5 Strategies To Avoid Employee Burnout

Employee burnout happens in almost every organization. According to the World Health Organization, employee burn out consists of; feelings of exhaustion, growing mental distance from an employee’s job, and reduced productivity.

You may think that it’s just companies with a bad culture that the employees experience burnout. You’re thinking wrong. A Gallup poll found that 23% of employees felt burned out often or always, while 44% felt burned out sometimes. Altogether, that’s 70% of employees struggling with this issue!  This means that it’s not just the amount of work, but the experience and emotions surrounding that work. Burnout consists of emotional and mental exhaustion of an employee.

The impact of employee burnout can affect other members of your team, the company, and your customers. When this happens, people start leaving your company.

So how do you help employees who are burnt out?

Ensure Managers Understand Employee Workload 

Across organizations, unnecessary workload accounts for over a third of employee burnout. There should be an effective way of working, where employees who work across different teams and with different team leads don’t burn out easily. Managers should have direct insights into what employees are working on and what exactly their workload is. 

To approach this the right way, ensure managers have the tools to help with this. A modern, flexible HR and People system can equip managers to understand the extent of the projects their employees are working on.

Also, your managers should understand the importance of regular check-ins and their role in supporting their employees to manage their workloads. 

Check On Employee’s Mental Health 

As much as you hate to admit it, some of your employees go through mental illness and mental distress. You have to take the mental health of your employees seriously.

It’s tough to ask your employees mental health questions without feeling invasive but there are ways to go about it, which makes it known to the employee that you’re trying to help. 

Talk about mental health to everyone in your company, not specific people. You can organize this in your monthly meetings. When you talk about it in a group you avoid uncomfortable situations.

Also, teach your employees how to be mentally healthy. You can do this by bringing in mental health professionals from your health insurance provider to teach your employees how to deal with personal and work issues, how to cope with stress and other mental health topics.

You can go further by getting an in-house counselor that your employees can talk to one on one.

Managers should understand their employees so they can learn to spot when any of them is facing mental health issues. Employee burnout is directly connected with mental health. Some of the signs and symptoms that an employee experiencing burnout may exhibit include; reduced efficiency and energy, lowered levels of motivation, increased errors, more time spent working with less being accomplished. 

Offer Flexible and Remote Working

The amount of hours employees spend in traffic trying to get to work every day can be exhausting. A research conducted by Sage showed that their employees placed importance and value on flexible working. When employees are expected to be physically present in the office every day, it places undue stress and anxiety which can lead to employee burnout. 

To have a better culture in your organization, you should adopt remote work. Flexible hours and remote work are simple with the necessary communication tools. It helps employees work in a way that suits them thereby leading to high productivity.

Give Employees The Tools They Need To Manage Stress

Your managers should encourage their subordinates to be more productive. If someone is currently experiencing burnout, but can’t take a vacation, encourage them to take time out off their desk during the day to relax. 

Maybe it’s setting reminders to take a break or go for a short walk. Without teaching your employees strategies that they need to combat burnout, the feeling of burnout can become crippling.

Ensure A Healthy Workplace Culture 

Is your organization friendly and is it the best place to work? Some of the emotional and mental health issues that are involved in employee burnout are due to poor workplace culture. You should look at things you can change to make your organization better for your employees. You can ensure things like; proper communication between employees and the management, a constant check of the workload expected of each employee, well-defined expectations, and roles are put in place. 

You need to revisit your organization culture if your employees are not sure of what they are doing, how much they should be doing, and if they can take a break. 

After reading this article, take your time to analyze what exactly needs to change in your organization. Do you need to adopt remote work? Or you need to care more about your employee’s wellbeing and mental health. You could get feedback from your employees to know which area to improve on.

Your employees who are at risk of burnout need their life back in balance and your organization should fully support them with the tools they need to relieve stress, especially during this pandemic period. 

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