There’s an energy crisis facing our organizations. But this crisis can’t be solved by switching to compact fluorescent light bulbs or simply turning up the air conditioning a degree or two. This crisis goes deep into the core of our personal and professional habits, and the resulting fatigue is putting all of us at risk.

“When [individuals and organizations] struggle for energy, they struggle to have life, and if you’re unable to generate the energy that is necessary to meet those demands, some ball is going to drop,” said Jim Loehr, chairman and co-founder of the Human Performance Institute and author of 15 books, including The Power of Full Engagement.

Think of the nurse at the end of a 12-hour shift who faces an emergency situation that requires rapid diagnosis and makes a careless mistake, or the air-traffic controller who nods off while monitoring incoming flights. Physical fatigue creates a risk that directly affects our safety and well-being.

Fatigue also has implications beyond our ability to physically perform on the job. It makes it difficult to connect with and care about others and leads us to be more impatient and detached. It diminishes our ability to focus, be creative and develop innovative and original ideas. It even plays a role in ethical lapses.

“When people are tired [and] they’re in an energy crisis, they don’t hold the line like they should,” Loehr said. “They’re much more easily coerced — maybe just a little or maybe a lot — to the dark side.”

Based on research with high-performing athletes, Loehr and colleagues at the Human Performance Institute have developed recommendations for delivering high performance in the business world. It starts with recognition that human energy, or the lack thereof, has far-reaching implications.

“Take energy out of the equation in business [and] nothing happens,” he said. “Nothing happens until your energy causes something to move.”

While organizations have a number of often expensive programs and incentives aimed at developing technical and leadership skills, they pay comparatively little attention to employees’ energy and health, usually leaving it up to the individual to manage in their personal time. That approach focuses too heavily on the demands made by the organization and too little on how energy is supplied by the individual, with potentially debilitating results.