6 Ways To Understand And Combat Your Team's Burnout
You aren’t alone right now if you feel frazzled and burned out. In the midst of the pandemic, 76 percent of U.S. employees surveyed said they were experiencing burnout. You might be sharing those feelings, whether it’s because you’ve lost your sense of boundaries by working from home, you’ve been supervising your kids’ schoolwork, you’re tending to vulnerable relatives or you’ve had to keep showing up to a potentially dangerous workplace. You’re also not alone if you have team members and colleagues who are feeling equally crispy.
Burnout is an expression of mental, emotional, and physical exhaustion that often comes from ongoing work-related stress. Burnout can become particularly acute when you keep pushing yourself to work harder, start neglecting your own needs or don’t see how to improve the situation. It’s part of your responsibility as a leader to notice what’s going on for your people and yourself. Then you can offer support to reduce burnout’s impact and help people restore their sense of drive and optimism. Here are six practical approaches you can take.
Pay close attention to individual reactions. Ask what your team members are experiencing, both at work and at home, and express your concern for their well-being. According to research at the University of Washington, communicating your compassion has the potential to shift burned-out employees’ self-perception and restore their self-esteem, sense of belonging, and even self-control. Of course, it helps if you’ve already established good working relationships.
