Friday Facts: Mental Health & Burnout
Posted on Friday, March 29th, 2019
Happy Friday – We made it to another fiscal year end!
Everywhere in my career I’ve experienced March Madness – this pressured focus on ending projects, reporting, and budgeting; and Algonquin College is no different. Although you have made many great achievements in the past 12 months, and are now wrapping up for another year of deliverables, it’s perhaps time to take a moment and reflect on how to help yourselves and others who may be facing burnout. Here’s some key points from a new article from the Harvard Business Review on “How to Help Your Team with Burnout When You’re Burned Out Yourself”.
- Make your own health a priority: Eat healthy, wholesome food; exercise regularly; get plenty of sleep at night; try meditating, and find someone to vent to. Once you have found your technique, make sure you share it with your team to normalize self-care.
- Tackle the problem as a group: demonstrate that you take the issue of managing stress seriously, ask your team, ‘Even in the context of this change, how do we come together?
- Exhibit compassion: Be compassionate. Recognize, both inwardly and publicly, that all of us are doing the best we can with the resources we have been given. This doesn’t mean that you’re “lazy or letting yourself off the hook.”
- Set a good example: Set a good example by making downtime a priority. Show your team that you don’t always operate in full-throttle mode at the office, set limits on how much work encroaches on evenings and weekends.
- Focus on the why: Remind the team of the objective and why it’s important to the organization and your customers. When people have shared values and connection they are more likely to feel positively about their work.
- Advocate for your team: It is manager’s responsibility to advocate for the team within the context of your organization’s goals, convey the consequences of burnout and describe how it is in your boss’s best interest to take action.
- Be a source of optimism: This is hard to do when you are stressed out but: Look for the good. Smile at people. And be kind. Make sure you regularly acknowledge, recognize, and thank people for their efforts.
These actions will support development a psychologically healthy workplace, in particular with Factor 11, Balance: Balance is present in a work environment when there is recognition of the need for balance between the demand of work, family, and personal life.
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