The #1 cause of burnout is not what you think | Liz Wiseman for Big Think+
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- Опубліковано 5 чер 2024
- Burnout doesn’t happen because of too much work. Liz Wiseman, an executive advisor, suggests it’s something else entirely.
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We normally associate burnout with being overworked, but that’s not actually the cause of it.
Studies show that when you’re working on something you feel passionate about - when you feel impact - you’re often able to go on much longer and be more productive than when you’re simply going with the motions.
Executive advisor Liz Wiseman shares the difference between the kinds of people who burnout easily and those who self-generate a dynamic environment for themselves in the workplace.
Read the video transcript ► bigthink.com/series/the-big-t...
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About Liz Wiseman:
Liz Wiseman is a researcher and executive advisor who teaches leadership to executives around the world. She is the author of New York Times bestseller Multipliers and Wall Street Journal bestsellers Rookie Smarts and Impact Players.
She is the CEO of The Wiseman Group, a leadership research and development firm headquartered in Silicon Valley, California. Some of her recent clients include: Apple, AT&T, Coca-Cola, Disney, Google, Meta, Microsoft, Netflix, Nike, Salesforce, Tesla and X. She writes for Harvard Business Review, Fortune and a variety of other business and leadership journals. She is a frequent guest lecturer at BYU and Stanford University and is a former executive at Oracle Corporation, where she worked as the Vice President of Oracle University and as the global leader for Human Resource Development. Liz has received the top achievement award for leadership from Thinkers50 and has consistently been named one of the world’s top 50 management thinkers.
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I often felt burned out because of lack of autonomy and respect. I had creative ideas, and felt I was trying to make an impact, but it fell on deaf ears. We can't be "impact players" when our different approaches to work are just viewed as incompetence in close-minded systems and strict hierarchies.
Well said, both good-lookin' and clever female. 😌
Agreed, seen it happen. Find a new employer, whatever it takes because in the end it WILL be worth it.
this is really true!
i felt so shut out, i walked away from my old goals. was a sadness that takes years to gett past.
Stop asking permission, just do it.
exactly how I feel in my firm.
So, shes approaching this from a Stephen Covey-esque angle of the attitude towards providing service. And while I can appreciate that this can impact how much someone enjoys their work, it does not detract from the main stressors in modern life that contribute to burn-out. I don't have statistics with me, but i do work as a therapist who sees individuals suffering from stress, depression and anxiety. 3 themes keep reoccuring with clients who see me for stress from work: unappreciated by higher-ups, financial difficulties exacerbated by the cost of living, and a lack of leisure time due to work and family commitments. There is no way i am going to tell them they just need to adopt a service-oriented mindset and all will be well.
Exactly, It's has never been that easy to tell all burnout are cause of lack of perspective.
Awesome comment!
The 1st 2 of your 3 I can relate to anecdotally. This lady seems to be talking about 'millennial' types that started at the company 6 weeks ago and feel like quitting because they're not making 'an impact' or the work they've been given is beneath them somehow?
For me, Burnout is being run ragged by your boss who then implies you're not working hard enough, when you can prove you're pulling the weight of a whole Department.
During the 2008 crash my employer took the time to accelerate their scheme to send jobs overseas, so we lost our 'jobs' were expected to keep the show on the road when everything was going to pot. Our Executive were lying to investors, employees and probably to themselves. We couldn't escape. No-one was recruiting, the company wasn't doing so internally either and we were 'forced' into telephone service roles that we hadn't applied for, or wanted, but it was that or redundancy during a crash and the company attitude was that we should be grateful they weren't tossing us out along with our jobs to people that couldn't do it properly. We were even told to lie to colleagues offsite so that 'people don't get the wrong idea'. The executive all later resigned having failed in their fiduciary duties and for the sake of the country our company was 80-90% Nationalised.
With no way out one of my colleagues ended up on 'anti-depressants' or in her words "everything is still shit but I can't cry about it anymore" I will NEVER take them after seeing what they do 1st hand. But lord at that time I despised everything and everyone involved with that company, it was an effort of will to show up, but I didn't allow it to impact close friends or family, colleagues and I would just complain about the situation, it was reasonably cathartic but, I kept so much bottled up for years afterwards, 3-4 years after moving to different sites around the country I came to the conclusion I could run that place better than the executives and I quit.
The company still hits the news today for all the WRONG reasons.
I'd say it was the lack of CONTROL over the situation and the lack of concern, empathy, understanding, humanity, or whatever is normal for human beings to do in difficult times that sent so many of us over the edge? It was like hitting your face into the wall and being told it wasn't hard or convincing enough LOL.
It probably took me 2-3 years to recharge my batteries and re-enter the Corporate world, I was that washed out.
Apologies for the essay ! People in your profession are a Godsend that's often underappreciated in a world where everyone has anxiety or depression.
I agree! I see the same problems with my patients! I'm sure in some cases impact could be important, but mostly stress is related with being underpaid and overworked.
@@s3p4kner 2008 - 2009 was really bad times for World Economy, especially whom looking for its first or second job with few experience.
This is only true at early stages of burn out. Once you are fully burnt out you lose the energy and interest to even care about being impactful.
True, but at that moment, it leans more towards depression
I agree, it does become depression and even a form of PTSD if is goes on long enough.@@questionmark8046
Burnout ≠ Depression altho the overlaps are vast
And that's when you become a mercenary, getting yours and not caring whether the project succeeds.
True burnout is seeing that you have a job to do, doing the bare minimum and not giving a single F because your company doesn't care no matter how hard you worked in the past you still get paid the same and everyone else got the same raise or better. You still get sent the same work, or even more work - for the same pay.
She had me at first, but then the whole idea that the impact player doesn't burn out because they have the right mendset just lost me. I've always been the impact player, the go to person, the one that understands and can come through with solutions amd implement them. I was also paid less, unsupported, in many ways not allowed to do my own job, made to work on great projects that were dropped on a whim by upper mgmnt rich kids and made to work on projects that were pointless, only to have it go nowhere because it was pointless.
All for what?... the business itself isn't making the world a better place, it's all just busy work to make some rich a-holes richer.
But isn't that what she described?
that's exactly what she's talking about broseph
You sound a lot like me, so I hope you don't mind it when I say I think you missed the message here. She doesn't make it explicit, but she's not really talking about impact in the broader sense. The issue is one's own motivation, so she's talking about being impactful according to your assessment criteria specifically. You mentioned that the company isn't making the world a better place, and mentioning that implies it's part of your worldview, and thus part of your assessment criteria. Being effective at a job you don't care about doesn't reinforce your motivation, or at least it doesn't do so nearly as much.
I had a major case of burnout several years ago. It was bad enough that I ended up living in my car for the better part of a year. I never went back to the private sector. When I got back on my feet again I went to work for a non-profit, one I cared a lot more about. That was 25 years ago, and I've never experienced that burnout again. And I've excelled far more in this career than I ever did in my old one.
Really that's just a long way of saying something pretty intuitive: You're more motivated in a job you care about.
The missing nuance of her video is that nothing is guaranteed should you follow her advice. You can do everything she says and still end up penniless and alone. That is real life. Her advice will likely improve your odds of success in the current capitalist system.
Example: I can do everything Michael Jordan did and never become a professional basketball player. It does not mean that all the practice did not improve my chances. It just means I'm not in the top percentile of recognized athletes.
The universe is not a "how-to" manual waiting for us to follow the instructions on UA-cam to succeed. It's a ball of chaos that sometimes throws hardworking people into the limelight and under the bus. That does not mean that you should not try, but it might.
I have to disagree. I love everything I do and have done for the past five years, but I just had waaaaayyyy too much on my plate at once. I burned out big time. Now, I admit, that when I was doing my PhD, it really affected my mental health, but for the majority of the time, I still had a passion for it.
I also HATE when burnout is only discussed in the context of work and workplaces. It makes me think that these people who research burnout don't really know what burnout is. You can burn out in many different contexts and areas of life.
Caring for an elderly parent and trying to keep your job will push you to your limits.
This might be a crazy theory, but here me out here: we can be impact players but get burnout anyway due to being constantly taken for granted. I think impact goes both ways, you know. If what we've done have impacted the business and won big deals, yet we get no recognition or reward from it (be it materially or emotionally), I think burnout can stem from feeling like you're being taken advantage of and receive nothing in return. Being impact players for the sake of the business itself is not enough, not when we live in a world where everything is changing and creating real meaning in life takes more than just money.
Nothing worse that being an impact worker and seeing jealousy and bitterness in for work colleagues. The petty digs but your still trying to proform. I think that's a huge factor towards burn out too
Taking personal control over your remuneration is easier said than done, but people who don't record what they did, when and how much $$ it made the company WILL be taken advantage of. Take control.
If the employer doesn't conduct formal Performance Reviews - RED FLAG - take your paperwork to another employer and show them what an asset you are, especially if those reviews are changed every year to keep you from being a top performer. It's such a shady world out there and HR is not your friend, it's the companies friendly legal team to keep THEM in the clear.
I've worked with far too many people that simple accepted what they were offered, then complained it's not enough.
There's also far too many employers that will point and say 'spreadsheet says no' when they should be saying yes, building up their employees , innovating and improving customer service and finding the right one is hard. So many customers will turn away from a cheaper deal because they know they're being taken care of it's unreal. But it's never what your boss tells you is it?
@@s3p4kner well said. I've worked with people who don't ask but complain constantly.
I do see their side, if they've worked for smaller companies that don't have the resources big business would.
It would put them in a defeated mindset maybe they've asked in the past and been turned down.
So you'd think " what's the point there just going to say no"
A defeated mindset+ feeling under appreciated+ dealing with jealous and bitterness in the work place would drastically increase burn out
@@s3p4kner I honestly think team bonding
With open lines of communication to bosses would really help a lot of the problems that cause burnout
That's pretty much getting no dopamine (reward) for achievement which gives you no second wind.
I don’t want impact, I want a roof over my head and food on my table…
Once you get a roof and food, you will want to impact your community. Maybe not through your job, but through other ways.
@@AdrienBurg the video is addressing burnout. I’m not experiencing burnout because I’m not making an impact. I’m experiencing burnout because it takes all the resources available to me just to keep a roof over my children’s head and food on the table. Making sure children are raised and nurtured with what they need to thrive is impactful to a community in my opinion. But that doesn’t address the burnout of a parent with no access to affordable childcare, low wages, or other things outside my control. People in power have to make changes to improve impact. Not those of us scraping by.
"It's not that people are working too much, it's actually because people don't work enough!", fine, fine, I'll smile while I'm overexploited.
when will it ever be enough?
@@nathalee.awhen you'll work, die and get replaced by someone else, simple as that
Oh, you're just quiet quitting. Also, we didn't hit profitability targets this year, and while us C-suite will be getting bonuses, we can't afford cost of living increases for you plebs. If you're one of the lucky ones that doesn't get laid off this year, you'll need to pick up the slack.
The sector in Sweden that has the highest levels of occupational burnout is health care and elderly care. That's not because they have too much to do. No, it's because they don't feel like they make an impact in their daily work.
Yeah. I'm not buying it.
Well thank god the issue of burnout is something to be addressed by employees instead of structural changes to the workplace.
What would you recommend? Imagine companies trying to encourage employees to work "where there's heat" and things need to be done. I'm pretty sure the employees aren't going to respond well. Their own personal engagement with their job is kind of their responsibility.
@@ClumsyToast They've already done studies on this... over a decade ago, and it depends on the type of work, which strangely she doesn't mention at all.
And brittneyleighba hit the nail on the head- autonomy and respect. It's actually giving people the freedom and environment to be "impactful".
But that means giving employees space to innovate, to goof-off, to try new ideas. But that directly challenges institutional hierarchies, which is why they weren't implemented then, and never will be.
"Where there's heat" is a euphemism for mismanagement and not hiring enough people people in the first place.
@@quintessenceSL It all sounds really good... for a certain percentage of employees. As having managed people, giving them that kind of freedom would just mean no work gets done whatsoever ha.
Obviously there's no one-size-fits-all fix.
@@ClumsyToast As I already mentioned... in. the. very. first. sentence., it depends on the type of work. Different types of work respond to different incentives.
But even a cursory glance at the comments here, the exact same sentiment comes up again and again- lack of autonomy. Why is that, and why is that somehow excluded from the discussion?
Further, you state "obviously there's no one-size-fits-all fix", except "their own personal engagement with their job is kind of their responsibility".
Funny that.
@@quintessenceSL Ah. Right. I had a lapse in judgment. I forgot this is what these interactions are like: meaningless for both parties ay. Whoever jabs the most wins. Touché 🏆
As a former impact player, I strongly disagree with this hypothesis.
Then you weren't one I'm afraid
I disagree. This approach is incompatible for people who perform functions in the lowest rungs of monolithic totem poles who are most distant to and have least influence on "impactful" agendas.
In my experience, burnout and a sense of purposelessness occur when we consistently make choices that are not in alignment with our true selves - our values, personal mission, and so on. It can also occur when the values and the meaning we find in our (work-)environment do not align with who we truly are.
Pause for a moment and ask yourself: How many of the choices that I make are in sync with my own needs and values? And, how often do I engage in activities simply because they are expected of me, because I feel obligated, or because they are perceived as the 'right' thing to do?
One of the most significant misconceptions ingrained in our upbringing and education, is the belief that we are responsible for the feelings and needs of others, and that we must adapt ourselves to earn love and recognition.
We have been conditioned to analyze, strive for efficiency, and make 'correct' choices. This conditioning has led to the development of an inner critic (yes, you know that voice in your head!) that constantly evaluates everything and everyone, but mostly ourselves. The issue with this inner critic? It cuts us off from our own needs and values, influences our decision-making, and prevents us from following our own unique path and creating a life full of joy and fulfillment.
If you recognize this, and you feel like you need to talk to someone about it, feel free to reach out.
Great comment👍 May I ask if you have read any books or watched any videos related to this topic? If so, could you please recommend them to me? Thank you!
I'm going to have to disagree with this idea. The reason we can't have an impact is because we're burned out and overloaded.
Why not both?
This channel needs to find people with real world experience in the work place. Not these writers and so called researchers who make their living writing about things they know nothing about. People like her are one of the many reasons people are burned out in the workplace: so called experts, managers, etc. who have no real experience and therefore knowledge of what it takes to work in a corporate setting these day. Corporate politics in my opinion is one of the main reasons for burnout. You end up spending most of your day navigating the political jungle and little time actual doing the work you were hired to do. Working harder gets you nowhere, but knowing how to interact with the narcissistic egos does!
I 100% agree. I work as a therapist which is very fulfilling but I work in the public system where you get pressured over and over again for more clients and more results etc etc. But I am working with some of the most vulnerable people of society. Healing doesn't happen that quick in a broken system. So of course I'm bloody burnt out, dragging my ass exhausted. I know I make impact but its within a pressured and broken system. Having experts talk about something that exists in their research vacuum does not speak to the real life experience that humans are dealing with day in day out.
100%. Its that owners, CEO's etc just want you to: work everyday, I get no paid vacation for a year and its 5 days. We only get 5 days off for holidays, 3 sick days and that's it. Meanwhile the CEO has their hands in everything, controlling everything and undoing what you were hired to do. They don't want to listen at all. I am unsure what the answer is but most places these days want you to just be quiet, do the work and go home. They don't want you happy, engaged, or thriving... they want you beat down, standard, unimpactful, get me my money or you can be replaced. Until they keep going through employees like a bad relationship and can't see that it's them.
Although she has a point in describing burnout at the beginning, she is shifting the responsibility to the individual when she provides the solution for burnout. It's vital to address systemic issues such as toxic workplace culture. People who run from the chaos often do because they have been burned out before from trying to be impact- players and being stepped over for it. If people ran away from problems and responsibility instead of trying to take on the wave again and again and again, they wouldn't get burned out in the first place.
[Edited for grammar.]
Her job is to help c-suites to deflect the blame to the employees.
I have struggled with burnout all summer long. I was an “impact player”, but was denied a promotion. I ultimately decided not to quit because this job gives me financial stability and the work comes naturally to me. I am no longer an “impact player” in my mind, I’m just a guy that does his job and anything I do that is more than that is to keep myself or others safe while at work. I have switched my mindset to pursing curiosity, wonder, passion, quality things, and a bit of travel. The job is just where I have to spend time in order to fund this. I’ve had to change inner dialogue and really focus on directing my mind off of work and negativity.
Edit: I’d also like to point out that I sent my boss a long email explaining that I’m no longer doing more work than my job description.
I realize this is a luxury. I don’t make a ton of money, but try to live frugally and have set my life up to accomplish this type of living.
I think this mindset is the *real* key to avoiding burnout. Work to live, not live to work. And sometimes doing what you’re passionate about as a source of income is an easy way to burnout, too. Find a job with a good union or that simply treats its workers fairly and then spend your income on your passions. Organizations mine people’s passions and wills for upward mobility as a source of increased value out of people. It’s even a core practice taught to management in many large organizations these days. Apple straight up has systems in place that constantly lure people into working harder with false promises of promotions, then gaslights them into thinking they have to try even harder next time when it doesn’t come their way. Meanwhile, that position was already internally filled months ago and they were just farming mid-level employees for exploiting on the basis of getting that position. Some people call that smart, others call it evil. Nobody ever said the devil was stupid, though.
@@itsd0nk That's very insightful. I had been wondering if management played mind games, and if so how deep it went. It's crazy how our minds can be hijacked by manipulative behavior from others. Scary really. I recently watched the "Ordinary Men" documentary, that was also an eye opener. I feel like I have had a new part of the world exposed to me.
She is misinterpretating burnout with working an unfulfilling job which generally drains your energy. People can have burnout regardless of their job, it is a matter of spending most of your working hours using your energy that does not recover due to not having enough time for it to recover thanks to said work. The most effective cure is time off.
So in another words, Bullsh!t Jobs by David Graeber where the work we do has no impact except make the higher ups look good.
Burnout feel like you helpless,scammed, defeated by the system that doesn't value you and your well-being.
This felt a tad guilt-trippy to people who have experienced burn out. Like "you're only burnt out because you're not taking charge and ownership when it counts", that if we just dove through the wave of chaos and showed leadership when things are really difficult in a company, then we wouldn't feel burnt out. From what I've observed from very high impact people, such as famous UA-camrs who are at the height of their fame, a job that ticks the box of being the height of a high impact player, being noticed and being validated by the work they're doing, is that they are burning out from the sheer amount of output that's expected of them. The burning out is from working too hard for too long without respite, at least that's what I've observed from people who have experienced it and from my own experience of it.
Exactly this. The few times that I’ve burned out were when I was super passionate about a project and was working on it non-stop. It’s all amount energy management. Your body will shut down if you’re overexerting yourself.
I was with her until she suggested that the individual employee can somehow just change their impact with a mindset shift.
I'm open to the idea that burnout may stem from a lack of impact but surely for the average person who works as a mere employee, the ability to significantly increase their impact is largely out of their hands.
Exactly. Most of white collars ( nowadays no diffrence from blue) have same problem.
100% agree with your sentiment. Telling people to just "change their mindset" and "seek out the high impact work" is as patronizing as it is disconnected from reality.
As a boss… totally disagree.
You can ask for change, volunteer for a different task or suggest a new project. When you’re managing a team - believe me, you’ll notice those who stick their hand up vs just “do their job”/scrape by. Leaders don’t always have time to focus on the details, esp if you’re looking a at decisions, or deals, or financials.
As she said - how can you be of service?
@@Showmetheevidence- Thanks for sharing perspective from Your Status Sir. It's giving some vision.
@@Showmetheevidence- you can't ask for change, as the average employee. You'll most likely be told to STFU and do your job.
There are obviously some work environments where that's possible but I'm pretty sure that's more exception than norm.
Most jobs have set tasks that one is expected to perform and outside of that, assuming you even have extra time to "take initiative", there isn't really much you can do. - should the McDonald's employee wash floors when it's momentarily quiet(they probably do that already anyway)? Should they try to suggest changes to a well established production process? - and at what point are you actually talking about more work rather than a mindset shift?
Some jobs are inherently low impact because the economy is set up to prioritize profit and rely on cheap labor. - to suggest that these workers can increase their impact is akin to ideas about people pulling themselves up by their bootstraps.
To more reliably, and much more easily, increase the impact of these workers, the company ought to value them more.
The issue isn't individual mindset that needs to change - it's the purposeful nature of corporate environments that create that. Individual solutions to systemic problems don't fix things, they just mask the damage a person at a time.
Stress is inherently the experience of having a lack of control, so having no ability to make an impact is generating stress to burn you out. This is why the removal of command structures from front lines and long communication chains that removed functional autonomy over soldiers in Vietnam War created such severe PTSD.
The inherent issue is that the structural dynamic of modern corporate environments remove those same relevant levels of impact from almost everyone in a workplace and push them up an obfuscated communication chain that creates these issues.
Strategic leadership theory used by a lot of corporate management strategies are built off of post-WWII strategies to control troops and force compliance in inescapable high stress environments that are DESIGNED to go until they break - because in war there is no other option.
The difference is that companies treat that stress from the workplace like it's the status quo and not an artificially generated issue. That's just late-stage capitalism in action that doesn't acknowledge how things came to be how they are now.
No matter how much of a mindset you have that embraces those ideals - it doesn't matter when you don't have the necessary autonomy to create impact when and where it matters.
Oh yes. Quoter based work targets with a bad boss.. is a recipe for disaster. Nice WW2 anology!
Well said
@@ulabosha4583 Thanks. One of the books that gave the most insight into those parallels was Jonathan Shay's "Achilles in Vietnam: Combat Trauma and the Undoing of Character" because of how much information he provides on the structure itself that makes those stressors so extreme and damaging, and recognizing those systemic issues are a PRECISE mirror for modern day corporate environments, which is why layoffs and other things cause such huge lasting impacts that are often not as acknowledged.
If you’re not an “impact player” my assumption would be that it would make people feel like you aren’t enough. If you are an “impact player” you aren’t reinforced until you make your work impactful. How is impact measured? If there isn’t a line you’re again constantly chasing your work until you feel personally feel you’ve made an impact. For some they never feel enough
Decent point. What mentioned in video is also Subjective.
Don't take the break or create the balance you need. Use everything you have to improve the company.
I think she needs to do more research on compassion fatigue vs workplace burnout. This research does not address either of these two. As well as, healthcare professionals working within a seriously broken healthcare system.
truth is there are so many obstacles and curveballs that get in the way of even working/thinking like this in the workplace. It dependent on office politics, the workplace and leadership structures in place. I think its worth discussing this in the same breath, unless you might actually lead someone to burnout 😅
No matter where you are in the organization or political spectrum, there is always a chance for you to make an impact. Start small - what are the day-to-day activities that you think can be improved upon? Start by implementing these tiny changes, bit by bit, and see what kind of improvements come as a result. Once you are comfortable with your results, share them with others (preferably those higher up, like your manager), and let them form their own opinions about it. You don't need to force these ideas down their throats to demonstrate your intelligence/impact - let them come to those conclusions on their own. The results will speak for themselves.
Good luck convincing the boss of this... I feel like if I went to leadership and said, I'm making no impact, they'd review the logs and say "oh, if you really aren't making an impact, why are you here?"
So, burnout means you're not being impactful? And, impactful people won't experience burnout? So, it's not enough to work hard and diligently on your job, if you're not diverting people's attention?
So, the cure of burnout is people's attention and validation? Great! Who needs sleep and rest anyway?
Yeah, I don't think that she has the science right around burnout. I'm sure I've read the statistic that it's the driven, sometimes called 'type A' personalities that are most likely to burnout. That is, exactly the types that chase the 'impactful roles'!!
I think several factors are completely missing here.
The solution to the problem is practically completely left in the hands of the employee.
He has the wrong mindset, so burnout occurs. If he gaslights himself that he's doing important work, then burnout won't happen.
What is ignored is that employers burden their employees with too much work, pay too little money, do not give them responsibility, structures in which criticism of working methods and superiors is forbidden, in which overtime is seen as normal, have made the workers feel guilty if they can't do their work because it's too much.
Liz Wiseman's career does not suggest that she has ever experienced the concept of having an employer pressure her and deny her everything she pretends is normal.
Ignoring companies' structural problems and blaming it on the employee's mindset is particularly easy when you work with employers and want to sell your ideas to them.
This is and ad disguised as something insightful. One cause of burnout was identified properly, but the whole rest about "impact players" is completley disconected from reality. Running around putting out fires is not normal job its chaos, motivated people need to be rewarded and recoginzed, many jobs in modern companies involve dull repetitive tasks (accounting), people are hired to do jobs in certain areas if you have expectations thowards them you need to tell them, lastly not all people aspire to be exceptional and its perfectly fine. For me this "impact player" concept looks like typical corporate gaslighting, saying its not the organisation that has problems, its you and your mindset. I bet organistaions led by this lady has led to many burnouts
While I can agree with you on some points (doing what you love matters), I also politely disagree that finding new way to think about alone is the only way. It is but a first step in a domino affect.
For instance part of being happy in your work and doing something you believe in is a)knowing what that is, b) knowing your own skill set and worth, and c) knowing your net worth and getting paid that.
That’s where the mindset has to change is in slow steps towards that. Putting proper boundaries in place when people take too much, is also in the contrast with people having mouths to feed.
So working smarter not harder to small steps towards that while also finding a balance of work life yes. Knowing your own worth and knowing how to bargain your skills, yes.
Exactly!! Very smart advice! 👍👍👍
This is a lecture from privilege. Many dont have jobs where this is an option.
All I’m hearing is “you just need to serve your business better to avoid burn out!!”, absolute load of shite. Pay me more, let me work less, then I wouldn’t be burnt out
My company loves a good firefighter. The person that goes in and does absolutely anything that needs doing in order to get things done until you make a choice that management doesn’t like. Successful or not you lose. That’s what causes the burnout. Not being appreciated for going the distance when you do and then if they don’t like your decision making process being shit on even in a win. Everyone wants to Monday morning QB when nobody else is hanging their nuts out there. That’s what pulls the wind out of my sails. That makes me go into that competent box and work there. They can eat shit. Then you wait until they fail at everything and beg you to dig in.
its because corporations, or to be precise managers who have climbed up the corporate ladder are incomponetent at many instances. Promotions rarley happen because someone is competent. Competent people are left to to their job and are rewarded with more tasks, no one cares if they quit. Managment will find another looser to put out fires for them, why should they bother or care to solve anything
The moment she said "we're burnout because we have too little impact" took me out. Ma'am, sit down. I dont think you've experienced what really is burnout, if you did then it might be caused by different issue but not like most of us experienced which is we've given too much work load but too little compensation and the disrespect we received from bosses.
I never thought about burnout being related to a high amount of work or stress. We got that within our hobbies too, still people don't get burned out of it. Imo it is a lack of autonomy. Especially if we are invested in the job we are doing. I'm often in a situation where I think I know what is important but I'm ordered to ignore it or to apply a dirty workaround instead of fixing the problem just to have the same problems a little bit later. Those are the most frustrating things for me at work. It feels like you know you gotta go south and your boss tells you to go north. And if you don't get to the destination you are ordered to run faster towards north. Yes if we talk about our planet after going north for 6.370 kilometers you end up 1 kilometer south too but I would prefer to just go 1 kilometer to the south to arrive there. So for me the problem is trying to be impactful but being held back. But at the end this is a discussion for jobs where there is a choice in direction. Someone at a fabric might feel their work is totally senseless or flawed too and there might be no chance of changing it from their position.
I'm out after the opening statement. I work in EMS, massive rates of burnout, we literally save lives every week, you don't get much more impactful than that.
Burnout rates are correlated with local call volumes, high call volume areas have higher turnover of employees than low call volume, it's not a causal link, but boy is that correlation suggestive.
What a stupid take, we work for money, not for feelings. It scares me that detached people like this sit in their ivory towers and decide what life should be for the rest of us.
I always went to my bosses and told them "look, this is not going to work". They did not listen, I quit, they realised they needed to hire 2 persons for that job😂😅🤣Yeeee👍
I am sure there are situations where burnout is caused by exactly the kinds of circumstances discussed here, but it feels out of touch wrt my personal experience. The worker bee doesn't get to decide what's "impactful". They do what they're told, mostly to someone else's schedule, and the more successfully you do what's asked, the more you're asked to do. I became burned out because I was working 60-70 hours per week for over a year. My work had an impact and was important to my company, but no amount of impact is worth that level of stress or loss of free time. Eventually, I burned out, wised up, and stopped caring. You need more work than I can do with a reasonable work-life balance? Guess you have a problem; better get to work on that.
This makes sense to me. I've been running a landscaping and construction company for 15 years and the times I felt the most burned out were when clients didn't appreciate the stress and work load that the installation required. Feeling the client's indifference to the effort needed for the process and lack of appreciation is what ended up burning me out. If clients or employees appreciate the effort, the work seems more justified because the impact of the work feels like it matters more.
This clip helps me explain why I’ve always thought HR departments are (generally) a waste of time.
When did your HR people ever bring up topics like this?
then why do doctors, even senior doctors with a lot of authority for treatment plans and procedures, as well as clear impact, as well as social respect, one of the most burned out professions?
asking the question "imagine this dream land where your work matters" and getting a positive response isn't a great method to figure out why people get burned out, because people will imagine the good without fully understanding the small details of the daily grind to get there.
personally, I don't think burnout is an issue with work itself, do something long enough, and something you love can become "just work" in the famous words of kiki of kiki's delivery service "I used to like flying, before I started doing it for a living"
I think the issue of burnout is more based on a sense of community, and time with that community, if you could go home at a reasonable time everyday, to fun and loving friends and family, even with work, such as, pressing a button at a factory everyday where you feel like a robot, you are bound to have an overall fun life experience.
As a PhD student, I think your message is resounding to the high-levels of burnout graduate study.
I truly miss being the go to guy when things get tough, I realize I did the same job as everyone else but my job expectation was way higher than my job description, I was a security guard, a therapist, a janitor, an exterminator, a negotiator and a friend. My job would have continued without me but I know my efforts helped everyone enjoy their jobs more and feel safer. It is a hole in my life I no longer have in the same quantity as I grow more and more sick but I do see it still in my life where I run into danger but the opportunities are greatly reduced and I worry about the people out there without me, like a superhero but humble, I never talk about it and I am stunned to see a video that reminded me of who I was, who I am. Thank you.
Maybe the impact can have something to do with the burnout, but there is an extensive amount of evidence that point out that elements as stress at work, workload, culture organization, work-life balance and others have a significant impact on health, causing, in the end, burnout. I make a call to caution to people when we hear things like these in topics related with psychology and social sciences, because in the last couple of months has come to light that an incredible number of researchers of prestigious universities falsified their research, just to be in the spotlight.
Well, it's hard to do the job that is needed when you don't like the job or work culture and you don't have the opportunity or privilage to change your job.
To everyone reading this, I sincerely pray for that whatever is causing you pain or stress will pass. May your negative thoughts, excessive worries and doubts disappear, replaced by clarity and understanding. May your life be filled with peace, tranquility and love
We can definitely feel burnt out because we have too much work. It may not be the #1 cause, but I have absolutely seen it happen. The idea that employees can change their impact through a "mindset shift" is absolute bullshit, but of course Liz you have only researched what the problem is, not the solution, so I'd be wary about proposing any if I were you.
I don't crave impact. I just don't. So, since your whole argument hinges on that . . . kind of done.
Burnout? It's not a toxic work environment, 'running lean' with too few staff or poor compensation. No, it's the individual's fault. You aren't LeBron.If you experience burnout its on you. 🤢. I am sure this 'expert' will experience great success with corporations.
😆🧠🔥
I need you to report to the HR department to where you will have the oportinity to elaborate on plans to improve your motivation. HR will also schedule a next meeting to evaluate impact of execution of your plans, and also your work performance.
Yeah maybe there is slight correlation between burnout and impact in the way described in the video. But still seems controversial. Impact sometimes demands more effort and requires to take more responsibility of your decisions. So what now? Of course appreciation matters, but I assume in matters of burnout, perfectionism may play a way too much more significant role, same as the belief THE MORE YOU WORK THE MORE YOU LOVED AND RICH etc.
I wish my awful corporate LLC would watch this. You can get a 5 star review and they'll still give you a 3% raise. After that I stopped caring and realized they don't care about your hard work, they just want you to be productive to make them more money. It's not about you, it's about them. They profited BIG time during covid and even got a TON of PPP loans (all forgiven too) and we got 3% raises that year. Inflation takes off and I'm sure the top board members / upper management all got big raises, but everyone else gets screwed.
Its "basically" a discrepancy between your own expectations and reality. But i would always suggest analysing the environment.
So critique on yourself but also your workplace etc.
It‘s not only how we work BUT also what we do as job. If it is not the thing you are enjoying, this can be very exhausting and stressful.
And also private life can lead to burnout. I had to handle the loss of several (!) family members of different age and of friends due to cancer and suicide within 14 months. Being confronted every few weeks with another bad news and having to watch them all suffering and finally dying without being able to help them and having a narcissist boss with no empathy but putting more work pressure on my back during this time caused my burnout. During recovery I always told myself that it’s only a long dark tunnel I have to go through and there will be light at the end of the tunnel helped me. It took some time and psychotherapy to process everything but now I am fine again.
I had this nagging feeling that burnout is due to a systematic problem. A system where employees are indoctrinated that they are never good enough, and that they should always improve. Where in reorganizations employees are indoctrinated that it is really important that they keep doing their job, whilst that very job is being made redundant. Where employees are indoctrinated to always say yes to more work, never to say no, whilst being held accountable if they do not deliver by imposed deadlines. Where employees are supposed to be team players, whilst being staff ranked against each other. Generating competition and fake relations, where your soul knows something is off, sacrificed on the altar of ever bigger shareholder return on investment, so that the haves can have ever bigger boats and ever more luxurious private jets.
Luckily Liz convinced me that this nagging feeling, that something is wrong with our capitalist system, is wrong. The system is not ill, we are! Thank you for opening our eyes. Now we can sleep in peace. Liz knows, she is the advisor to the haves. May greed run rampant! Amen!
And I’m also overworked and under poor leadership. This just felt like propaganda
I burned out after being used… being service focused doesn’t always work, a lot depends on where you are, on how cut throat is your “team”, whether you’re an “other” (poc?) etc…. These thought pieces really leave a lot to desire.
Could this be a more simple way to put it:
Hard work = Stress
No results = Stress
= Burnout
Hard work = Stress
Positive results = Brain chemicals that counteract the effects of stress
= Balance
Doctors and other healthcare workers have one of the most impactful occupations yet they are one of the most burnt out
I just recently retired. I did not hate my job but there were a few things that finalized my decision to quit. The commute was one of them. Sharing the road with distracted drivers in urban assault vehicles was playing with my sanity. I can do that once in a while but on a daily basis it was getting to be too much. Another was the idea of keeping projects on track while not spending the needed resources on them. I knew it was only a matter of time before something went wrong and I would end up being the scapegoat. One other factor was my employer considering the idea of making forced medical procedures a condition for my continued employment. Once you reach the stage where one's profession becomes more of an aggravation than it is worth it is probably time to change careers or quit working entirely.
I hope you didn't take it.
I burn out at work because I don't make enough money to pay my bills. 😂
Doing too much and not caring about your needs and desires - this is what burnout is about for me.
"doesn't happen because of too much work..." Said by someone in an executive position... I dont know Rick...😒
Burnout is not about having too much to do. It's about doing all the things and nothing working out. Burnout is Failure to arrive at Achievement.
As I always say, “Work Smarter, not harder”❤
Big think needs to stop assuming that everyone works in a cubicle/office setting. There are so many other and different types of jobs in this world.
If you feel under appreciated why would put 100% in or even take pride in your work. Specially if you feel used just because of a greedy boss
Maybe the book advertised here has the data, but on the surface what was said is hard to make sense of. What about all the people who made impact by simply giving it their all and running themselves into the ground? That happens for sure. If your one of those people I doubt you are hunting down impact positions at your job after the fact.
Nothing to do with amount of work but everything to do with having a workplace where you can't do your job with constant interruptions and change of focus, and be surrounded by assholes. I'm surprised to hear your "research" ignores it.
Good idea. This + being constantly distracted are the main reasons I'm burnt out. I can't concentrate on anything because there is always a meeting I'll need to stop for or an "urgent" email or texts pinging me because I'm the smart one...
I agree with the reason as one major underlying cause for sure, however, the suggestion that the solution is to do different work assumes a significant level of autonomy, flexibility and authority at the person's work place, which isn't the case for the majority of workers at most company/institutions.
I was following her at the beginning but disagree with her conclusion. I completely agree with the notion that burnout is related a feeling of fulfillment and impact at work. But then to go and say "you just need to change your mindset and work on more impactful stuff" is just patronizing. We can't all be doing the impactful fulfilling work all the time. We might be able to ask our managers to give us more impactful work, but that doesn't mean you'll get the chance to do it.
My mother told me she was burned out when parenting me. No matter how hard she tried, I was still a dumbass at the end of the day. Her actions had no impact on me. Lol.
The proportion of the population which has the mindset to be a sort of leader / “impact player” is low in percentage. Like in sport, those people who stand out, they do because they differ from the norm. Fine for them, and maybe fine for those who are in the same team as them. But asking people to be something different that they are does not seem to me a good way to feel better. On the contrary, finding your true self may be more helpful. On the other hand,
, “work smart” in place of “work hard” this can help. And understanding what is truly important in the organisation (which may not be what people close to you say it is) is certainly a skill to develop, but I doubt it have to do with burnouts.
This observation of "burnout" and using buzz words like "impact players" is superficial way of explaining how people should have their work significant to themselves. It's a problem with our industry and education of "how to work" that gives a lack of significance in our work.
Acknowledged, however there are more fundamental levels to this. Alignment of self and corporate needs has foundational underpinnings in our emotional structure. So knowing your emotional needs and fulfilling them through work AND other environments we experience, is the key.
I'm simply not convinced by her deduction! She seems like someone who had a hypothesis and did the classic confirmation bias.
Good advice for individualistic countries like Europe and the US, but this won't work so well in Asia where hierarchical work type is more dominant. If you try to step out of your box and stand out too much you will be shut down. As they say in Japan, the nail that sticks out gets hammered down. But of course this depends on the company's work culture too so it's all variable.
Having more work to do is a sign that the business flow is in good shape, I mean like if there are projects coming in and this can energize some while overwhelm some. The problem is lack of team support and trust in the company.
I liked the idea of impact but the mindset part was off. To expand on impact, we could relate this to what Erich Fromm and Marx talk about as being alienated from our work. Blacksmiths see the impact their swords give to the king's guard. The report an office worker creates doesn't directly give feedback on the output of his efforts.
i think the underlying thing about not burnout, or having impact is on the brain level. The brain receives dopamine when you get praised, when you scored a goal, when you make an impact, when you did a cardio, when you do strength training, when you raise a succesful family, when you help someone on the street, when you won on the chess game, when you win on video game, when you just create something on physical/digital world ... to generalize, when you do X and that X creates dopamine on your brain .... that's i think the antidote of burnout? what do you think?
Quiet quitting is far more effective
Teachers have a significant amount of impact and yet teacher burnout is significant these days.
How to use this "impactful work" thing when we feel burnout while studying??
I was excited to watch this video, but on finishing, I realise I don't totally agree with this.
Burnout can be as a result of lack of impact.
But it can also be as a result of misalignment. You could strive to have impact in your job but at the end of the day, if you don't value the impact you have added, you might still feel burnt out.
People are fuelled by personally seeing the value of the work they are doing.
Some realise this value when they are recognised etc, others have an intrinsic sense of value. And if it isn't aligned with say the company's goals, going for the impact that you have suggested wouldn't solve their burn out.
What a ridiculous theory. It assumes the difference between impact players and those who are not is simply one of mindset. Tell that to Tom Brady. Michael Jordan. It’s a whole truckload of talent and luck, too. Imagine you work in a field you care nothing about because your education says you can. Is that just mindset? No. This is flawed on so many “Think yourself successful” levels it’s not even funny.
Well done. It's great to see what I defended and believed it's actually worthwhile. Grab metafors from areas of studying not related to the scientific field of the subject in order to open and understand other areas of knowledge. It's also good. Very good to see that the frustration I feel at work isn't just me making it up.
Thank You For The Video ❤
Sometimes the onslaught is just too relentless and I get overwhelmed. Like sure you wanna take on the meaningful challenging stuff but sometimes you’re just tired and don’t have the answers or insight
Maybe they should have asked them if they are doing something they like and enjoy because if you don’t like what your doing, impact is irrelevant.
I know this is just a short overview. But I think that, by definition, not every employe can be one of the impact players.
According to David Graeber, we want to "be the cause." We want to work in ways that are meaningful and don't do violence toward the human spirit.
This does not apply to factory workers or anyone who works on a line or in a warehouse, etc.
I think those are the workers who it should mean the most too. Well the company who hires them. I think they feel undervalued the most. Companies who hire them should watch this and really consider making a healthy work environment where the emotional needs are fulfilled.
Those are the workers who need their voice heard
@@ulabosha4583 Agreed. I worked for a company that allowed me to take charge of my department even though I was a part of floor staff and it dramatically increased my esteem and value to the company. Fast forward a few years we all moved to a bigger facility and they have lowered the workload to just "go here, go there, go here, go there." We now feel little value and cannot see any work completed or progress made.
Maybe it is not more and more difficult work for people who already have the necessary leadership and organization skills, but I can't see how doing so wouldn't be more and more difficult work for people who don't actually have those skills and would have to learn them while doing those things, especially if you have any kind of difficulties impacting your learning so that you need to put in more effort into that.
Walking away from toxicity, correct.
Is this anyhow related to working on a product vs service based company?
I have met such people in the company that do things differently. Even those impact players what she described also get burnout. What solution do you have for that ? I think we need to revisit the definition of burnout.
The #1 cause of burnout is corporate greed.