The High-Performer’s Paradox: Why the "Always-On" Culture is Failing Women (and How I’m Rewriting the Rules)

There’s a reel doing the rounds on Instagram lately that stopped me mid-scroll. It says: "Being a working mum is great. I get to feel like I’m failing at two things at the same time every single day."

It’s funny because it’s a gut-punch.

For twenty years, my identity was built on being a "high performer." In the world of Enterprise Sales and MarTech, that meant being the one who pushed the hardest, reached the top of the leaderboard, and immediately looked around to ask, "What’s next?" I lived for the hierarchical climb and the political navigation of big organisations. I was the person who stayed back, the person at every industry event, the person whose "success" was measured by how much of myself I could pour into the machine.

Then, at 40, I had my daughter.

I took 11 months off, and I expected to just... be a mum. But I quickly realised that you don't just "turn off" a high-performer brain. Instead of applying that intensity to revenue targets, I applied it to growth milestones. I found myself weighing my baby every couple of days, meticulously planning every stage of "starting solids" like it was a multi-million dollar tech implementation. My daughter was perfect. There was no medical reason for the scales. It was just me, trying to "win" at motherhood the only way I knew how: through data and relentless effort.

When it came time to return to work, the shift was jarring. I wasn't just returning to a job; I was returning with a diagnosis of Postpartum Anxiety (PPA).

The irony? I work in an industry that talks a lot about supportive cultures. My current organisation is incredible—there is funding, there is empathy, and my boss at the time was amazing. Yet, I still felt I had to hide it. I’ve only ever told one person at work.

Why do we do that? Why, as women in leadership, do we feel that transparency about PPA, or the silent grief of miscarriages, will somehow "flatten" our professional reputation?

For a long time, I felt I was making a conscious choice every afternoon: every minute I work past 5:00 PM is a minute I am choosing not to be with her. That trade-off is where the "leaky pipeline" begins. When we tell women they just need better "work-life balance," we are ignoring the internal friction of an identity that is being pulled in two directions.

But here is what I’ve discovered: The struggle hasn't made me a "lesser" performer. It has made me a more dangerous one.

In 2023, a successful week meant "mega hours" and total exhaustion. It meant being seen at every event. Today, a successful week looks different. It’s about momentum. It’s about moving enterprise deals forward with a "structured hustle." Because I want to be home to see her take her first steps or hear her new words, I have become more outcome-focused than I ever was in my 30s. I don't burn time unnecessarily. I am more patient with the things I can’t control and more surgical with the things I can.

The "always-on" culture isn't a badge of honour; it’s a high-attrition business model.

To the leaders in the Australian Tech and FSI space: if you want to keep your senior women, stop looking for "hours at the desk." Start looking for the "structured hustle." We need to move beyond performative div

ersity and start building systems that allow for the "mask" to come off.

We aren't "failing at two things." We are redefining what success looks like in a way that the old version of the tech industry isn't ready for yet.

I’m still figuring out what my new version of ambition looks like. It’s less about the "always-on" exhaustion and more about the "always-present" ROI. It’s about killing it in a meeting at 10:00 AM so I can be the one picking her up at 3:00 PM.

That’s not a compromise. That’s the future of leadership.

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Written by: Jess Ransley, Co-Founder and Board Member, Her Tech Circle

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