Burnout, job satisfaction & resilience: A dynamic relationship
As employers start to bring people back to the office, it is critical to understand that the ongoing physical and mental ramifications.
Employers recognize that their employees have been put through the ringer during the past 16 months. No one in living memory has been through what we’ve been through. While many employees have been inoculated against COVID-19, many are not protected from burnout and job stress. In fact, burnout is at epidemic levels: With Gallup showing that 67% of us feel burned out either some or most of the time. That means two out three of the people on your team are feeling it.
As employers start to bring people back to the office, and COVID-19 continues to mutate, it is critical to understand that the ongoing physical and mental ramifications of the pandemic may linger, compounded by the additional stress of returning to the work site. In fact, 4 million people quit their jobs in April and another 3.6 million did in May.
Related: 4 ways you to help create a healthier workplace environment and stave off burnout
Why is it that some people are better able to manage stress and change, protect themselves from burnout and stay engaged at work even under the most demanding situations? The key to understanding the connection between change, stress, burnout and job satisfaction is the concept of resilience; a set of cognitive skills that not only help us manage change and stress, but to thrive.
Making sense of the dynamic relationship between burnout and job satisfaction and the power of resilience to impact these problems
Back in October 2019, the World Economic Forum declared that the sheer pace and depth of transformational change in the workplace was the greatest threat to workforce health and wellbeing and driving rising levels of anxiety and declining levels of engagement. And that was before COVID-19. Prescient organizations were already concerned about the impacts on employee mental health and the potential impact on productivity and job satisfaction. COVID acted as an accelerant, making a bad situation worse. Our studies found that between December of 2019 and June of 2020 risk for burnout had increased by 9% – motivation and engagement was down 29%. Heading off these downturns in productivity and wellbeing, a priority prior to the global pandemic, became critical.
Those in the workforce with the self-awareness and skills to move from a threat state to a challenge state in the face of change and COVID were able to achieve calm, remain focused, take care of themselves, connect to their mission and purpose, remain positive and empathetic and stay engaged at work. Those who didn’t have those skills have suffered from increased anxiety, depression and loss of engagement and satisfaction with work.
Resilience skills are what made the difference. Resilience is a set of competencies you can call on to calibrate your reaction to events. The way we think has a profound impact on how emotions take hold and how we behave. These foundational capabilities act as a catalyst to strengthen the critical skills to manage change, reduce risk of burnout and increase job satisfaction.
Our own studies have shown that highly resilient people are almost 4x more satisfied with their jobs than those with low resilience and 60% less at risk for burnout.
And lack of resilience has negative consequences, with 34% of those low on resilience strongly inclined to quit their jobs vs 10% with high resilience. Lack of resilience drives increases in both burnout and job dissatisfaction. Employees with lower levels of resilience skills are at a higher risk of burnout, increased risk for depression and anxiety and lower work engagement and job satisfaction. Job satisfaction is related to attendance, performance, and turnover. Satisfied workers are more likely to provide high levels of customer service and achieve better results.
Workers under 40, those who likely didn’t have the experience of the 2008 Great Recession to provide perspective, were one of the most impacted groups, with a 45% decline in motivation vs a 14% decline in those over 40, and a 19% increase in risk of burnout vs those over 40, who only experienced a 3% increase.
What employers can do to mitigate burnout, improve job satisfaction & prevent turnover
1. Employer support is key to mitigating burnout and sustaining motivation
The research is very clear; there is a crucial role for employers to play during the pandemic. Perceptions of employer support serve as a critical buffer against threats to employee wellbeing. The rate of increase in job stress among employees who feel unsupported by their employer was more than 10 times higher than observed among those who felt strongly supported by their employer.
Increases in disordered sleep, symptoms of burnout, and motivation difficulties were also all substantially higher among those who reported low employer support than among those who felt well supported. In addition, being surrounded by a supportive work community magnifies the positive impacts of higher resilience and if not present magnifies the risk of depression and low productivity.
2. Encourage self-care
Brain science tells us that the reason people don’t take care of themselves is not that they don’t have the time or the interest. It’s because they have long-standing thought patterns that get in the way of their success at getting enough rest, eating healthy foods, and being active.
At the root of why so many of us don’t refill our tanks and take care of ourselves are Iceberg Beliefs. Iceberg beliefs are big, foundational beliefs we have about how the world works and how we should be in the world. For example, those who believe “I must get everything done perfectly” AND “I should always be there for the people I love” are pinballed emotionally between work and home and will sacrifice their own self-care for that of others.
3. Empathy
Empathy builds trust and fosters understanding, leading to improved team and organizational culture, where positivity, collaboration and connection can thrive. It is important to train managers and employees in the practice of empathy so that verbal and non-verbal cues to burnout and dissatisfaction are detected and steps taken to offer help. Empathy also allows people to hold space for others’ perspectives and different lived experiences – essential to building diverse and inclusive teams and retaining talent.
4. Building connection to meaning and purpose
In high change scenarios, giving individuals a sense of meaning, mission, and purpose in their work is not only good for the employee, but also key to ensuring a high-functioning, competitive organization. Employees who have a personal connection to their work and see how their work and life purposes intersect are more committed and motivated on the job. Employees with a clear sense of purpose are 50% more resilient, have half the levels of presenteeism at work, and have only ⅕ the risk of clinical depression.
Think of the sense of purpose at work in terms of signal and noise. Some organizations have a strong sense of signal – it’s very clear that they serve a worthwhile purpose with a direct positive impact. But organizations also have noise – processes of organizational structures that inhibit purpose. Seeking purpose is an important resilience skill; the ability to see the bigger picture, to be able to zoom out and see the entire landscape and put things in perspective.
Organizations with resilient cultures are in the best position to mitigate the threats of burnout and boost job satisfaction because they deploy mentoring and empathy even in the toughest times. These organizations celebrate positivity, have clear values, mind the gap between what they practice and what they preach, have clear transparent and equitable rules, and equip their people with actionable tools to help through tough times.
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