Simple Steps to Help Prevent Burnout
Now more than ever, we are working long hours, with less support. This is leading to a mental health crisis. According to Forbes, “A new study by Asana, looked at over 10,000 knowledge workers across seven countries, and found approximately 70% of people experienced burnout in the last year.”
As an executive coach, I help busy, high-achieving professionals have more time for the things they love without sacrificing their career. Often, my clients come to me experiencing burnout. They are exhausted… working long hour weeks. They feel like they’re too absent in their personal and family life and they long for balance.
I too am familiar with feelings of burnout. For the first 30 years of my life I sought my worth through being a pleaser and a hyper achiever. I was very aware of other people’s expectations and desires.
I was one of the most successful sales people in my company. But when my 2nd child arrived, I began to experience debilitating and overwhelming anxiety for the first time in my life. I was burnt out from trying to please everyone else and sacrificing my own wellbeing.
This is when I sought out a coach for myself. Coaching empowered me to be a leader in my own life, take responsibility for my own wellbeing and act on what’s most important to me.
And I realized I wasn’t alone!!! Seeing the anxiety in the people around me who were either working too much and not having enough time with their kids or choosing to be a stay at home parent and missing out on the career they’d worked towards was painful to see. I realized something had to change.
That is why I want to share effective and practical ways to create work/life alignment and put an end to the burnout. We’ll review how to more effectively manage yourself and the people around you so you can have better relationships at work, and more time and energy for yourself and what’s most important to you.
This article is not for the single-minded corporate climbers who are willing to sacrifice everything else in their lives for their career.
I wrote this article for busy professionals who believe it's important to be able to perform well at your job, and still have an amazing home life AND personal relationships.
3 Quick Tips to Help Prevent Burnout
1. You need to get comfortable saying ‘No’
Raise your hand if you've ever said ‘yes’ to something you wanted to say no to… Let me tell you a secret that most of us who feel uncomfortable saying ‘no’ tend to forget...whenever you say ‘yes’ to another meeting or task, you are automatically saying ‘no’ to something else. We may say ‘yes’ to help a colleague only to later realize that now we don’t have time for our own work.
Saying ‘no’ can be difficult for many of us, but it doesn’t serve us in the long run if we end up breaking promises or end up exhausted and frazzled. Tony Maree Torry, an executive coach, offers a powerful analogy between your time and your bank account. She advises that you should think of your time like you think of your money. Just like our financial bank accounts may fluctuate from time to time, our timebank accounts (metaphorically speaking) will also go up and down. Everytime you say ‘yes’ to something, you are making a withdrawal from your time savings. If you don’t think of time as the finite resource that it is, you will end up with a depleted bank account.
There are only so many hours in the day. Ask yourself whenever you consider saying ‘yes’, do you even have the time in your “time bank account to do it? If the answer is yes, then ask yourself whether that is really what you want to spend your time and energy doing.
2. Empower others
Often, high achievers become burnt out because they know they can get the job done. Whether it's writing a proposal, cleaning up someone else’s mistake, or facilitating a difficult situation, in the moment it often feels more efficient to just do it yourself. Unfortunately, not only will this exhaust you, it can create unintentional dependences. It’s the old adage we are all familiar with “give a person a fish they eat for a day, teach a person to fish, they eat for a lifetime.” It truly is a win-win when you take the time to create an empowered team around you - whether that’s at work or at home! Creating an empowered team simply means that you let others handle what is theirs to handle. Trust that others can accomplish their tasks and give them the space to do so, even if that means it may take a bit longer at first or not be exactly as you’d do it. Let go of attachments to perfection. By trusting those around you, you not only free up some of your time but you establish trust with the other person AND build that other person’s self-confidence and independence. A total win-win-win!
3. Be aware of your triggers
When life feels really difficult, it’s easy to get triggered by a rude comment or another request for your time. By understanding your emotional temperature you can be a less reactive and more effective leader. To do this, all it takes is a two-minute check in. I advise clients to create space between their meetings for a quick self-awareness check-in. You can do this by scheduling 45-55 minute calls instead of back-to-back 60-minute calls. With the extra few minutes, turn your focus inward. Take deep breaths to clear your mind and ask yourself, ‘How am I feeling? What emotions are here? How does my body feel?’ A regular practice of self-awareness can be all you need to help you maintain your cool and enabling you to make good decisions.
If you feel you could benefit from professional coaching support, please contact me for a free consultation call.