a year. And all those things happened to me because I was burned out. I wasn't taking care of myself. I wasn't resting.
I was making mistakes at work. I was irritable. The poster child for burnout, I would have been on it because I was checking all the boxes for it. Now, after having all of those experiences, some would say, you survived. And I could have chose the path saying, you know what? I'm Superman. I survived it. Here I am. I'm just going to continue on.
But I recognized right away that, especially at the age I was at that time, that's way too young to have a heart attack. I thought, I need to make some changes. And as I started to, and I started to unpack all that had happened,
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Chapter 5: What are the challenges in addressing burnout at the executive level?
I've spoke legal, education, farming, insurance, finance, retail, manufacturing, nonprofit, for-profit, every industry, you name it. So, yep, I've done something for them, whether it's been a Fortune 500 company or... an independent insurance organization outside of Boston or a talk for European leaders. It doesn't matter. Burnout hits everybody.
And it's one of those things that even the World Health Organization recognized burnout as a workplace phenomenon back in 2018 or 2019, prior to all their work with the pandemic. And for them to recognize burnout is a huge issue globally brought to light, okay, this is not something that's just a thing that's in style right now. This is legitimately a problem for people and
We need to get to the bottom of it, figure out what it is, identify the signs, which we can easily do. But the thing with burnout recovery or even burnout prevention is the steps that I see work that I used on myself and I've seen others work through them and it's helped me.
are really easy to do but unfortunately they're also easy not to do and we as humans tend to lean more towards the comfort way of living instead of doing a little bit of challenging work on ourselves and that's that's one of the things that is so hard is when we need to work on us
For some reason, that's really difficult for some people to do, which is strange in a way, if you think about it, because we're never around anybody else longer than we are with ourselves. So it's an interesting dynamic to see people struggle with trying to do things to make themselves feel better, look better, and be better.
So before we talk more about burnout prevention, and how we can help ourselves recover faster and easier from burnout. There's a problem with this problem. Burnout as a problem carries a stigma. I believe this is cross-cultural, especially among leaders, high achieving professionals. You experienced burnout yourself more than 10 years ago before this topic has become mainstream.
Now in your business, in your practice, for the sake of helping people, helping organizations, I was wondering, how did you establish the importance of addressing burnout at the C-level as well as at the operational level? Perhaps at the beginning, when you pioneered this unique role in the corporate world, what challenges did you face? How did you overcome them?
Yeah, you hit it right on the head when it comes to C-suite executives and C-suite leaders having a difficult time because of the stigma of burnout. There's a mental health component to it. Actually, a lot of people do in talks and things like that. They'll ask burnout, especially with the science and all that. It sounds a lot like depression. There are a ton of similarities between the two.
As someone who has dealt with both, I've dealt with clinical depression myself, as well as burnout. I'll tell you, yeah, there are a lot of similarities, but the key difference is with burnout, you can still muster up the energy to go out and do it. You're fatigued, you're cloudy, you're wiped out, but you're still out there just grinding and just doing it.
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Chapter 6: How can cognitive behavioral therapy and NLP help combat burnout?
Once they address the stigma of burnout and address it, get their trust, then we can start doing the work. And the work is simple for me anyway. It's one of the reasons why I got certified in cognitive behavioral therapy and neuro-linguistic programming. Much easier to say CBT and NLP therapy, by the way, because those are some mouthful words.
But the reason why I did that was time and time again, I kept running into people having similar issues. And a lot of it was what they were telling themselves, their beliefs, their habits, their thought patterns, their programming that they have instilled in their lives. And it's much like programs on your phone or apps on your phone or on your computer.
you can uninstall them and you can install better apps and better programs for you to live your life the way you want your life to be and just giving them that initial courage that they can make the adjustments that they need to make in my situation real quick i had to reinvent my life because the way that i was living painfully wasn't the best way to live
But for 99% of the other people out there that are burned out or approaching burnout, you don't need to reinvite your life. Just make a couple adjustments here and there. You'll see humongous dividends when you do so.
You have dealt with a lot of individuals, leaders, and their companies. So share with us two examples. One is a success story where your intervention led to positive changes in the individual's life and career or might be in the firm's culture. Another story would be a situation where things did not go as well as planned with your intervention. What were the key lessons you learned from them?
How do these not-so-good experiences have helped you shape your approach to dealing with similar situations in the future?
Yeah, the first one, turning around an organization culture, they had a ton of turnover. In their early days, they were a startup organization, ton of turnover, no trust, no communication. People were stressed, people were leaving, and these were young people by any stretch. They were well-educated individuals that were leaving like they were quitting a fast food job as a teenager.
And I'm like, okay, what's going on here? And it boiled down to communication and trust was a big issue. Expectations, I think, were another. Miscommunication, going back to the communication thing, seems to be a common challenge. And then toss in some ego, and you have yourself a toxic environment. So for me, it was like, okay, let's get to the bottom of this. So
The nice thing about it was how I approached it was, look, I'm your friend here. I want to make this better for you. If you were in my seat, what would you change? What would you do? And once they trusted me and felt comfortable sharing, then they were an open book, and they would share all the things.
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