NFIB

Burned Up About Burnout?
03/ 28/ 2002


A common workplace malady that saps an employee's job satisfaction is burnout. Dissatisfied, unhappy employees are unlikely to perform in such a way that their job results will provide maximum benefits to the company. On the other hand, clear expectations about productivity and performance are essential to good employee management. Sometimes an insightful preventive program can help accomplish both conditions: satisfaction and productivity. In today's Workshop, Edith Helmich discusses how to develop such a program.

Burnout is not just jargon. It occurs when an employee feels overwhelmed, irritable, and drained of initiative. Burnout is most apt to happen to your best employees, the ones who care most about doing a good job. Fortunately, burnout usually does not require formal counseling, medication, or even a trip to the family doctor. A few management interventions that can avoid the burnout problem or correct it are as follows:

Create a balanced work atmosphere. No one can or should work every minute or hour of every day on the job. Taking scheduled breaks or allowing an occasional activity in the workplace is healthy and increases productivity.

Design some diversity and cross-training into all jobs. Experiencing different tasks or assignments fosters more understanding of the workplace, creates back-up security, and fosters a more cooperative attitude among employees.

Encourage individual initiative and involvement in on-the-job decisions.No one knows a job better than the person doing it. This allows the employee to make individual modifications in task completion instead of requiring adherence to a rigid process. Providing recognition for that knowledge empowers and motivates an employee as well as increasing efficiency.

Encourage employee relationships. Although some conversation will be personal, employees tend to talk about their jobs when they are at work. This sharing tends to relieve tension and often leads to more productive ways of accomplishing the task at hand.

Assign realistic workloads. If employees are routinely working overtime, during lunch breaks, etc., then those people are giving more than 100% to the job. In the long run, performance will suffer, attitudes will deteriorate, and the scene is set for a classic "burnout" syndrome. Wise employers will hire enough people to do the work required.

It is fruitless to be burned-up over problems like burnout, when the problem can usually be resolved by adding some common-sense modifications to the workplace. Your employees will respond favorably and so will your profits.

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