In this article for Harvard Business Review, Jennifer takes a radical stance on burnout – it’s about your workplace, not your people. Although developing emotional intelligence skills — like optimism, gratitude, and hope — can give people the rocket fuel they need to be successful, if an employee is dealing with burnout, we must stop and ask ourselves why. We should never suggest that if they’d just practiced more grit or joined another yoga class or taken a mindfulness course, their burnout would have been avoided.

This is a huge departure from the thinking of the past, and it requires organizations to really consider what is making their staff so unhealthy and why does our work environment lack the conditions for them to flourish? How can I make it safe for them to work here every day? This can be a scary and overwhelming task, but a necessary one for every organization that truly wants to address burnout.  

We must dig into the data and ask our people what would make work better for them. More generally, we need to better understand what causes people to feel motivated in our organizations, and what causes them frustration. There’s a major opportunity here to not only fix burnout, but to put the systems in place to avoid it altogether.

If you’re a leader or organization looking for tools and strategies to address and prevent burnout, keep reading below!

Burnout is About Your Workplace, Not Your People

Changing the Burnout Narrative 

In this article for Harvard Business Review, Jennifer takes a radical stance on burnout – it’s about your workplace, not your people. The most pragmatic way to address burnout, especially when it is a commonplace issue within a workplace, is by doing away with the individualistic approach and approaching it as a broader structural issue. Company culture shapes the employee experience and can be empowering or detrimental to wellbeing depending on corporate values and management strategies. 

Although developing emotional intelligence skills — like optimism, gratitude, and hope — can give people the rocket fuel they need to be successful, if an employee is dealing with burnout, we must stop and ask ourselves why. We should never suggest that if they’d just practiced more grit or joined another yoga class or taken a mindfulness course, their burnout would have been avoided. This approach would be reductive and dismissive, as well as largely ineffective due to its failure to address the factors outside of an employee’s control that contribute to their burnout. Empathetic leadership is the key to making employees feel heard and working together to find lasting solutions by shifting workplace culture. 

The Task at Hand for Employers

This is a huge departure from the thinking of the past, and it raises some important questions for organizations. Namely, what is making their staff so unhealthy and why does our work environment lack the conditions for them to flourish? How can employers make it safe at work every day? 

This can be a scary and overwhelming task, but a necessary one for every organization that wants to meaningfully address burnout. While the challenge may seem daunting, the lasting effects of this radical new outlook on burnout present a tangible way out and not just a band-aid solution that addresses burnout solely on a surface level. Developing coping skills and resilience is certainly a major variable in stress management, but it is not in and of itself a cure for burnout, as sustainably addressing this problem requires a holistic approach.

The Cost of Burnout

Stress in the workplace is costly not only to employers in the form of productivity loss, but also has societal consequences. Stress, depression, and anxiety all have a major impact on healthcare costs. In fact, Stanford researchers found that, in the United States, the healthcare spend on workplace-related stress amounts to $190 billion, which is about 8% of the overall spend. Caregivers and those in passion-driven roles, such as healthcare professionals, are the most susceptible to extreme burnout, experiencing nearly doubly high suicide rates than the average population. For some, burnout can be a life and death issue. It is imperative that employers take action to mitigate its far-reaching impacts.

Organizational Burnout Remedies

Burnout happens when employees don’t feel heard. Sometimes, management thinks that they understand what employees need, but they would be unwise to habitually make budgetary decisions based on assumptions. Taking steps to ask employees specific and actionable questions, such as “If I have $1000 to spend today, what is a top priority area that the money should be spent on?” can provide valuable insights to management about how to meet employees’ needs. Asking these questions anonymously, for example through a survey, may make employees feel more comfortable being honest. This virtual communication method is also easily integratable into a remote work context.

Another method of gauging employees’ needs is a leadership practice called MBWA, also known as management by wandering around. By immersing themselves into the day-to-day environment of their employees, management gets direct access to what is and is not effectively helping employees’ workflow. Maybe there are functionality issues with tech or office equipment that make it more difficult for employees to do their jobs, or perhaps the office is not set up in such a way that makes it comfortable for employees to take much needed breaks. All of these gaps are observable, and by paying attention, management can take meaningful steps to address factors contributing to burnout. 

In her Harvard Business Review article, Jennifer contextualizes these practices using specific examples. 

Take Steps to Address Burnout At your Organization Today

We must dig into the data and ask our people what would make work better for them. More generally, we need to better understand what causes people to feel motivated in our organizations, and what causes them frustration. There’s a major opportunity here to not only fix burnout, but to put the systems in place to avoid it altogether.

If you’re a leader or organization looking for tools and strategies to address and prevent burnout, contact us and we can discuss how we can help.