When I first started my business, I was working more than 60 hours a week. I was building my website, choosing my logo, picking branding colors, getting booked on podcasts, checking things off my to-do list left and right.

There was just one problem: I wasn't making any money. And I couldn't figure out why.

When I finally hired a business coach and we looked at what I was actually spending my time on, the problem was painfully obvious. I didn't have a real offer. I wasn't doing any sales activities. I was doing a fantastic job marketing a business that had nothing clearly defined to sell.

You can be incredibly consistent at doing the wrong things.

That story fundamentally changed how I think about productivity — and it's exactly what this episode is about. Are you busy? Or are you actually making progress?

WHAT YOU'LL LEARN IN THIS EPISODE:

• Why being busy and making progress are not the same thing — and how to tell the difference
• Four patterns that create the illusion of progress — including the sneakiest one that most people miss
• Why your gut is the worst measurement tool you have — and what to use instead
• Four practical tools to track whether your effort is actually getting you somewhere
• How I'm using my own recap ritual right now to course-correct my health and wellness priorities
  
  

TIMESTAMPS:

00:00 — The story that changed how I think about productivity

02:00 — Busy vs. making progress: what's the actual difference?

04:00 — Pattern 1: Measuring activity instead of outcomes

06:00 — Pattern 2: Reacting instead of directing

07:30 — Pattern 3: Confusing motion with momentum

09:00 — Pattern 4: No baseline to compare against

10:00 — Tool 1: The recap ritual

11:00 — Tool 2: Habit trackers

12:30 — Tool 3: KPI and performance trackers

13:00 — Tool 4: Daily team progress updates

14:30 — Bringing it all together

THE NEXT STEP OPTIONS:

✔️ Take the Overwhelm Culprit Quiz: www.corrielo.com/overwhelmculprit

✔️ Order my book: http://www.corrielo.com/overwhelmculpritbook

✔️ Connect with Me on Social:

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/iamcorrielo
Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/iamcorrielo
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/iamcorrielo
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/iamcorrielo
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/iamcorrielo
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@iamcorrielo
Substack: https://iamcorrielo.substack.com/

✔️ Visit my Website: www.corrielo.com

✔️ Book me to Speak: www.corrielo.com/speaking

✔️ Enroll in Coaching: www.corrielo.com/coaching

SUBSCRIBE FOR MORE:

Don't miss future episodes where we dive deeper into topics like leadership, personal growth, and turning challenges into opportunities. Hit that subscribe button and join the journey to confident leadership!

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What's the priority on your team right now? And if your answer is some version of "well, there are a few" — I want you to actually think about how many there are.

Because there's a massive difference between having multiple important things happening at the same time and creating a culture where everything is treated like the most important thing all the time.

If everything on your team feels urgent, your people don't have a time management problem. They have a clarity problem. And in most cases, it's not something they created — it's something leadership built without realizing it.

In this episode I'm walking you through four of the most common ways leaders accidentally create cultures of urgency — and a simple four-question framework to run before handing your team anything else labeled "urgent."

WHAT YOU'LL LEARN IN THIS EPISODE:

• Why "my team needs to get better at prioritizing" is usually the wrong diagnosis — and what the right question actually is
• Four ways leaders unintentionally build a culture of urgency — and what to do differently
• Why adding a priority without deprioritizing something else isn't prioritization — it's accumulation
• The four-question framework to run before you assign anything as urgent
• What to do when you're the one being buried by shifting priorities from above — including how to make your leaders prioritize for you

TIMESTAMPS:

00:00 — If everything feels urgent, it's a clarity problem — not a time management problem

03:00 — Four ways leaders accidentally create a culture of urgency

09:00 — The four questions to run before assigning anything as urgent

10:30 — What to do when the urgency is coming from above

13:00 — Ways to take this work deeper

NEXT STEP OPTIONS:

✔️ Take the Overwhelm Culprit Quiz: www.corrielo.com/overwhelmculprit

✔️ Order my book: http://www.corrielo.com/overwhelmculpritbook

✔️ Connect with Me on Social:

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/iamcorrielo
Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/iamcorrielo
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/iamcorrielo
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/iamcorrielo
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/iamcorrielo
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@iamcorrielo
Substack: https://iamcorrielo.substack.com/

✔️ Visit my Website: www.corrielo.com

✔️ Book me to Speak: www.corrielo.com/speaking

✔️ Enroll in Coaching: www.corrielo.com/coaching

SUBSCRIBE FOR MORE:

Don't miss future episodes where we dive deeper into topics like leadership, personal growth, and turning challenges into opportunities. Hit that subscribe button and join the journey to confident leadership!

✔️ Subscribe to the Podcast: Apple Podcasts | Spotify

✔️ Subscribe on YouTube Podcasts: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL2iLLfzM7QKFoP2JFPE41hUl1SVHcH3IF&si=Fk3ZsBem6xBLRF1R

What if your team isn't overwhelmed because they can't handle the workload? What if they're overwhelmed because of the way your culture expects them to handle it?

When leaders notice everyone seems overwhelmed, the instinct is to look for the obvious answer — too much work, not enough staff, poor time management. And sometimes that's exactly the problem. But what if it isn't? What if it's that everything is urgent, no one knows who owns what, people are afraid to make a decision without approval, and every new process disappears three weeks later?

The real question isn't: are they overwhelmed? It's: have you built a culture that keeps recreating it?

In this first live episode of The Next Step, I'm applying my Five Overwhelm Culprits™ framework not to individuals — but to entire teams and organizations. Because when the same patterns keep showing up across multiple people, the question to ask isn't what's wrong with them. It's what are they responding to?

WHAT YOU'LL LEARN IN THIS EPISODE:

• Why team overwhelm is often a culture problem — not a workload or capacity problem
• How the Five Overwhelm Culprits™ show up across an entire team — and what each one signals about your culture
• Why you can't ask people to prioritize better if the organization won't — and other hard truths about leadership
• The difference between having people available to help and creating a culture where people actually feel safe asking for it
• The one diagnostic shift every leader needs to make when their whole team seems overwhelmed at once

TIMESTAMPS:

00:00 — What if your culture is creating the overwhelm?

02:00 — The Five Overwhelm Culprits™ applied to teams

04:00 — Culprit 1: Lack of Clarity

05:30 — Culprit 2: Lack of Confidence

06:30 — Culprit 3: Lack of Community

07:30 — Culprit 4: Lack of Conditioning

09:00 — Culprit 5: Lack of Consistency

10:30 — The diagnostic shift: what is your team responding to?

11:00 — Ways to go deeper

NEXT STEP OPTIONS:

✔️ Take the Overwhelm Culprit Quiz: www.corrielo.com/overwhelmculprit

✔️ Order my book: http://www.corrielo.com/overwhelmculpritbook

✔️ Connect with Me on Social:

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/iamcorrielo
Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/iamcorrielo
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/iamcorrielo
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/iamcorrielo
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/iamcorrielo
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@iamcorrielo
Substack: https://iamcorrielo.substack.com/

✔️ Visit my Website: www.corrielo.com

✔️ Book me to Speak: www.corrielo.com/speaking

✔️ Enroll in Coaching: www.corrielo.com/coaching

SUBSCRIBE FOR MORE:

Don't miss future episodes where we dive deeper into topics like leadership, personal growth, and turning challenges into opportunities. Hit that subscribe button and join the journey to confident leadership!

✔️ Subscribe to the Podcast: Apple Podcasts | Spotify

✔️ Subscribe on YouTube Podcasts: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL2iLLfzM7QKFoP2JFPE41hUl1SVHcH3IF&si=Fk3ZsBem6xBLRF1R

"How do you create routines that work even on your worst days?"

This question came up during a private event Q&A while I was discussing the Lack of Consistency Overwhelm Culprit — and it's one I hear constantly. Because most people design their routines for their best days. And then wonder why they fall apart when life gets hard.

Here's the shift that changes everything: design your routine for your worst days — and build in enough flexibility that it can move with you as your seasons change. In this episode I'm sharing exactly how I do that — including a real-time look at how I'm shifting my entire routine from school year to summer, right now.

WHAT YOU'LL LEARN IN THIS EPISODE:

• Why most routines fail — and the one mindset shift that fixes it
• Why you need to know how you spend your time before building any routine
• Two tools I use to make routines stick: task batching and time boxing
• Why your routines should flex with your seasons — not stay rigidly the same
• How to build your Minimum Viable Plan (MVP) for non-negotiable daily routines
• A real-time look at my school year routine vs. my summer routine — and exactly what changes and why
• How to use time boxing on your calendar so your routine can flex without falling apart

TIMESTAMPS:

00:00 — The question that sparked this episode

01:30 — Start here: the time tracking audit

02:30 — Tool 1: Task batching

03:30 — Tool 2: Time boxing

06:00 — Step 1: Know your MVP non-negotiables

08:00 — School year routine vs. summer routine

10:30 — A live look at my calendar

13:30 — Recap + free Overwhelm Culprit Quiz

NEXT STEP OPTIONS:

✔️ Take the Overwhelm Culprit Quiz: www.corrielo.com/overwhelmculprit

✔️ Order my book: http://www.corrielo.com/overwhelmculpritbook

✔️ Connect with Me on Social:

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/iamcorrielo
Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/iamcorrielo
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/iamcorrielo
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/iamcorrielo
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/iamcorrielo
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@iamcorrielo
Substack: https://iamcorrielo.substack.com/

✔️ Visit my Website: www.corrielo.com

✔️ Book me to Speak: www.corrielo.com/speaking

✔️ Enroll in Coaching: www.corrielo.com/coaching

SUBSCRIBE FOR MORE:

Don't miss future episodes where we dive deeper into topics like leadership, personal growth, and turning challenges into opportunities. Hit that subscribe button and join the journey to confident leadership!

✔️ Subscribe to the Podcast: Apple Podcasts | Spotify

✔️ Subscribe on YouTube Podcasts: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL2iLLfzM7QKFoP2JFPE41hUl1SVHcH3IF&si=Fk3ZsBem6xBLRF1R

"What do you see as the most common theme behind people whose overwhelm culprit is conditioning?"

This question came up during a private event Q&A — and the answer surprised the room. Because by far, the most common theme I see behind the Lack of Conditioning culprit isn't a lack of time. It's this: you care more about everyone else's wellbeing than your own.

In this episode I'm sharing one of the most personal stories I've ever told on this show — what happened after I had my daughter, how I ended up on the verge of a mental breakdown in a moving car, and exactly what it took to turn it around. This one is raw. And I think a lot of you are going to recognize yourself in it.

WHAT YOU'LL LEARN IN THIS EPISODE:

• Why the most common conditioning theme isn't a time problem — it's a self-worth problem
• The generational reason women are wired to put everyone else first
• The hidden costs of chronic self-neglect — and why depletion makes you the bottleneck in every system
• The oxygen mask mindset shift — and the exact steps I took to implement it
• How to use boundaries to protect your self-care time when old routines creep back in

TIMESTAMPS:

00:00 — The question that sparked this episode

01:00 — My personal story: postpartum, no sleep, and running on empty

04:00 — The near-breakdown that changed everything

06:00 — Why women are wired to put everyone else first

08:00 — The hidden costs of depletion

10:00 — The oxygen mask moment and what I did next

12:00 — Boundaries, accountability, and your next step

NEXT STEP OPTIONS:

✔️ Take the Overwhelm Culprit Quiz: www.corrielo.com/overwhelmculprit

✔️ Order my book: http://www.corrielo.com/overwhelmculpritbook

✔️ Connect with Me on Social:

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/iamcorrielo
Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/iamcorrielo
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/iamcorrielo
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/iamcorrielo
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/iamcorrielo
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@iamcorrielo
Substack: https://iamcorrielo.substack.com/

✔️ Visit my Website: www.corrielo.com

✔️ Book me to Speak: www.corrielo.com/speaking

✔️ Enroll in Coaching: www.corrielo.com/coaching

SUBSCRIBE FOR MORE:

Don't miss future episodes where we dive deeper into topics like leadership, personal growth, and turning challenges into opportunities. Hit that subscribe button and join the journey to confident leadership!

✔️ Subscribe to the Podcast: Apple Podcasts | Spotify

✔️ Subscribe on YouTube Podcasts: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL2iLLfzM7QKFoP2JFPE41hUl1SVHcH3IF&si=Fk3ZsBem6xBLRF1R

"How do you identify whether the people in your life are supporting your growth or draining your energy?"

This question came up during a private event Q&A while I was leading an exercise on the Lack of Community Overwhelm Culprit — and it's one I hear constantly. Because it's all too common to be surrounded by people every single day and still feel completely alone, unsupported, and unenergized.

Here's the truth: if the people around you aren't supporting your growth or giving you energy, you don't have a support team. You have a liability you can't afford to keep carrying. In this episode I'm walking you through the 10 signs someone is draining your energy — and exactly what to do about it.

WHAT YOU'LL LEARN IN THIS EPISODE:

• Why being surrounded by people doesn't mean you have the right support team
• What energy vampires are — and my personal experience navigating them after my divorce
• The 10 signs someone is draining your energy — and why these can show up in anyone: a spouse, family member, colleague, boss, or neighbor
• Three strategies for handling energy vampires depending on how close they are to you
• Why you are the average of the five people you spend the most time with — and what to do with that information

TIMESTAMPS:

00:00 — The question that sparked this episode

00:30 — Why being surrounded by people doesn't mean you have the right support

01:00 — My personal story: the friends who left me more exhausted than before

02:30 — What energy vampires are — and where they show up

03:00 — The 10 signs someone is draining your energy

06:30 — Three strategies for handling energy vampires

08:00 — Recap: you are the average of the five people you spend the most time with

08:30 — The Five Overwhelm Culprits™ book + ways to work with Corrie

NEXT STEP OPTIONS:

✔️ Take the Overwhelm Culprit Quiz: www.corrielo.com/overwhelmculprit

✔️ Order my book: http://www.corrielo.com/overwhelmculpritbook

✔️ Connect with Me on Social:

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/iamcorrielo
Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/iamcorrielo
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/iamcorrielo
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/iamcorrielo
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/iamcorrielo
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@iamcorrielo
Substack: https://iamcorrielo.substack.com/

✔️ Visit my Website: www.corrielo.com

✔️ Book me to Speak: www.corrielo.com/speaking

✔️ Enroll in Coaching: www.corrielo.com/coaching

SUBSCRIBE FOR MORE:

Don't miss future episodes where we dive deeper into topics like leadership, personal growth, and turning challenges into opportunities. Hit that subscribe button and join the journey to confident leadership!

✔️ Subscribe to the Podcast: Apple Podcasts | Spotify

✔️ Subscribe on YouTube Podcasts: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL2iLLfzM7QKFoP2JFPE41hUl1SVHcH3IF&si=Fk3ZsBem6xBLRF1R

"How do you stop tying self-worth to productivity?"

This question came up during a private event Q&A while I was discussing the Lack of Confidence Overwhelm Culprit™ — and the timing couldn't have been better, because I had received the exact same question from a coaching client the day before.

Here's the truth: this is not a productivity issue. It's a money mindset issue. And once I understood that, everything changed. In this episode I'm sharing exactly why this happens — including my own story — and the exact process I used to rewire it for good.

WHAT YOU'LL LEARN IN THIS EPISODE:

• Why tying self-worth to productivity is a money mindset issue — not a time management one
• My personal story and the unhealthy cycle that finally forced me to tackle the root cause
• The OCP process that changed everything: Origin Story, Connection to Sabotage, Pattern Interrupt
• My three origin stories — and how they were quietly running my behavior for years
• The specific affirmations I used to rewire it — including the one I didn't believe at first
• Why I am worthy — and so are you — simply for being who we are

TIMESTAMPS:

00:00 — The question that sparked this episode

00:30 — Why this is a money mindset issue, not a productivity one

01:00 — My personal story: the unhealthy cycle after having my daughter

03:00 — Introducing the OCP process

04:00 — The three origin stories I traced this back to

06:00 — Connecting origin stories to sabotage

07:30 — The pattern interrupt: affirmations and the ThinkUp app

09:00 — What I ultimately learned about worth, time, and value

10:00 — Recap + free Overwhelm Culprit Quiz

NEXT STEP OPTIONS:

✔️ Take the Overwhelm Culprit Quiz: www.corrielo.com/overwhelmculprit

✔️ Order my book: http://www.corrielo.com/overwhelmculpritbook

✔️ Connect with Me on Social:

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/iamcorrielo
Instagram: http://www.instagram.com/iamcorrielo
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/iamcorrielo
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/iamcorrielo
YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/iamcorrielo
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@iamcorrielo
Substack: https://iamcorrielo.substack.com/

✔️ Visit my Website: www.corrielo.com

✔️ Book me to Speak: www.corrielo.com/speaking

✔️ Enroll in Coaching: www.corrielo.com/coaching

SUBSCRIBE FOR MORE:

Don't miss future episodes where we dive deeper into topics like leadership, personal growth, and turning challenges into opportunities. Hit that subscribe button and join the journey to confident leadership!

✔️ Subscribe to the Podcast: Apple Podcasts | Spotify

✔️ Subscribe on YouTube Podcasts: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL2iLLfzM7QKFoP2JFPE41hUl1SVHcH3IF&si=Fk3ZsBem6xBLRF1R