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Job burnout: How to spot it and take action
Job burnout is a type of stress linked to work. It includes being worn out physically or emotionally. Job burnout also may involve feeling useless, powerless and empty.
Burnout isn't a medical diagnosis. Some experts think that other conditions, such as depression, are behind burnout. Burnout can raise the risk of depression. But depression and burnout are different, and they need different treatments.
Certain personality traits may affect the risk of burnout. Other factors, such as past work experiences, also can affect burnout risk. That helps explain why if two people are dealing with the same job issues, one might have job burnout while the other does not.
Whatever the cause, job burnout can affect your physical and mental health. Here are some tips on how to know if you have job burnout and what you can do about it.
Job burnout symptoms
To find out if you might have job burnout, answer these questions:
Do you question the value of your work?
Do you drag yourself to work and have trouble getting started?
Do you feel removed from your work and the people you work with?
Have you lost patience with co-workers, customers or clients?
Do you lack the energy to do your job well?
Is it hard to focus on your job?
Do you feel little satisfaction from what you get done?
Do you feel let down by your job?
Do you doubt your skills and abilities?
Are you using food, drugs or alcohol to feel better or to numb how you feel?
Have your sleep habits changed?
Do you have headaches, stomach or bowel problems, or other physical complaints with no known cause?
If you answered yes to any of these questions, you might have job burnout. Think about talking to a health care professional or a mental health professional. These symptoms also can be linked to health conditions, such as depression.
Possible causes of job burnout
There are different causes of job burnout. They include:
Lack of control. Not having a say in how you do your job, such as your schedule, assignments or workload, can lead to job burnout. Not having what you need to do your work also can add to burnout.
Lack of clarity about what's expected of you. If you're not sure what your boss or others want from you, you're not likely to feel like you're doing a good job.
Conflicts with others. Maybe you work with an office bully. Or you feel that co-workers are against you. Or your boss is too involved with your work. These conflicts can add to job stress.
Too much or too little to do. Maybe your job is boring. Or it's so busy you can't keep up with the demands. In these situations, you need a lot of energy to stay focused. This can lead to fatigue and job burnout.
Lack of support. If you feel alone at work and in your personal life, you might feel more stressed.
Problems with work-life balance. Problems with work-life balance. Maybe your work takes up so much of your time and energy that you have nothing left for family and friends. This lack of balance can lead to job burnout.
Job burnout risk factors
The following factors can add to job burnout:
Having a heavy workload and working long hours.
Struggling with work-life balance.
Working in a helping profession, such as health care, that involves a lot of giving to others.
Feeling of having little or no control over work.
Costs of job burnout
Doing nothing about job burnout can make the problems worse. As a result, you might:
Feel drained.
Not feel able to cope.
Not be able to sleep.
Be sad, angry, irritable or not care.
Use more alcohol or other substances.
Get heart disease, high blood pressure or type 2 diabetes.
Be more likely to get sick.
Handling job burnout
Burnout often involves things in the workplace that you can't control. But there are ways to control how you cope with the stress. To get started:
Look at your options. Talk to your boss about your concerns. Maybe you can work together to make changes or solve problems. Set realistic goals for what must get done. Find out what can wait. If things at work are not likely to change, you might look for a job that would be a better fit for you.
Seek support.. Ask co-workers, friends or loved ones for support. Talking to others might help you cope. Feeling like you belong protects against burnout. If your job offers an employee assistance program, look at the services offered.
Try a relaxing activity. Look for activities that can help with stress. Examples are yoga, meditation or tai chi. Something as simple as taking some deep breaths a few times a day can help relieve tension.
Get some exercise. Regular physical activity can help you cope with stress. It also can take your mind off work.
Get some sleep. Sleep restores well-being and helps protect your health.
Practice mindfulness. Mindfulness is being aware of what's going on inside you and around you without judging or reacting. This practice can help you deal with what's happening on the job.
Keep an open mind as you think about the options. Ask for help. There are ways to overcome burnout and protect your health
#MentalIllnessAwarenessWeek
Mental health is important in all aspects of our lives, including in professional settings. That’s why we’re putting it first this #MentalIllnessAwarenessWeek and #WorldMentalHealthDay! Let’s make our workplaces #NAMIStigmaFree. Share how you prioritize Mental Health at Work!
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6 Tips on Being More Assertive to Reduce Stress and Anxiety
Marlynn Wei M.D., J.D.
Key points
New research indicates that learning to be more assertive can reduce stress, anxiety, and depression.
Saying no and setting boundaries is not the same as being mean or impolite.
Being assertive is context-dependent; you do not have to be equally assertive in every situation.
New research suggests that learning how to be assertive can significantly reduce stress, anxiety, and depression. Assertiveness is a communication skill that allows you to express your needs, feelings, emotions, and thoughts in a balanced and respectful manner, without violating the right of others. Practicing assertiveness can improve your self-esteem, agency, and self-confidence. This skill is crucial for managing stress, reducing anxiety, and preventing depression and burnout.
Understanding Assertiveness
Assertiveness involves expressing oneself in a balanced manner that respects both your needs and the needs of others. Two contrasting modes of communication are passive and aggressive, on opposite sides of the spectrum. In the passive mode, one prioritizes other people's needs constantly over one's own, which can lead to depression, low self-esteem, feeling helpless, lack of agency, frustration, and resentment. On the other end, there is the aggressive mode of communication, in which one's own needs is prioritized in a way that violates the rights of others.
Being able to negotiate one's own needs with others in an assertive way is essential for achieving balanced relationships and a strong sense of agency and self-confidence. Being on either end of the spectrum—either too passive or too aggressive—can result in higher levels of stress, anxiety, and depression.
New Research on Assertiveness
Recent studies reveal the positive benefits of assertiveness. Research shows that people who learn how to communicate assertiveness experience lower levels of stress, anxiety, and depression. Assertiveness also increases self-esteem, self-empowerment, and effectiveness at being a leader. The new study found that assertiveness training weekly for 10 weeks significantly improved levels of stress, anxiety, and depression for those who received the training compared to those who did not. This finding is consistent with previous research suggesting that learning assertiveness improves self-esteem, work engagement, and leadership effectiveness.
6 Assertiveness Tips to Get Started
1. Saying no and setting boundaries is not the same thing as being mean or impolite. Learning when and how to say no and set boundaries is essential for reducing stress and anxiety and preventing chronic burnout. If you were raised to be constantly accommodating to others without question, then standing up for yourself and speaking up may feel challenging, uncomfortable, and unfamiliar at first. People new to assertiveness will often experience a lot of difficulty expressing their needs and negotiating them with others and may also fear rejection or that they will be seen as asking for too much, offensive, or rude. Remember that asserting your boundaries respectfully is a form of self-respect and is a long-term personal and professional investment.
2. Boundaries come in many forms, including emotional, physical, time, energy, resource, social, digital, work, material, and spiritual. Learning the different types of boundaries is an important first step. Emotional boundaries protect your feelings. For example, observe if certain people consistently belittle, criticize or undermine your feelings or emotional needs. Time and energy boundaries protect how you want to spend your limited time. Work boundaries include deciding your limits on working after hours and how available you want to be to those at work. Enforcing these boundaries protects you from chronic stress, burnout, and fatigue.
3. Recognize physical and emotional signals of your boundaries being crossed—your body often "knows" before your mind. It is important to learn how to identify the physical and emotional signals that you are not asserting your boundaries and they are being crossed. Your body will often "know" before your mind does that your boundaries are being crossed. When someone crosses your boundaries, your mind and body can react with a wide range of signals—from shutting down, feeling numb and dissociated to being irritable and short with others, feeling angry, resentful, and overwhelmed. The body can also signal boundary crossing by physical pain, such as getting headaches or feeling nauseated.
Burnout symptoms of anxiety, fatigue, exhaustion, headaches, depression, and irritability are common signs that one is not recognizing or enforcing one's boundaries. Learning these signals is very important and takes time, especially if you were trained early on in childhood to ignore these signs and to override your own instincts and just follow marching orders.
4. Being assertive is context-dependent and does not mean you have to be equally assertive in every situation. Knowing when and how to be assertive requires nuance and a careful assessment of each situation. Research has found that assertiveness has an inverted U-shaped relationship with leadership effectiveness, meaning you don't want to end up being seen as either too passive or too aggressive. Interpersonal assertiveness requires a constant assessment of factors in individual situations and weighing the risks and benefits. There is no one-size-fits-all approach.
5. Expect possible resistance from those used to your non-assertiveness. If you have been accommodating in your relationships, people in your life may have come to expect or rely on this dynamic. Adjusting to your newfound assertiveness might disrupt established patterns. Some people may not be as supportive as you would hope, especially if they have relied on you being an accommodating person to them.
A chronic lack of assertiveness can cultivate imbalanced or one-way relationships involving self-sacrifice and people-pleasing behaviors. As you integrate more assertiveness into your relationships, some people may not react positively. For example, if you tended to always be available to a friend or family member to hear about their problems and begin to enforce better boundaries and are now less available, they may feel disappointed or upset. It is important to offer yourself self-compassion and room for growth. People who have counted on your being accommodating to them may balk at the fact that you are no longer as available to them or that you are only willing to engage in a more balanced and reciprocal relationship.
6. Be patient and offer yourself self-compassion as you learn and practice assertiveness. The journey toward refining your version of assertiveness can be a long but worthwhile one. Developing and practicing assertiveness is an investment both in yourself and toward creating long-term healthy personal and professional relationships.
