Spot the signs of workplace burnout and take action ASAP

Are you suffering from a workplace burnout? These easy tips can make your life easier for sure.

By: Juhi Kumari | | Updated: September 17, 2019 6:03 pm

Occupational burnout can potentially lead to both physical and mental health issues, if left unaddressed. © Getty Images

The term ‘burnout’ has become extremely common these days. According to German-born American psychologist Herbert Freudenberger, who first coined the term, burnout refers to the “Extinction of motivation or incentive, especially where one’s devotion to a cause or relationship fails to produce the desired results.” The urgency to meet the daily target at work, facing the demands of life, and constant efforts to fit in—these are some of the life-work situations that almost everyone experiences on a daily basis. And, these are the factors that lead to a burnout. If we particularly talk about workplace stress, it occurs when you feel unable to cope up with the daily challenges it throws at you and when you find yourself exhausted and empty.

If you find your job extremely frustrating, experience headaches, loss of motivation, and resentfulness while working, feeling drained out, or find your performance deteriorating, you are going through workplace burnout. Unreasonable deadline pressure, lack of communication or support from manager, lack of clarity in your role, unfair treatment, unmanageable workload etc. put you at risk of experiencing workplace stress. Occupational burnout can potentially lead to both physical and mental health issues, if left unaddressed. Some of the detrimental effects of this condition include excessive stress, depression, insomnia, fatigue, high blood pressure, alcohol misuse, vulnerability to illness, heart diseases, type 2 diabetes, anger, etc. Recently, even WHO added workplace burnout in the list of official medical diagnoses. Spot the signs of a workplace burnout and address it without delay.

HOW TO DEAL WITH WORKPLACE BURNOUTS

According to one of the researchers at the American Psychological Association Office of Applied Psychology, both managers and employees play equally significant roles when it comes to identifying and managing a workplace burnout.

To manage the chronic work-related stress, employees need to take required steps to have effective coping skills. They can try to identify the possible triggers of stress and eliminating them when they can. Here we will talk about the actions both managers and the employees should take in order to reduce the work place stressors.

Maintain a balance in your personal and professional life

Pushing yourself and spending extra hours at work once in a while is fine. However, if this is happening on a regular basis, it can have detrimental effects on your health. It can also hamper your ability to do work at the required pace and maintain the quality of the work. In order to manage workplace stress, you need to talk to your manager and discuss the problems you are going through. Also, neither take your personal matters in the office, nor bring your office work at home. Moreover, don’t prolong your working hours. In this case, managers should stress the importance of having a life and ask about outside-of-work activities. Additionally, they should offer flexible working arrangements to help manage busy schedules.

Prioritize your tasks

One of the major reasons behind workplace burnouts is not being able to prioritize work. This can increase the output time of your work and you may have to stay in office for longer duration to complete the given target. If you are not able to prioritize your assignments, seek help of your manager. Ask him, what should go when. And, managers should make sure that their employees do not have too much work pressure. Also, they should lend help in prioritizing assignments.

Take the necessary breaks

If you find yourself lacking enthusiasm and motivation at work, it is time to divert your attention. Experiencing these things means that though your body is at work, your heart and soul are not. Chronic stress, lack of involvement in work can only have detrimental effects on your assignments. So, it better to distant yourself from these things for a while and breathe in fresh air. Plan a vacation with people you enjoy hanging out with. If you can’t do that, take out time from your working hours to go for a walk or enjoy a cup of coffee. And, do not talk business during this time. In this scenario, managers should ask employees to take leave at least for a week and come back fresh.

Communicate with your manager

In case you feel your work has become mundane and that is what’s affecting your productivity and motivation, have a conversation with your manager. Don’t tell him directly that you are going through burnouts. Express that you need a challenging work to work interestingly. Also, tell him that as want to give full attention to your work and churn out better results. And, in order to do so, a big list of work is not helping. Make him understand that probably reduction in daily target is required. On the other hand, managers should take these conversations positively and find out a way to help. Neither employee nor manager needs to be complaining or offensive. Just try to give and take suggestions to make things better at work.

Indulge in exercise, eat well, and sleep better

Being in stress means you need to let go of certain things. Exercising on a daily basis can help you in this regard. You can also indulge in yoga. Also, eat healthy foods like green leafy vegetables, fruits, curd, milk etc. Additionally, take at least 6 hours of sleep every day. Compromising on your sleep can impact you negatively. It can lead you to both physical and mental issues like depression, cardiovascular issues, type 2 diabetes etc.

Published : September 17, 2019 4:43 pm | Updated:September 17, 2019 6:03 pm

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