Three Ways to Beat Employee Burnout
October 28, 2024
Learn how you can help create a supportive work environment, recognize signs of employee burnout, and utilize available resources for the benefit of your team.
Learn how you can help create a supportive work environment, recognize signs of employee burnout, and utilize available resources for the benefit of your team.
“What does employee burnout look like?”
“How do I help my employees avoid burnout while still meeting responsibilities?”
“Is burnout preventable?”
Managers frequently find themselves pondering these questions. Approximately 82% of employees are at risk of burnout primarily due to financial pressures and excessive workloads. Additionally, between June 2023 to June 2024, employee happiness dropped by 5%.
Ultimately, this workplace epidemic is preventable, and there are ways to navigate what employees need to feel empowered at work. Some tactics take time, but remember that this is a marathon, not a race.
It is important to emphasize to your employees that they are meant to work to live, not live to work.
A healthy work-life balance can look different for everyone.
For some employees, it may be important to leave work and not think about tasks until the following day. These “digital detox hours,” (e.g. no emails after 6:00 pm or on weekends) help reinforce boundaries between work and personal time.
For other employees, the flexibility to adjust their work hours is often a priority, enabling them to be present for life’s special moments or care for loved ones. When possible, offering unlimited PTO further enhances this work-life balance, empowering employees to manage their own time as effectively as possible.
Throughout the workday, don’t underestimate the power of a quick breather. Whether it is a lap around the office, a quick trip to fill up water bottles, or stepping outside to get some vitamin D, this little recharge can curb employee burnout.
When employees feel supported in their roles, they are more likely to communicate when they are running out of bandwidth. Developing a work environment that cultivates trust and collaboration is vital to building relationships between managers and employees. A strong relationship increases the likelihood that associates will share their concerns.
Open conversations allow managers and department leaders to ensure that workloads are manageable and distributed fairly. Scheduling frequent, proactive check-ins with employees to address their well-being is a great way to implement this. This could be a regular 1:1 meeting or monthly check-ins.
Something we like to do at The Miller Group is to host fun team-building activities outside of the office. These not only provide needed breaks from work, but also build trust between managers and associates.
Knowing and recognizing the signs of employee burnout is half the battle. Companies can hold manager training sessions to help them recognize the early signs. Training, along with being familiar with your employee’s patterns and habits, makes it easier to spot when something is off.
Some symptoms to be on the lookout for are:
Resources are available to help managers be proactive against employee burnout. What works best may look different based on your company’s challenges, size, and leadership style.
One option is to create a closed group chat for managers in your organization to brainstorm and compare feedback across the company.
Manager book clubs are a great way for team leads to connect and share. A great option to start with would be The Cure for Burnout: How to Find Balance and Reclaim Your Life.
Finally, if you’re looking to grasp the full complexities of burnout, there’s a wealth of articles and studies that shed light on how burnout impacts both employees and the overall work culture.
