HR Director of the Zarplata.ru service Vera Manevich told how to distinguish real burnout from physical fatigue and what will help maintain energy during work. We are publishing an article based on the results of her presentation at the ProductSense conference.
Burnout in the 21st century is the most common reason for changing jobs. It’s convenient to say “I’m burned out”; there’s even a certain trend in this. But so far, many people misunderstand this term and confuse it with various conditions - from ordinary fatigue to depression. Therefore, self-medication and various tools do not always help.
What is employee burnout, how does it happen and why does it appear?
Burnout is a special mental state in which a person begins to be cynical about work, receive less satisfaction and feel his own inadequacy.
Burnout is like depression, but only affects work. Due to negative emotions, fatigue and lack of pleasure, workers' productivity decreases. They begin to neglect their responsibilities, fail to fulfill the plan, and take it out on their colleagues.
Professional burnout is dangerous to health. Research shows that this condition accelerates the thinning of the prefrontal cortex. Tel Aviv University scientists have proven that burnout increases the risk of developing coronary heart disease.
The term “burnout” first appeared in 1974. It was introduced by the American psychiatrist Herbert Freudenberger, who noticed that people whose activities involve regular communication with other people and emotional empathy for them and great responsibility are susceptible to this syndrome. Until recently, professional burnout was considered nothing more than an emotional state close to devastation. Today it was recognized as a disease. At the World Health Assembly, held May 20–28, 2019 in Geneva, burnout was assigned the code QD85 and included in the ICD-11 (International Classification of Diseases) catalog.
Think about alcohol, coffee and cigarettes
Lack of normal sleep and nutrition, as well as physical inactivity, will have a very effective effect on your psycho-emotional state. But what if you want to make it even worse? Cigarettes, alcohol and other substances that will harm your body will help with this.
Of course, it's more fun to burn out together. Therefore, you need to find drinking and cigarette buddies. Preferably colleagues.
Slowly but surely destroy yourself. The worse your soul is, the more cigarettes you smoke and alcohol you drink. Your burnout will progress, and you will, one way or another, increase your doses of substances for instant gratification.
Psychologists distinguish three types of professional burnout:
Administrative delight
Appears among managers. It is characterized by the fact that a person literally revels in power. Leads to excess or abuse of official authority.
Managerial erosion
This also appears among managers at all levels. It leads to the fact that power over people brings more satisfaction to a person than the work itself.
Emotional burnout
It occurs among ordinary employees due to the accumulation of negative emotions. Leads to a decrease in labor efficiency.
Regardless of the type, burnout is characterized by emotional exhaustion, negative emotions towards work and decreased productivity. Workers with burnout bring less profit to a business than motivated employees.
Psychotherapeutic assistance
Dealing with emotional burnout at work on your own is extremely difficult and sometimes ineffective. Since this is now a disease that is officially listed in ICD-11, it requires a full course of treatment from a psychotherapist.
After an entrance test, which will help determine the strength and degree of neglect of the so-called white collar syndrome, the psychotherapist will select the most suitable treatment method. The most effective techniques for working with emotional burnout today:
- art therapeutic techniques (normalize psycho-emotional state, relieve tension);
- symboldrama (reveals a traumatic moment, a problem);
- neurolinguistic programming (changes the reaction to stressors, psychotrauma and conflict situations);
- cognitive behavioral therapy (activates personal resources);
- relaxation methods (relieve muscle and neuropsychic tension).
The following techniques are often used in psychotherapeutic courses of treatment:
- progressive muscle relaxation according to the Jacobson program;
- autogenic training;
- breathing practices.
Psychotherapists also teach their patients with this diagnosis to manage their own emotions and find joy in even the smallest little things. Among the most effective techniques are self-programming, self-orders, self-approval, and visualization.
If you follow all the recommendations of a psychotherapist, you can cope with burnout in 1-1.5 months.
Causes of professional burnout
- overtime - according to Hays, 87% of workers admitted that they work overtime and do not receive additional days off or other relevant compensation; in addition, overtime does not leave time for rest;
- ambitions , especially unrealized ones - if an employee does not see prospects for career growth, he may get bored with work;
- pressure from management - if the manager is also burnt out or is incompetent, it is difficult for employees to work;
- uncomfortable working conditions - for example, if the office is too hot or cold, or an introvert in his current position has to communicate with new people every day.
There are other reasons for this emotional state. It will not be possible to organize ideal working conditions for everyone; everyone has their own needs. You need to try to create comfortable conditions and prevent burnout.
“Employee burnout often occurs when you overload them. When I was employed, at one point I felt that my favorite job had become a burden. Waiting for the end of the working day, irritability, fatigue - everything was growing every day. One day I couldn’t stand it and left. She opened her own business and took away people she could trust. Now I try not to overload my employees. I know when you get burned out, a regular vacation or break won't help. Productivity will simply decline. Both quality and quantity will suffer. Unfortunately, managers rarely think about how overload affects the employee. Sometimes it’s easier for them to replace it with someone else who hasn’t burned out yet, and move on. But the other one will also burn out. This is how you end up with eternal staff turnover” - Alisa Sakharova , founder of the unoYuno design studio in Kazan
Surround yourself with toxic people
Everyone knows at least one person for whom nothing good exists. Such people are easy to recognize by their eternal dissatisfaction: with the government, with their superiors, with colleagues, with neighbors, with their own and your results...
The most useful thing for speedy burnout is toxic colleagues. Can you imagine how cool it is to devalue your own and the team’s achievements together?
Another indicator of the desired toxicity of the team is frequent quarrels and internal corporate intrigues. Get involved in all sorts of scandals or wait to be involved in them.
Your loved ones, family and friends should be at least indifferent. They should only be interested in their own problems. If you are surrounded by people with whom you cannot share difficulties, you are on the right track. There is no point in talking about asking for help at all.
Symptoms and signs of professional burnout
Symptoms may vary depending on the place of work, the person’s psychotype and other factors. But if you or your employees are experiencing at least three of the symptoms listed below, this is a reason to think about whether you have professional burnout.
Signs of burnout:
- lack of self-confidence and a feeling of fear in front of new tasks - routine or from another field of activity;
- negative thoughts about work, reluctance to go to work in the morning and the desire to leave early;
- reluctance to deal with work tasks during the day, attempts to have lunch longer, play on the PC, or do something else;
- a permanent attitude towards the future that no matter what you do, it won’t get better;
- a feeling of monotony, routine actions, lack of novelty in work processes;
- deterioration of the general emotional state: irritability, apathy, isolation;
- dislike of the work environment, colleagues, workplace, distance from the team;
- physical disorders - headaches, drowsiness or insomnia, lethargy, disturbances in the gastrointestinal tract.
Some of these symptoms may indicate other diseases - for example, headaches may appear due to head injuries, disturbances in the gastrointestinal tract due to gastritis or ulcers. It is necessary to assess the condition of employees comprehensively and notice any little things - what the employee does at work, whether he needs rest, how he behaves in the team.
“We are developing and implementing the Kickidler working time tracking system on the Russian and foreign markets. The main task that users come to us with is to identify the level of staff productivity and their involvement in the work process. According to many of our clients, the most problematic employees are those susceptible to professional burnout. We recently conducted a survey of our users working in HR departments and found that 70% of all employees whose productivity is below average are those who have been working in the company for more than 3 years. For example, our clients from a tool manufacturing company said that they had an employee who spent about 80% of his working time reading news on the Internet and communicating on social networks. We found out about this only after installing the monitoring program. Before that, he constantly complained about the high workload and refused new projects. Another client of ours from an IT company had a system administrator who, on the contrary, demonstrated high efficiency for a long time, constantly staying late at work, sometimes until late at night. But one day he simply disappeared and did not answer calls for a week. Without a doubt, old-timers are the conveyors of values and the main driving force of any company. Therefore, the strategic task of the manager is to prevent burnout of his employees, and if it begins, to notice it in time and take the necessary measures” - Alexey Utkin , marketer of the Kickidler time tracking system
Give up meaningful goals
You can have meaningless goals, but you should not have great aspirations that would be practically unattainable within one lifetime. You shouldn't strive to change the world around you for the better. The maximum is improving your life through the purchase of material goods, the joy of which disappears in about a week.
“Why conquer the stars? Why waste yourself on improving the lives of others? Why give hope? Why should I sleep? Why wake up? Why move? Why am I living? - this is exactly what your train of thought should look like.
How to help an employee if burnout has already happened:
The following ways will help improve the employee’s condition:
New hobby
Advise him to do what he loves or try something he has long dreamed of. For example, origami. Recommend spending 10–15 minutes a day on a hobby: this will be enough to relieve stress, redirect attention and take a break from work.
Change of responsibilities
Transfer him to another position, update his responsibilities, or give him a new project.
Rest
Send them on vacation on time, don’t load your weekends with additional tasks, and recommend giving up the frantic pace of life. Tell us how to find a balance between work and personal life - our tips will help you free up more time for relaxation.
Workplace update
The advice is banal, but effective: just change the environment. Buy an employee a new desk, renovate the office, transfer the employee to another office.
Sports activities
Physical labor helps cope with emotional fatigue. Enroll your employee in a fitness club, advise the employee to walk 20-30 minutes a day in the fresh air, take warm-up breaks for the entire office:
These same methods can be used to cope with your burnout. Rest more, take on new projects, redecorate your office, do what you love, or start going to a fitness club.
“Employee burnout is fatigue when “external” motivation does not work, and “internal” motivation goes somewhere. The employee loses energy, he is overcome by apathy and this, of course, affects productivity. The first signal that you need to pay attention to is the discrepancy between the results of work and the planned ones. A manager should always look an employee in the eye and see what is happening to him. From my experience: every day in the company I made two rounds, in the morning and in the evening, and sometimes three, and each time I talked to the employees, looked them in the eyes. When you see that an employee is starting to burn out, the first thing you need to do is talk. One-on-one conversations work very well. We sat down, poured two cups of tea and spent an hour and a half, and sometimes more, talking with the employee. This made it possible to understand what was happening and what could be done about it, as well as to find solutions that would “charge” the employee. Another option is to move the employee to a more interesting job/position if he has this desire. Here it is important to see this need, and then negotiate and transfer the employee to a job that is more interesting to him. The third point is mastering a related profession: here we free you up a little, and you begin to study a related profession with a further complete transition and immersion in it. A business trip is also a good tool. I sent an employee on a business trip, usually abroad, and this gave him strength for new achievements. One option for solving the same problem is vacation. And another solution to the problem is to create a “positive” image around this employee. I made sure to praise him at meetings, emphasize some achievements, create a positive emotional background around him” - Vladimir Mozhenkov , business practitioner and business coach
If all else fails, there is a radical way to get rid of burnout - radically change your field of activity. Talk to the burnt out employee and, if there is no other option, encourage him to write a statement of his own free will. And then recruit new employees. We talked about how to build a dream team in a separate article.
Associate yourself with work and take all failures personally
This point is closely intertwined with the previous one. You are your job and nothing more. Every failure at work is akin to your death or some kind of incurable disease. However, it will be difficult for you to perceive work failures as your own if you do not limit your life exclusively to work. Therefore, fulfillment of the previous point is mandatory.
I also recommend taking personally the failures of colleagues, other people’s dismissals, quarrels, the boss’s bad mood and other things that are far from you. The coronavirus crisis, by the way, is also your personal failure.
How to avoid burnout if it hasn't happened yet
Employee burnout is easier to prevent than to deal with the consequences. For this:
- distribute the load evenly so that it is approximately the same for all workers: if you load one more than others, he can quickly burn out;
- switch attention between different types of activities - give employees diverse tasks, for example, alternate tasks that require creativity and routine ones;
- let people rest - monitor the vacation schedule, introduce a normal lunch break, try not to keep employees after work and not send work home, and in case of overtime, adequately compensate for the time spent;
- create a comfortable atmosphere in the office or at work - install air conditioners, install coolers and a coffee machine, buy comfortable chairs and tables, make repairs in a timely manner;
- interest employees in something new: for example, invite everyone to go fishing or play airsoft, this will help not only prevent burnout, but also unite the team;
- motivate, not scold - introduce KPIs and reward for exceeding the plan, and in case of failure, do not scold or fine, but figure out why this happened and help the employee overcome the backlog;
- conduct surveys that identify employee burnout, and help those who are close to it - transfer to another position or use the tips given above.
Don't forget about yourself. For example, automate management accounting and business processes, relax more and spend time with your family.
Regularly devalue your results
It doesn’t matter what you have achieved in your career, there is always someone above you, you are still “working for your uncle.” And even if you are a successful entrepreneur, remember that Zuckerberg became a dollar millionaire at the age of 22. You have not overtaken him, which means you have achieved nothing.
When you devalue every result achieved, it is much easier for you to focus on failures. Remember that you simply have no successes, only failures, mistakes and problems.
The most interesting thing is that your worthlessness at work can easily be carried over to the rest of your life. Especially if you already associate life with work.
Interesting examples: as in Russian burnout workers
L'Oreal Russia conducts a survey showing the level of employee satisfaction, and then adjusts business processes depending on the survey results. For example, workers expressed a desire to come to work later and sometimes work from home. The request was heard and employees were allowed to come not at 9 am, but between 8 and 10, and sometimes not to come at all, while working from home.
Yandex conducts a survey showing the degree of involvement in work . If a manager sees that an employee is close to burnout, he suggests that he change the team, project, or field of activity in general. For example, a developer can become a tester or try himself in a managerial position.
Megafon found that workers who communicate with people most often suffer from burnout . A special “No Stress” program was developed for such employees. Within its framework, psychologists help employees cope with stress.
At the Ural Bank for Reconstruction and Development, call center employees are asked to give up monotony. Employees are assigned to either incoming or outgoing calls, and are also offered to work with different bank products. In addition, some vacancies in other departments are filled by call center employees. Thanks to this, staff turnover in the call center has halved.
There are other ways to prevent professional burnout. Data from the recruiting agency Hays shows how Russian companies are doing:
If you feel that burnout is close (or has occurred), then we recommend taking the test on the Experimental Psychic website and getting the results completely free.
Don't you dare rest
A common mistake newbies make to burnout is to take time off. Ignore it as a phenomenon. Don't book tickets in advance, don't go anywhere. You understand that in our unstable times there is no point in planning anything. Firstly, this way you won’t be able to give up vacation in favor of work (and we remember that there are force majeure and insolvent colleagues at work). And secondly, again some kind of virus - and your tickets cried.
If you suddenly want to watch a movie or TV series, read a book or play - think again! Listen to successful motivators who started from the bottom and worked 25 hours a day to get where they are today. Where are you and where are they? So decide for yourself what kind of vacation you want here.
Advice from sociologist Vladimir Savelyev
If you have planted a splinter, it should be removed. If you have an infection, you need to defeat the pathogen. And if you experience burnout, you need to eliminate stress. It's simple.
Work needs to be done from two sides: from the organization and from the person. It is necessary to eliminate sources of constant non-productive stress. Unproductive stress, unlike productive stress, does not add value from a business perspective. For example, deadlines are a source of productive stress. They help you complete the task on time. But a constantly working hammer drill behind the wall is a source of unproductive stress.
Pay special attention to overloads. Overload and overwork is a signal that something needs to be changed in the organization of work.
Self-prevention of burnout is possible. First, rest as soon as you are tired. If you are thoroughly tired, take a vacation. No work on weekends. No work after work. Spend this time on family, leisure, and self-development. If you feel guilty about not working during your vacation, consult a psychologist. If you don’t have time to solve problems during working hours, improve your skills.
Second, consider how to minimize your own sources of stress. Master time management to manage your tasks. Request feedback from your manager. Have a heart-to-heart talk with the colleague who is hurting you. Most likely, everything is not all right with him either.
Another life hack: try to find external meaning in your work. How does your work help solve other people's problems? How does it improve the world around us? How does it allow you to grow? Answer these questions and you will significantly increase your level of stress resistance. As the classic said, “if you know the why, you will survive any how.”
Ignore everyday problems
It is advisable that you have a whole range of long-unsolved everyday problems. Dirty dishes, unwashed clothes, uncooked food, unwashed floors, unkempt children or pets - the more the merrier.
From unresolved problems, you will not only feel that same sword of Damocles over your neck, but also constant dissatisfaction with life. If a problem can be dealt with in 10–30 minutes, put off solving it as long as possible - the stronger the effect will be.
If there is chaos at home, it will be in your head and at work. There are no better conditions for burnout.
