Author Mike Drayton, a clinical psychologist and leadership coach at Saïd Business School, University of Oxford, explains why certain people are more susceptible to burnout than others, how people can recognise the early signs of burnout within themselves and in the people around them, and why it’s important to stay “rounded”.
Drayton suggests tactics that leaders and professionals can adopt to establish firm boundaries, promote work/life balance within their teams, cultures, and themselves, and encourage professional and personal development.
Drayton is scheduled to speak in October at UK and Ireland ENGAGE about the psychology of influence and persuasion.
What you’ll learn from this episode:
- Steps for managing burnout.
- What behaviours can determine if leaders will be prone to burnout or not.
- Two personality traits that make people more vulnerable to burnout.
- Ways to set firm boundaries that prioritise work/life balance.
- What it means to “strive for wholeness” and how to adopt that mindset.
Play the episode below or read the edited transcript:
— To comment on this episode or to suggest an idea for another episode, contact Steph Brown at
Stephanie.Brown@aicpa-cima.com.
Transcript
Steph Brown: Welcome to the FM podcast. I’m Steph Brown. Today I’m joined by author, clinical psychologist, and executive coach at Saïd Business School, University of Oxford, Mike Drayton. We will be talking about burnout, how that shows up at work for employees and leaders, along with steps to take for both prevention and recovery.
Mike will also speakat the UK and Ireland ENGAGE about the psychology of influence and persuasion, and the ethical ways leaders can apply those principles to improve decision-making. UK and Ireland ENGAGE is taking place in October.
Welcome to the podcast, Mike. Thanks for coming on.
Mike Drayton: Thanks, Steph. It’s a pleasure to be here.
Brown: For anyone tuning in that may be new or unfamiliar [with] the topic, what does it mean when someone is burnt out?
Drayton: Well, it’s a term that’s often used not very precisely. It’s a term that when people talk about feeling burnt out, they mean tired and exhausted, But there is more to it than that. The early warning signs of burnout are people [feeling] tired physically, emotionally, [and] mentally knackered and exhausted. But there is more to it than that.
When people feel like that, they also tend to start feeling a bit more cynical and negative about work. There’s an increase in irritability and impatience.They start feeling detached, both from their colleagues at work but also from their personal relationships at home. A person on the verge of burnout might go home feeling exhausted, irritable, and snappy and their partner might say, “Is everything all right, can I help you?” They will say, “Yes, everything is fine, just leave me alone.” They start getting this personal detachment from relationships.
Often, people also experience physical symptoms like headaches, insomnia, and certainly a loss of motivation, and enthusiasm for work. Like I said when I started this answer, there is a lot more to burnout than just feeling tired and a bit fed up at work.
Brown: When someone recognises that they are experiencing burnout, what are some steps or self-care practices that can help them in their recovery?
Drayton: Well, I think the first step is to recognise it as a problem and something that you need to address. Because the danger with burnout is people’s tolerance for stress and tiredness and exhaustion starts to shift. A person who isn’t burnt out and they have a bad day, let’s say their stress tolerance is at five, but if that becomes chronic, and they have bad days every day, and they have bad days every day for six weeks — that kind of stress tolerance creeps up to seven, creeps up to eight, creeps up to nine. So what, for you or I, might be feeling really awful, it becomes their new normal, if that makes sense, and then it becomes difficult to recognise. If you suspect you are suffering with burnout, the first thing to do is recognise this is a serious thing,and it’s not going to get any better unless you do something about it.
What do you do about it? Well, the first one is quite straightforward really. You need to take time off, rest, and recharge. You need to sleep. You need to be away from the stress and pressures of work for a week or two, which often happens when people go on holiday. But often people who are burnt out, starting to burn out, when they go on holiday they get ill because their defences are down, and it’s the first time they have relaxed for months.The first thing you need to do is to take time off work.
And then start to re-evaluate your work/life balance. Set some boundaries. Is this the life you wanted for yourself when set out in your career in accountancy? Is this what you envisaged to yourself? Well, probably it wasn’t. So you need to start to think: What do I want my life to be like? Obviously, you’ve got a job, you have to work hard, and you’re committed to your organisation. But not at the cost of your health.
You need to think about what you want your life to be like and then start setting some boundaries around that life. Well, I like to work hard, so I work until ten at night. Well, maybe I should start finishing at 7 at night. [Setting] some reasonable boundaries would be good. Seek some help and support from your colleagues, friends, or even professionals. Go and see your GP. Go get some psychological therapy if you feel you need that. Because it’s an illness. Burnout is an illness just like heart disease or anything else, and it can lead to physical illness as well.
Then maybe start thinking about doing some stress-reduction techniques such as mindfulness, meditation, exercise. Good, hard physical exercise is really helpful for people who are suffering with burnout. Just think about your goals in life because, as I said earlier, things are not going to get better if you don’t do something about it, they’re likely to get worse. Think about the goals, think about how you are going to be in a year’s time. If you don’t want to be as you are now in a year’s time, you need to do something about it.
Brown: How can people in demanding leadership positions, like finance professionals and management accountants, take action to avoid becoming burnt out?
Drayton: It’s a good question. Since I’ve been working in leadership development, one of the conclusions I’ve come to is that your trajectory as a leader and your ability to move up the hierarchy at work is largely determined by one thing. That one thing is the ability to say no to things. Because the more responsibility people get, the more other people want things from them, the more people want you to do the work. The more people want you to validate their work, and the more strategic thinking you have to do. You have to think about your team, your organisation, but you also have to think about the future and so on and so forth.
In order for you as a leader to think more strategically and more creatively about your task of a leader, you’ve got to let go of the day-to-day operational tasks of leadership. And that’s where saying no comes in. I would say that if you’re a leader, the one thing that will help you, prevent you burning out, is your ability to say no to tasks that used to be important but now are no longer important when you’re a leader. That’s one.
The second most important thing is your ability to switch off at the end of the day. I’ve written two books on burnout and resilience, and these are fairly academic books – well, the first one is. I have reviewed all the research literature on burnout, read hundreds of research papers. The one finding that’s consistent across all of these papers is this: You can do a really tough, hard, demanding, stressful job. But, at the end of the day, if you can switch off, if you can leave work at work and go home and do a hobby, cook a dinner, watch Netflix, go and work in your garden, or do whatever it is you like to do to relax – if you’re able to switch off from work, the risk, the probability of you developing burnout, is low. It’s very low.
However, if you do a stressful, difficult, demanding job, and then you take work home with you, either literally take you take your laptop to do work at home, or even conceptually, if you take work home with you in your head, and you’re thinking about work all the time, trying to figure things out, and you’re lying in bed at night, thinking about work and thinking about the problems of the next day, then your risk of burnout is high.
That’s the second thing I would advise: Do whatever you need to do to switch off at the end of the day. Of course, you can’t just stop thinking about work. You have to think about something else or find a hobby, find an interest. Talk to your partner. Read a book. Whatever it is, you need to switch off at the end of the day.
They’re the two main ones; there are a few other things people can do.
I’ll say one more thing. Most leaders are very conscientious, and they care about the teams that they are leading. One thing that you can do that’s incredibly helpful, is to model good behaviour to the people who follow you. You can tell them to switch off at the end of the day, go home on time, and so on. But if they see you overworking and becoming irritable, tired, and burnt out, they’ll end up in the same position. If you can set a good example for your team, then that’s a good thing to do. You set a good example by taking care of yourself rather than taking care of everybody else’s needs.
Brown: Thanks for that Mike, that’s really interesting. For leaders in charge of teams, what sort of managerial, management styles are more effective in minimising the risk of burnout among employees?
Drayton: I think one of the most effective strategies is to encourage discussions, encourage open communication. What’s the buzzword now? It’s psychological safety, isn’t it? Encourage members of your team to voice any concerns that they have about their workload or particular problems they might be having at home. Somebody might be feeling really stressed at home because their partner is ill or because arrangements for dropping their kids off at school have changed, which is making it difficult for them to get into work on time, all those kinds of things.
I think a really useful thing is to give people a message that if they’re feeling unwell at work in any way, if they’re feeling stressed, if they’re feeling they can’t cope, if they feel their workload is too much, or they feel they’ve got too much of a certain type of work, encourage them to talk about that. Then when people do that, when they feel they’re listened to, it can be enormously helpful, and, of course, it opens up a discussion as to how that situation might be improved and changed. Because the last thing you want people to do is for your staff to feel stressed and burnt out and go looking for another job, or even worse than that, [so] stressed and burnt out [that they] become ill and go off sick for three months.
Encouraging open communication is really important. I think being clear about boundaries is incredibly important if you’re a leader in an organisation. Being clear about, what time do we start work? What time do we finish work? Being clear that in this time, I as a leader think it’s very important that you stop for lunch and have a break. Walk around in your garden, or walk around in the office. Look up at the sky, look up the trees, and get from behind the screens for a little while.
Be [clear] about boundaries and also be very clear about people’s roles. What they’re expected to do at work. Who’s responsible for what. And what outputs, what expectations you have in regard to what they produce. To say to somebody, “I expect this report by Wednesday afternoon at 3 o’clock.” Rather than, “Get this done as quickly as you can.” So people are clear about what’s expected of them, what they’re responsible for, and what they’re not responsible for.
I’ll just do one more. Remember to say “thank you” to people and develop a culture that savours appreciation. Because often that’s missing from many work environments, not because the boss is mean or doesn’t appreciate or is ungrateful to their team. It’s just because the boss is really incredibly busy and they just forget to say “thank you”. But for a team member to feel appreciated and that their work is appreciated and it’s being noticed — that can be incredibly useful.
Brown: In this hybrid world of working, I suppose picking up on social cues to gauge the well-being of employees is, in some ways, perhaps more challenging than it was before. How can psychology as a skill help to close the communication gap and inspire better leadership?
Drayton: That’s a good question. Well, this is my latest book actually, which came out two weeks ago, and it’s called Leading Hybrid Organisations. Again, I’ve reviewed all the literature on remote team working. You make a very good point there. I think one of the strongest findings of the literature is that your team needs to be together face-to-face as frequently as possible. An ideal might be two or three days a week. But even if it’s only once a month or even once a quarter, it just makes a massive difference, to performance and to well-being, the well-being of that team.
It’s very difficult, I think, to judge people’s psychological state over a Zoom call or over a Teams call. People who burn out have got two particular personality characteristics. One is that they’re highly conscientious. They work hard because that’s how they are. They work hard, not because somebody’s waving a stick at them and telling them to work hard. They work hard because if they don’t work hard they feel guilty. Now that’s a lot easier to manage in a workplace because the office closes at five and they get sent home, so then they can stop them. There’s a bit of decompression time and they can get on with their life. But when they’re working from home, there’s no boundaries again. Somebody who’s got a task might work until ten at night because they’re conscientious, not because they’re frightened of their boss or anything. That’s the first thing; people who burn out tend to be highly conscientious.
The second characteristic of people who burn out is that they tend to be highly agreeable. In other words, they like pleasing other people, and they don’t like conflict. The hardest thing in the world for a highly agreeable person is to say no to things. Because you might upset the person who is asking you to do what it is you’re being asked to do.
Just being aware, I think, of those two personality characteristics can help a manager or a leader manage a team. Because if somebody is constantly smiling saying, “Yes, I’ll do that.” Maybe you need to take some responsibility for their well-being and say, “No, you’ve taken too much on this week. I’d rather you didn’t do that. We’ll give that to somebody else, or I’ll do it.”
The second thing is to go back to what I said before, set firm boundaries “Yes, you’re working at home, but I expect you to finish by 6 pm.” To give them permission, or even to say, you wouldn’t say it as bluntly as this, to say something like, “I’ll be very cross if I found out you were working after 7 pm.”
Another tip is never send emails outside of office hours unless it’s an absolute dire emergency, unless the building’s burning down or something. Why is that? Because, as I said before, the biggest thing that will prevent you from burning out, one of the biggest things, is to be able to switch off. Imagine you’ve finished work at six, you’ve cooked your dinner, you’re sitting down in front of Netflix, or playing the piano, or reading Russian poetry, or you’re relaxing, and then the phone pings. It’s an email from the boss: “Don’t forget the meeting at nine.” What’s going to happen to your mind? You’re immediately back into work mode and thinking about work. That’s another golden rule, I’d say, not to send emails outside of work hours. It’s very toxic and very dangerous.
Finally, another tip is to ask people a couple of times how they’re doing, because it’s a social convention, isn’t it? Steph, if I said to you, “How are you Steph?” You’re likely to say, “Oh, I’m fine.” But if we were in a different context, and I said to you, “How are you?” You’d say, “I’m fine.” Then I’d say, “Are you sure, how are you really?” Then you might say, “Well, I’m not so good. I’m really busy.” I think it’s important when you’re asking people how they are to ask them a couple of times, because the first time you’ll just get a socially conditioned response: “Yeah, fine.” It’s only the second or third asking that they’ll probably might start to tell you how they actually are feeling. Those are a couple of tips.
Brown: In this era of just constant change and disruption all across different sectors, what advice would you give to those early in their career journeys to help them strike the right balance between ambition and well-being?
Drayton: Strive for wholeness rather than perfection. What do I mean by that? Strive to be a good early-career accountant, to do your job well. But also strive to have good relationships with people, both in your work life, your professional life, and more importantly, in your personal life. Strive for wholeness in terms of, as I say, be a good professional, but also be a rounded person. Have an interest in other things outside of work, have hobbies, have interests.
In my job as an executive coach, I come across so many people later on in their career, people in their 50s and 60s who have just devoted their life to work. They’ve got nothing outside of work. Especially when people approach retirement, it fills them with horror because they’ve devoted everything, their whole lives to work. And when work’s taken away from them, there’s nothing left. What I’d say to people starting out in their career: Think about that. Strive for wholeness, not perfection. Make sure you have hobbies and interests. Make sure you have good, solid relationships, especially if you have children.
I remember one person I spoke to who was a bit of a workaholic, and he was burnt out actually. He was working 15 hours a day, working weekends. One of the biggest problems, the reason he sought help, was his family, his wife was cross with him. Because he had no family life. I was chatting to him, and I said,
“Tell me about your family, your childhood. What was your father like?” Do you know what he said? He said, “My dad, I never saw him. He was always at work.” I thought, “Well, you are 38 years old, and you’re doing the same thing. Is that what you want your children to say about you when they’re your age?” Well, of course, that filled him with horror. He said, “No, I don’t.” And that was a shock to him. That helped him to find more balance in his life. That’s one thing, strive for wholeness, not perfection.
The second thing is to have a plan. Think about your life, let’s say in five years’ time. What would you like to be doing professionally? Write down a few bullet points. Then think, what do I want to be doing personally? Do I want to be married? Do I want to be in a relationship with someone? Do I want children? What hobbies would I like to develop? What am I interested in now that I don’t want to let go of? Well, I enjoy playing the guitar, I enjoy playing the piano, and I don’t want work to push that out. Just do an A4 page of what would you like your life to be like professionally and personally and keep looking at it.
Another tip is to write down what hell would be for you in five years’ time. What would be a terrible job? Well, I don’t want a job where I’m working twelve hours a day. I don’t want a job where I’m being micromanaged. I want a job where I can show some creativity and do something imaginative. You might say, “Well, I’d like a job where I’m managing people, where I’m responsible for a team.” You might say, “I hate managing people. I want a job where I’m just doing interesting technical work.”
Then write down, what if your personal life was horrible and hell – what would that look like? Well, I’d be lonely. I wouldn’t have any friends. Whatever it would be for you. What would be hell? You’re writing down what you’re running towards, what you’re striving towards, and what you’re running away from as well. I think that’s a good tip for people starting out in their career. Write down what [your] heaven of life is and what [your] hell of life is.
Brown: That’s great, Mike. Thanks so much for being on the podcast today. Some great recommendations and insights. Is there anything you would like to add in closing today?
Drayton: Two things. Burnout is now included in the World Health Organization’s International Classification of Diseases as an “occupational phenomenon”, and it makes the point that burnout only happens in relation to occupation and work. You can’t be burnt out if you’re a carer for a disabled relative. You might have something else, you might be stressed, you might suffer from anxiety, but it’s not burnout.
This is important because the main responsibility for burnout lies less with the individual and more with the employer. Because it’s the employer who is asking people to overwork often and piling work onto people. That’s important to remember because the moment you say, “Burnout is my problem”, it’s not a good thing because it’s very difficult to sort out burnout individually.
Of course, you’re responsible for your own well-being and saying “no” to things, often it is very hard to say “no” to things if you’re working in a culture that doesn’t accept that. That doesn’t hear that. That doesn’t listen to that. I just want to make the point that it’s not only an individual problem. Burnout is more of a systemic problem. It’s a problem for the organisation more than it’s a problem for the individual.
Moving on from that, I would also say that one of the most important things about burnout is, first of all, recognising it, which is what was said right at the start, not losing perspective, and doing something about it. Because your health is your responsibility. If you’re in a team or an organisation that doesn’t listen and you find it impossible to strike a good work/life balance, you need to go and find somewhere else to work. Because it’s going to kill you, it’s going to make you miserable. Take some responsibility for your own actions, I’d say.
