One day I was visited by a gentlemen who worked for a non-profit in the Midwest. His organization had formed to address a recurrent problem. The pattern looked like this: A fantastic new leader showed up in the community. That meant the community was able to recruit good leaders! The new leader hit the ground running, quickly forming key connections, and tackling significant issues. The new leader, responding well to early challenges, became the go-to person for other challenges. Slowly, the new leader's plate got full. Then over-full. Then way over-full. Then the leader burned out. Maybe there was a half-hearted attempt to get away for a while--a vacation, a sabbatical. But more often, he or she just imploded. There were substance abuse issues, broken relationships, or some kind of community scandal. But the root problem wasn't any of those things. The problem was that the community saved up all their problems for the new person, then kept piling them on until something broke....