We believe that a high degree of productivity is a desirable objective that most workplaces aim to achieve. But focusing on productivity to the point that you ignore the people who do the work could be an utterly wrong move. It has a direct human price: employee burnout.
Burnout among employees is the result of both physical and emotional exhaustion. A lack of help and assistance further influences this.
What happens when your workplace is suffering from employee burnout?
Employees can perform the following actions:
- Removing or disengage
- Maintain a negative workplace culture
- Look demoralized, anxious, or frustrated
- Get sick frequently
- Make frequent breaks
- They might leave your company to find a new opportunity
Is Productivity Valued Above Anything Else?
Let’s say that you try to increase productivity to the max. What could go wrong?
The effects of employee burnout can affect other members of the team along with your business customers. For example, if employees are sad about their work environment, they can express their discontent in a non-intentional or unintentional way to coworkers and customers.
In your workplace, negative feelings can spread to others. For example, it can turn customers because of a poor experience.
If people are absent frequently or quit your company and leave, you’ll not have the employees to meet the output demand, which can affect your bottom line and reduce productivity.
However, employee burnout isn’t always just a matter of getting annoyed and in need of an interruption. It could also have severe consequences.
What is Employee Burnout? Why Does It Happen?
Herbert Freudenberger first created the word “burnout” in 1974 and introduced the concept in his work “Burnout: The High Cost of High Achievement.”
He first defined the term as “the extinction of motivation or incentive, especially where one’s devotion to a cause or relationship fails to produce the desired results.” Burnout occurs when employees are exhausted mentally/physically.
It often results from long-term anxiety or frustration; burning out can cause various adverse effects on an individual. They can oftenly characterize by intense exhaustion and a lack of enthusiasm for their work. Also, there is less satisfaction and loss of identity.
Burnout may manifest in various ways. It can signify frustration or lack of interest in work, constant irritation, or anger-related outbursts and absence. An exhausted employee shows a lack of passion at work, which reduces their morale.
Innumerable factors, including stress-inducing jobs, inadequate resources, and support or personal problems, contribute to stress. There are times when there may be more than one cause that contributes to the burnout issue, but the primary thing to do is be aware of the problem before it becomes a problem.
The most common cause of burnout is an absence of something within the employee’s work or personal life. For example, many employees feel they aren’t in control or aren’t clear on their job requirements. They might also feel an absence of social support or have an inefficient time-to-work schedule.
The Adverse Effects Of Burnout
If not treated or identified before it is too late, burnout could cause various negative consequences for the body. The symptoms of stress include stress, insomnia, fatigue, heart disease, elevated blood pressure, and a weak immune system.
Personal effects of burnout can include:
- Drinking.
- Separation from family and friends.
- Financial responsibility.
- An inability to take on responsibilities.
The psychological effects of burnout impact employees’ areas, which can affect their performance at work.
A few effects of burnout on the workplace are withdrawal from work, reduced productivity, less satisfaction at work, and increased conflicts with colleagues. In addition, a burnt-out employee can affect the whole team’s performance.
The employees could lower morale in the team and stifle the rest of the group. Burnout can also lead to excessive absenteeism at the workplace. The absences affect the working environment of employees.
Suppose work on punctual, employees cannot do their job. It can pull the whole team back. Employees who are burning out also lead to an increase in levels of employee turnover.
The Work Environment Can Literally – Cause You To Be Sick
Specific work environments or jobs are more prone to employee burnout.
Sales Personnel
Salespeople are under intense pressure to achieve certain goals or reach a specific amount of potential customers – in the full knowledge that their jobs are at stake if targets aren’t born.
Employees of these types can be sick, mainly if goals for sales or the procedures which define their job are not sustainable.
These illnesses can attribute to stress.
- Weak immune system
- Heart attacks
- Blood pressure can be elevated
Remote Employees
Remote employees can feel pressure to prove their professionalism and work ethic levels.
They aren’t in the same work as their supervisors and are worried that others will consider them lazy or gaming the system to decrease the workload. Ultimately, they might overcompensate for the work hours and be obsessed with their work quality.
There are fewer lines between work and private life – such as cell phones, email, and instant messaging (IM). These workers may feel like they’re always on call and are unable to rest. People who work non-stop are more prone to snapping.
Warehouse Workers, Truck Drivers, And Other Roles That Require Time
Truck drivers are often required to complete deliveries on time regardless of what. As a result, they can compel to drive for hours to reach their destination and keep on time, particularly if they’re late due to road conditions or maintenance issues.
There’s a good chance they’ll be asleep behind the wheel and cause a significant auto accident.
In the age of on-demand fulfillment and online shopping, workers on an assembly line on an industrial floor might be rushing to meet their expectations for performance. As a result, they’re in danger of making a naive error and suffering severe injuries.
These situations that require attention to time can result in workplace injuries, Workers’ Compensation claims, and prolonged periods of lower productivity at work.
The Strictest Attendance Policy – A Cause Behind Burnout
A region may have unfavorable roads due to inclement weather conditions, like flooding from the aftermath of a hurricane or iced-over roads caused by winter storms.
If attendance counts as a critical productivity measurement, and you’re very specific with your employees regarding the time they’re allowed to take off from the office, they could reduce their security.
They’ve heard that the message they’ve received is “come to work or else.” As a result, they can feel pressure to take risks they would not usually take. But, in the process, they might be driving into an accident while commuting.
Similar to the requirements for attendance, sick people might be required to go to work only to experience a severe medical issue in the office and then be taken to the hospital.
In any of these scenarios, it is possible to lose not just a valuable employee but expose your business to risk.
What can you do to prevent such situations from occurring? Think about that!
The Benefits Of Avoiding Burnout At Work
An employee who is exhausted could impact the rest of the team.
Thus, not only will preventing burnout make it easier for employees to be productive and happy and productive, but it also helps the business. A productive workforce indicates that employees are more likely to focus on the company’s main goals.
The Critical Element To Efficiency Is To Put People First
People are your most valuable assets.
Setting the proper standards for production and efficiency is essential and crucial. But your goals for productivity are not worth the effort if your workers are:
- Inattention and lack of focus
- Sick
- Injured
- Exhausted
- Every opportunity is a chance to escape
- Exhausted and stressed to the limits
Overall, happiness and work satisfaction are directly related to productivity. You will get the best consistently performed work from those with nutritional health, both mental and physical health, and feel requirements are being satisfied.
Be aware that a content employee is a productive and happy workforce.
You must prioritize the requirements of your employees and then trust all else to be in order.
Let your people feel:
- Supported
- Valued
- Heard
- Validated
Tips For Avoiding Employee Burnout
These are the areas in which you can concentrate your efforts.
Setting Expectations
The fastest method to make employees unhappy is to force them to meet standards they aren’t able to meet.
Tips to ensure that your goals are realistic and achievable:
- Create Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) for every role or department in your business. These should include:
- Specific
- Measurable
- Connected to the business’s goals and strategies
- Find benchmark performance and productivity levels.
- Monitor and evaluate KPIs constantly.
- If your staff members can achieve their KPIs, They may not be sufficient, and your expectations could have been too modest. Think about increasing KPIs.
- Suppose less than 50% of employees have achieved their KPIs. It could mean that your expectations are not realistic, or there’s a more fundamental issue.
Is there an overall constant absence of efficiency within your team? What do you do next?
Examine your workplace and procedures to determine if you have any issues. For example, are there any recent adjustments that could be the reason? Is your employees’ working area conducive to getting work accomplished? How is your office layout hindering productivity?
Consider all the workplace-related reasons for an increase in productivity, including your management style.
You can ask your team members whether something they do at work or in their private life is affecting their performance. Plan on how they can overcome the issues. You can take the following actions:
- One-on-one interviews
- Small focus groups
- Team meetings with a larger size
You could consider combining group meetings or focus groups with one-on-one interviews for better feedback integration from less talkative employees.
If you can find no other apparent problems, you might want to consider the possibility of reducing your KPIs.
Be aware of the fact that efficiency is dynamic; it’s going to fluctuate and change at intervals.
Proper Training
You should provide your employees with everything they require to succeed and achieve their desired levels of productivity, including the proper education for their job.
Be aware that you cannot train a destructive work process, however. If your procedures are not working, then nothing training can assist. It is why you must ensure that you’ve developed solid, well-tested methods, policies, and guidelines to train your employees by those.
Be honest about how employees will perform when they begin a new position, whether new hires or transferees from a different department. You shouldn’t expect that from the very first day, they’ll perform at the same level as someone who’s been in the same job for five years.
Give them a time-out for training and teaching, usually between 90 and 120 days. It will allow them to increase their confidence and establish a rhythm with the new job.
They must also adjust to the new work culture and their new coworkers’ personalities and work habits.
Other Ways to Avoid Burning Out Employees
Strategies To Balance Productivity And The Well-Being Of Employees
- Inform your employees of their performance regularly, not only at formal Meetings.
- Establish an atmosphere that encourages constant, continuous dialog. Then, as the manager, take the way and establish the tone for your team.
- Inform employees that you’re listening and that you hear their input. Recognize their information and feedback. Then, you should explain why you cannot act on their ideas appropriately.
- Be aware and attentive to employee needs. Be aware of indications of stress. It’s a good idea to make it a habit to talk to employees and inquire about their performance.
- Inform employees of the proper methods and channels for submitting feedback or concerns about performance or productivity. Also, they should know which avenues to take when they’re not at ease speaking to their manager directly. Must include this information in the employee handbook.
- Create a wellness program or an Employee Help Program (EAP).
- Promote a work-life balance. Include more flexible schedules if your company allows them. It is also possible to offer employees regular wellness days, perhaps a few hours off from time to time – to let them take a break or concentrate on personal issues.
- Take a traditional break from your office to allow people to change their surroundings and escape the office humdrum. For instance, take your group out for lunch or hold a few meetings outside the office.
- Consider how automation and technology enhancements could make certain operations or tasks easier and ease the burden on individuals. But, in the end, there’s only so much a person can accomplish in one day.
- Always exercise intellectual humility. It means you’re open to new possibilities for improving efficiency and performance and are flexible and agile enough to alter your methods.
Summing It All Up
Meet arbitrarily under too much pressure insisting that unattainable productivity goals could harm their well-being and your company. Making employees happy is the first and crucial step in any productivity-boosting strategy. It is possible to achieve this by:
- Delivering proper training
- Establishing expectations and evaluating the performance
- Be open to adapting to your workplace
- Improved communication with employees
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