Benefits with Company

Welcome to another episode of our wellness podcast. I'm Mark DeFee and with me, is KC Schroder. We're both licensed therapists who focus on workplace mental health.

We're also pretty good friends so we're gonna have a little bit of fun. Maybe tell some stories but most importantly, we're gonna give you some great information to help you develop both personally and professionally. Does that sound good? All right! Let's dive in!

KC, KC, KC, it is always fun speaking to you on our podcast episodes. It's one of my favorite parts of my job. How are you doing?

I'm okay, I guess.

Yeah?

Yeah, kind of just here, trying to figure out all the things on my to-do list for this job.

Oh yeah, there's a lot of them.

Yeah, can't seem to check one off though.

No

Mm mm [no, no]

Darn. That's no good sounds like you're struggling a little bit.

Maybe I'm even a little burned out, Mark.

Oh, really?

Really

So…

Okay, I can't keep on doing this. [laughs] So, today we're going to be talking about burnout and I think that my tone that I just used and kind of the statements I just made I think all of us can admit to either using that tone or saying those words at least one time in the past year and a half.

Yeah, or hearing co-workers say those things and like as soon as you get on a call with them they're affect, you're immediately like something's off.

The energy has left the building.

Yeah, the energy and then they start talking about "Is our role really that important? Or I don't really see the difference we make like all those things. I know myself can feel them but I also hear those in other people's and those are the red flags for me where I'm like: Oh, they might be struggling with something".

Yeah, when you hear somebody who sounds like their job every day is to kind of peddle a bicycle through peanut butter [laughs] just kind of tread or tread water forever and ever. I think those are really like red flags of burnout. And I think we have to get real about it and start talking about it and admitting when we feel that way or admitting to somebody else when you think that they sound that way.

Yeah, yeah, and you're right. This is so important because burnout is more than just being tired in a way that a few nights sleep can resolve that. I mean, burnout fatigue is a key piece to burnout, for sure. But it's not the only thing there when we talk about burnout especially from a professional perspective. There are those moments of being able to connect the dots between what we do and the larger purpose we serve either for the organization or for the values we hold in terms of what our purpose is on this planet. So, when you hear those things you're like "okay, either I am or the person I'm talking to is really experiencing a level of burnout that that's going to be impactful to them."

Yeah, when I think when you hear somebody who really does not have the energy to even begin to check off their first to-do of the day, of their to-do list or if you hear somebody who really just is questioning the purpose of their job or their connection to their job that is what burnout is. It's nothing that you can really …if it gets too far down the line of burnout, it might be something that you really can't even come up with an action plan to get back. It is that severe.

Well and you're right. It's something that needs to be paid attention to at an individual level but organizations need to be too, because it's contagious. Not only to the other areas of an individual's life. If you're burned out at work that can seep over into your personal life and your relationships, but also can move to different employees and different co-workers, especially if someone is seen as more of a team leader. Someone on the team that people look up to and now, all they're spouting off is negativity. What do you think that's going to do to the other team members? And so that contagiousness is something that we all need to be working towards making sure that doesn't spread.

Right, right, which is why it is so important to not only check yourself but feel very comfortable or comfortable enough with your co-workers to maybe be supportively mention it to them if you hear some red flags within them.

Yeah, absolutely and some of the causes of burnout I think are pretty obvious: an unsustainable workload. If you just feel like you're getting buried every day with work that you're not able to complete and that goes on and on, especially if there's a perceived lack of control. I can't moderate how much is coming to me. I just have to put up with it. Those things can really cause some burnout. Insufficient rewards for our efforts if we feel like even a lack of acknowledgement "hey, what you're doing is meaningful". Even without that, we can really just feel unmotivated. If there's this mismatch of our values and our skills. If we're being asked to do things that we don't feel capable of doing. That agitation and that anxiety is very real. So, there's a lot of causes of burnout but what can people do when they realize they're burned out? Or they're talking to someone that is burned out? Now, what would you recommend as the things to try?

Well, I think first and foremost, it is important to talk about it, especially to your leaders. And I know that not all of us might be in the position to really have that type of relationship with their leader, with their manager, with their people leader. But I do think it's incredibly important to go to them and explain to them how you are feeling. And work with them to maybe come up with some steps to combat some of the things that might be causing your burnout whether that's mismatched skills or kind of that like Mark mentioned, that perceived lack of control. Those are the things you can really talk to your leader about. And if you aren't fortunate enough to have that type of leader, I think again going to that supportive co-worker or maybe it's an HR business partner you trust or somebody else outside of your leadership team that might be able to help you. Maybe even calling into something like the EAP can really help you get those skills or a different thought process going around your burnout.

Communication in general is just so key. But there are other things that we know that help us: that we need to lean into getting enough sleep and if you're struggling sleeping looking at ways to improve your sleep hygiene, making sure that you're eating healthy and when we're burned out and stressed, we need to be putting good things in our body. Get those greens and putting them in your body. So, those are the things that come to mind for me in terms of what I would do. What would you add to that list?

Let's pretend that you're not burned out, that you don't have these feelings. How would you act? How would you tackle your day at work? Even if you don't feel that way, even if you feel like you're being literally a Hollywood actor. Pretend for 10 minutes if that's all you got in you. Pretend for 15 minutes if that's all that you have in you. But kind of push yourself to imagine how it could be and what you would feel like if you did not have those feelings of burnout.

I love that. I love visualization exercises being able to think about what life would be if x y and z were solved for how would I be acting differently. I think it's also important to do those type of visualization exercises before you start feeling burned out. Because with burnout, there's this lack of processing, this lack of cognitive ability to figure things out. But if you have a plan before that all occurs it's going to be much easier to implement it and say "here's what I'm going to do when I start feeling these symptoms coming on".

Yeah, prevention is key with burnout because in any role you can get burned out in any situation: pandemic, no pandemic. Tell your partner, tell your best friend, tell your most trusted co-worker to call you out if you start sounding like you are burned out.

Yeah, yeah, for sure. All right, everybody we hope you enjoyed this episode until we speak again take care and be well.

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