One strand away from burnout

Helena Cooper Thomas

Are you having trouble sleeping? Do the smallest things overwhelm you?

Do you feel isolated from the people around you, particularly those at your workplace?

Have you lost contact with yourself, feel directionless and have you lost confidence in your ability?

These are some of the signs that what you are experiencing may not be mere stress but burnout, which can have huge repercussions for your life, health and general wellbeing.

Dr Stress, John McEwan, describes burnout as being the flattening of one's batteries.

"Think of a car," he says. "With normal battery usage the car battery can recharge and bounce back. When the battery is burned out there is no bouncing back.

"Extreme burnout can lead to serious depression, which can be difficult to treat."

One way of recharging a car is to motor along to a distant beach, thereby giving it a good run without too many traffic lights, McEwan says. People under stress have to do that too - take time off.

However, McEwan emphasises that taking time off is active, not necessarily passive.

"Everyone now and then needs a significant break," he says. "This involves running or a workout, long walks, sun exposure, creative writing or art, laughter and tears, worship - things that charge you up rather than deplete you.

"In a thirteen-week cycle, you should take the thirteenth week to recharge."

But what exactly is burnout and how does it occur?

McEwan says burnout is a result of chronic work overload or chronic conflict.

Stress builds up slowly; sometimes it can take you as long as six or seven years before you really hit the wall. But hit the wall you eventually do, and it's incapacitating.

Helena Cooper Thomas, psychology lecturer at Auckland University, describes burnout as "a chronic emotional response to severe work demands".

She says that those with direct contact with other people [emotional work] are particularly at risk - that means teachers, nurses, those in customer services and other such professions.

Cooper Thomas says some of the signs of burnout are:

* Feeling emotionally exhausted

* Having a sense of depersonalisation and cynicism about one's work

* Not really seeing people as individuals any more.

"Someone who used to be caring and thoughtful starts being offhand and starts treating people as objects."

A key to knowing if you're suffering from burnout, Cooper Thomas says, is feeling that you're not able in your job any longer.

"You're surviving but not having an impact. You may feel that you are ineffective while at the same time being effective.

"You've lost confidence."

For employers, burnout can be hard to spot.

"They can look out for cynicism to the workload, a lack of showing care and respect," she says.

At a performance appraisal, the employee could seem disinterested. A sign could be that employees underrate their competence and the ramifications for the employer can be high.

"It means having people in the workplace who are not as effective as they should be and who are seriously unhappy," she says.

Of course, there is legislated employer responsibility outlined in the Health and Safety Act. Employers are responsible for identifying stressors, but employees also have this responsibility.

Employers have to consider what to put in place in order to prevent burnout in their organisation.

McEwan says when there is burnout, management is usually responsible.

He says it's no coincidence that it's only the best people who burn out. Employers tend to overload their best people.

"Burnout results from systematically overloading someone with work and responsibility to the extent that they eventually cannot handle it," says McEwan. "If you lose your best people, you've lost those who will help you beat the competition."

This is obviously damaging for a company, he says.

McEwan says that some companies, particularly monopolies, can be arrogant about this, saying "they're not concerned about their position in the market".

Cooper Thomas says: "If you can't change the stresses in your life, you perhaps need some help in reframing the problem.

"Take a break from work, turn to medical support and counselling."

An employee should be able to go to an employer and discuss the problem.

"If you're burned out from a profession that has a lot of emotional labour [teaching, nursing, etc.] then you need to question whether it is the right profession for you.

"Perhaps you had an idea of that profession before you went into it, thought you were well suited to it, and you're not."

McEwan's advice is if a company is overloading you and you're experiencing the signs of burnout, then get out as fast as you can.

"Some workplaces are toxic environments and no life/work balance is going to save you," he says. "There are some places you just need to flee from. It could be fine for a year or two, but then you need to run for your life."

He says one of the problems of new-age thinking is that you're in a situation for a reason and therefore you have to stay to find out why.

"I reject the idea that wherever you are - that is your path and lessons need to be learned there. People can get off their life path.

"Assess the situation, ask if you are on your life path or whether you have stepped into something you shouldn't have. Are you losing your sense of self?

"Think of what working at a particular company is doing to you. Yes, learn from your mistakes and ask the right questions."

He says some people stay in toxic environments because of low self-esteem and need outside help. But mostly the best advice is to get out - now.


SIGNS OF BURNOUT

* Defending themselves, not advancing in the task, because distracted by "politics".

* Feeling isolated, not knowing what's going on, overwhelmed by workload.

* Being unfit and fatigued.

* On the receiving end of things they cannot understand or control.

* Lack of quality sleep, sickness.

* Discomfort

* Sporadic, unpredictable stressors, lack of strategic planning.

* No support staff, so they "have to do everything", and get distracted from the task.

Source: John McEwan