June 13, 2024 • 25 mins
According to the World Health Organisation, burnout is characterised by emotional exhaustion, increasing mental distance from one’s job, negativity and cynicism in the workplace, reducing professional efficacy.
And burnout rates are increasing with one survey reporting that 72% of people often feel used up at the end of the day, an increase of 12% in the last 2 years.
On this week’s episode we not only look at why some organisations are allowing this to happen, we look at the effects of burnout and what can be done to change it.
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Join us as we reveal strategies to close the gap and craft a workplace where values are not just spoken, but lived and breathed, paving the way for a more authentic and engaging organisational culture.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Colin (00:02):
Welcome to the Inside Out Culture Podcast, where we look
at insides of working cultureand provide ideas, insights and
actions for you to take on theoutside.
I'm Colin Ellis.
Cath (00:12):
And I'm Cath Bishop, and in each episode we'll examine a
different question or adifferent organization, and
we'll use case studies, researchand our own insights and
experiences to help you changethe way things get done in your
world.
Colin (00:27):
We hope you enjoyed today's episode.
Please like, subscribe and, ofcourse, let us know what you
think.
Hello everybody and welcome toanother episode of the Inside
Out Culture Podcast.
It's really exciting for Cathand I because we're actually in
the same space.
We're in a studio in Soho inLondon.
Cath (00:51):
So it is a real culture shock for us.
I think, yeah, normally we'rerecording literally continents
apart, oceans apart, so it'susually about 6.30am for you and
9.30pm for me.
So we're in the same time zone,in the same place, a few feet
apart.
So, yeah, it's great.
And today we're talking aboutburnout.
Yeah, big topic, burnout.
And actually we were bothsaying, when we were doing some
research for this conversation,how prolific the literature is
(01:13):
around burnout.
It's being written aboutabsolutely everywhere Harvard
Business Review, mckinseyResearch, every organization,
psychology magazines, you nameit everyone is talking about it.
People talk about an epidemicof burnout, and so what we
wanted to do is to, as always,go a little under the surface.
What's going on?
(01:33):
How might we think about thistopic?
How might we sort of break itdown in some different ways and
also give you some helpfulpointers to be thinking about
your workplaces?
So let's start off, colin,thinking about how would you
situate this topic?
What are maybe the key signs ofburnout?
Should we start there?
Colin (01:50):
Yeah, it's probably a good place to start is how do
you know if you're burned out orjust really really tired
Burnout?
So I did some research on whatthe key signs of burnout are.
The first one is exhaustion.
Exhaustion is a word that weuse a lot, but exhaustion is
(02:11):
when you feel physically andemotionally drained even after a
good night's sleep.
You know that feeling when youget up in the morning and
there's just nothing left in thetank where you feel you have to
force yourself just to even getin the shower.
And I know myself, I'vesuffered from burnout just
getting into the showers andeffort.
So that's the first sign.
Second is a lack of motivation.
So you really lose interest inyour work and in your personal
life.
(02:31):
You're constantly having totell yourself to come on, you
can do this.
Things that you used to beexcited about you're just no
longer excited about.
The third thing and I noticedthis in myself particularly is I
suddenly become skeptical orcynical, so quite negative.
That's a real key sign ofburnout for me is that's just
(02:51):
not who I am as an individual.
All of a sudden I'm thinkingnegatively about stuff and you
start to withdraw and people areasking you are you okay.
Fundamentally, you know you'reokay and you probably say you're
okay.
You know you're okay and youprobably say you're okay, but it
doesn't feel right.
The fourth one is irritability,which just the little things
(03:12):
that just start to really irkyou and really bug you and you
feel that feeling of fear, angerand hostility.
And then the last one is healthissues.
And this is the big one,particularly for sustained
burnout, is it can reallymanifest itself physically
Headaches, migraines, stomachissues, irritable bowel syndrome
is always linked to burnout.
(03:34):
Muscle tension, you feel likeyou need a massage every single
day, changes in appetite andobviously a lack of sleep.
So they're just some of thesigns.
And the other thing that I read, Cath, when I was doing the
research, is what medicalprofessionals say is it takes
six weeks of rest to reallyovercome extreme burnout, which
(03:56):
is why we probably struggle withit.
Who can take six weeks off you?
Cath (03:59):
know.
Yeah, the whole concept of thatfeels both beautiful and
frightening.
So it's one of those thingsthat we are seeing so much more
and there are a whole load ofreasons why.
So it can be partly, as you cantell from those signs that you
read out, it can be partlythings in our own minds.
So the way we're drivingourselves, the way we are
focusing, the goals we're givingourselves, but there's also
(04:21):
lots of social factors.
So in the environment around us,of course, the overload we get
from technology, from our phonesbeing on the whole time and
piling our brains with tons ofinformation, there's a sense of
demands from companies wantingto speed up work and putting
pressure, and there's ashort-termism, trends that push
us in that direction.
There's a sense of perhaps someof our organizations not caring
(04:44):
about us as people but reallyjust seeing us as machines
churning stuff out.
That starts to again leave usin a space of why am I doing all
this work and I'm working everharder?
And there's an isolation andthat's something that I think we
all experience in differentways.
During the pandemic, thatreally showed us how a lack of
connection to others can leaveus, you know, bewildered, burnt,
(05:07):
feeling, quickly, you know, ata loss.
So there were lots of thingschanging both in the way we all
think and live in modern societyand there are lots of things in
the environment around us thatare leading us in this direction
.
So it's quite hard to find apathway through all of those.
What would you say in your?
You mentioned there your ownexperiences of burnout.
What were the things that ledto that for you?
Colin (05:29):
I think some of it was choice, Cath, is I overworked, I
felt like I had to be doingthings and unfortunately, I have
one of those personalitieswhere I feel like I have to
always be on the go.
If my wife listens to thispodcast, she'll be like, oh yeah
, he's that guy.
We'll always have to be doing,always have to be writing,
(05:50):
always have to be researching.
But actually in my you know,when I was an employee, the need
for almost to make sure that Iwas conforming to the culture
that existed, one ofback-to-back meetings where I
had no time for my job and I wasthen choosing to work in the
evening and at weekend, and Ithink one of the ways that I
(06:13):
coped with that is then to saywell, I don't have to conform to
those things.
And that was almost a light bulbmoment for me in the kind of
around about 2008.
It feels like a long time ago,16 years ago now, but for me
that's when it changed, becauseall of a sudden I'm like feels
like a long time ago, 16 yearsago now, but for me that's when
it changed, because all of asudden I'm like oh, wait a
minute, I don't have to conformto some of these things, and I
think that's a trap that manypeople find themselves in is
(06:34):
that they conform to culturalnorms because they feel a sense
of rejection.
They feel that you know it'llbe seen as they're not part of
the team.
Maybe there's an expectationfrom managers, and I still do
think that some organizationsplace undue, put undue influence
on people to conform toridiculous cultural norms,
(06:55):
particularly around you know,kind of the time that they spend
doing things and there's nevera time for a break, which is
probably something that you'veseen as well in the sporting
world, Cath.
Cath (07:04):
Yeah, hugely.
And I think I mean in one way,sport shows us that you can't
have performance withoutrecovery.
It's such a crucial part oflife, the sort of human cycle
and the human ability to achieve, and so I always think you
wouldn't cut recovery typicallyalthough some sports
environments do get pretty closeto that at times and the
desperation to get the nextresult.
(07:25):
But this principle of recoveryis one that we've lost in life
in work.
Who talks about when are wegoing to recover as a team and
how are we going to recover inorder to do even better in the
next project?
So I think that concept is onethat we need to re-educate
ourselves about.
Remember, plan involve.
It is part of how we canfunction at our best and
certainly if we want to sustainthe work that we do.
(07:48):
It was interesting.
The World Health Organizationhas added it into its
international classification ofdiseases and says that chronic
workplace stress it's aboutchronic workplace stress that
has not been successfullymanaged.
So it is very much somethingthat we need to think about for
ourselves, but we also can'ttake it out of that context of
(08:09):
how we're being managed, and I'mjust not sure that line
managers necessarily see thingsthrough this lens.
Always, we tend to focus on thetasks, so my job is to make
sure my team delivers X numberof tasks and hits X number of
objectives, rather than actuallymy job is to make sure that my
team are healthy, that they'reable to work, that they are
recovering in order to completethe next set of objectives and
(08:32):
the set of objectives after thanthat, rather than, oh my God,
we've just got to get throughthis month's objectives.
So I think there's a huge piecearound needing to reshape what
we think good line management isabout and how we might train
line managers I actually hatethat word, line managers, but
anyway it's the one we still use.
I mean as if we're managinglines, we're the people in all
this.
You know that indicates there'sa lack of humanization of our
(08:55):
environments and that's verymuch been part of the increase
in burnout.
I think and you know, comingback to that sports piece, for
me when I experienced it waswhen I was just being turned
into a rowing machine.
I couldn't be human, I couldn'tbe have an off day, because you
can't have an off day on theOlympics.
You're not allowed to have anoff day.
So you're not allowed to saywhen you're not feeling great
(09:17):
when you need a bit of help,when you're struggling, you're
also kind of you know, in thefirst part of my career as an
Olympic athlete then there wasthis focus on more and more.
More is good If you can do anextra exercise in the gym, if
you can do some more here, thenof course that, you know, gets
to a point where you're thencutting into your recovery,
where you're then cutting intoyour recovery, where you're
actually pushing your bodyconstantly and not enabling it
(09:38):
to get stronger each time.
And also there was a culturewhere there was very little joy.
You were only as valuable asyour results.
And so then I kind of foundmyself, after a really poor
performance in the SydneyOlympics, just feeling really
destroyed, burnt out from theexperience of four years of
trying to train harder all thetime and actually not even being
(10:01):
able to deliver my bestperformance at the end of it.
So yeah, I think about it quitea lot on a personal level and in
terms of how to helporganizations that have got into
sort of such a cycle of beingtrapped into asking for more,
more, more all the time.
What's the sort of work that?
What are the sort ofrecommendations that you make
(10:23):
when you're talking toorganisations.
What are the things that youtry and help people with, colin
on this?
Colin (10:27):
Well, you, touched on it, Cath is middle managers really
are the difference.
You know the OCS had a globalculture report in 2023.
They found that a vibrantculture reduces burnout by 66%,
increases tenure by 63% andincreases job satisfaction by
28%.
All of these things and a bigpart of that is actually being
(10:47):
able to be your best, mostproductive self in the office.
Middle managers really createthe foundation for that, and so
we need to teach them not onlyhow to build great culture, but
also how to make sure thateveryone isn't feeling
completely spent Even halfwaythrough the day.
The global leadership forecastlast year burnout rates are
increasing 72% of people whowere surveyed felt used up by
(11:11):
the end of the day.
That's almost three quarters ofemployees and that's an
increase of 12% in just threeyears.
But only 15% of leaders feelprepared to prevent employee
burnout, which goes back to that.
You know really teachingmanagers.
You know certainly for me, theprograms that I run and talk
very much about the importanceof making sure that people have
(11:32):
time in their day to do theirwork and have time in their day
to stop and have a break.
But most corporateorganizations their day to do
their work and have time intheir day to stop and have a
break.
But most corporate organizations, their response to burnout is
to implement wellbeing programs,not to address the root cause
right, and so the wellbeingprograms.
You know.
Companies around the worldspend, you know, over $60
(11:57):
billion on wellbeing programs.
It's expected to be about $95billion by 2026.
And yet what Oxford Universityfound is none of that.
None of those interventions hada significant impact at all on
well-being, sense of belonging,job satisfaction, nor did they
improve the culture.
(12:17):
The most effective way toimprove how people feel and
burnout is to actually reducethe stress, rather than
implement new ways to helppeople cope with the stress.
It's crazy.
Cath (12:30):
Yeah, this is a sort of initiativitis that then comes in
oh, let's fix it.
Let's not look at any of thecauses.
The root causes of burnout willjust bring a little fix, a sort
of temporary, shallow,superficial thing that we do.
And I saw a lovely phrase,actually when I was reading some
articles that said you can'tyoga your way out of burnout,
(12:51):
which I thought was a greatphrase.
And it sums it up yes, we alldo yoga on Thursday lunchtimes
and therefore everything will beokay.
I mean, how ridiculous is that?
Because it actually reallyundermines the culture, it's
really not valuing your peopleand it's not understanding how
our bodies work, how our mindswork, how our emotions work, and
(13:11):
ultimately, that will affectyour performance, if not this
week, the week after, the weekafter, after that.
And then you're into a wholeworld of pain, of retention
issues, of people going off sick, the number of times now I find
it's quite a regular thing whenI'm working with the team oh so
and so's not here becausethey're they're off on stress,
and, of course, again, when youadd that together and there are
lots of research papers thathave added all of those costs of
(13:35):
burnout you see, well, somehowit's cost you more than you
thought you were gaining byhitting this month's targets.
So there's a short-termism thatstops us seeing the long-term
damage here, and so for me, ahuge part of this is getting
much more long-term strategiesfor looking after your people,
and they must be prioritizedover short-term gains, because
(13:55):
the cost is so high and even I'mnot even thinking that
long-term, I'm thinking over ayear, over two years the costs
are so high if you don't lookafter people this week.
So there's some things that arecoming back to some of the
themes we've talked before abouthaving much stronger listening
cultures, having thatpsychological safety where
people can say I'm strugglingwith something.
Those become really core toenabling us to shift into a
(14:18):
different place on this.
Colin (14:20):
Those social supports are crucial.
There's some research by Hammerand what they found was that
kind of prolonged wellbeingreally relies on three factors.
The first you know one of themis social supports is creating
that environment where peoplecan say, hey, listen, I need
help.
Where you feel able to do thatin a way where people don't
judge you.
Some people listen to thepodcast like, oh, I probably
(14:43):
feel I could tell my teammatesthat, but they'll probably then
talk behind my back and say, gee, what's wrong with Colin?
He needs to get his head in thegame, those classic phrases.
The second one is, for me, whichis the most important one is
decreasing the demands of work,and one of the phrases that I
use all of the time is that ifyou want to do more, you need to
do less, which soundscounterintuitive.
(15:04):
But what you know, again, whatthe research has proven, what
science proves, is that actuallyif we focus on fewer things,
they get done faster, to ahigher quality, than if we have
20 things on our plates.
You know people get into thesereally bad habits of writing
task lists, daily task lists,with 15 things on them and
immediately they feel this senseof I haven't done enough, I'm
(15:24):
not getting through my task list, and I'm a big fan of creating
a master task list but then onlyhave the tasks on your list for
your day.
You know that.
Focus on, well, what do I havetime to do?
And then the third thing thatHammer found was really giving
you know, kind of empoweringemployees to say who do you need
to be with, where do you needto be, what's the environment
(15:44):
that you need right now in orderto do your best work.
And then, when we have thatchoice, it's up to us as humans
not to fall into bad habits,which also plays a part into
burnout.
You know, once you've got that,I'd say this is what I need to
do, this is what I need to getdone, I'm going to focus on that
and then away we go.
Cath (16:04):
Yeah, and of course, part of those bad habits is not being
able to switch off, and youmentioned it there and I'm
guilty as well.
I've been quite an obsessivepersonality who always wants to
read another book and writeanother article, and I've always
got these things swellingaround my head and there is then
no switch off point.
I have lost the habit ofswitching off, which would help
me to recover, and I thinkthat's something that you can
(16:26):
get away with it.
There's almost a bravado of Inever switch off and that is so
damaging for any of us asindividuals, but also as teams,
as workplaces, for us to havethat sort of oh yeah, you can
always catch me, I'll alwaysrespond really quickly and
actually, over time, we'redecreasing our capacity.
So I love that message of lessis more and it reminds me of
(16:46):
some of the brilliant work thatI think is really starting to
come into the mainstream, morefrom Cal Newport, who's written
some great books around digitalminimalism, the concept of deep
work, and his latest one iscalled Slow Productivity.
So he's leaning into challengingall of the myths that we have
(17:06):
that you've got to go faster andharder and do more all the time
and, as you say, the way to domuch higher quality work is to
do less things much better.
So that means you're paringback your to-do list.
You're also thinking about whenyou do things.
So first thing in the morning,when you're off and freshest and
have got the biggest capacityfor thinking, then you don't sit
(17:27):
at your inbox for an hour,which will just drain you and
then leave you in a sort ofshort-term headspace of pinging
things back and forth.
You actually sit down and dokind of something where you make
much more meaningful progress.
And I think that people arelooking towards how the hell do
we get out of what we're doingand what does good now look for?
(17:49):
And I think he offers lots oftips, although they feel really
challenging to the way.
Now we've set our organizationsup.
Colin (17:56):
Yeah, there's the three books that I read that changed
the way that it changed myrelationship with technology.
So I read the 4-Hour Workweekby Tim Ferriss, which has got
some really great stuff in there.
I read Stolen Focus by JohanHari, and I read, but then kind
(18:17):
of slightly.
And there was a Christmas book,you know, one of those big,
thick books.
I read the Age of SurveillanceCapitalism by Harvard Business
School professor Shoshana Zuboff, which talked about how
technology companies are usingthe information that we provide
them with for all manner of justnefarious activity.
(18:38):
So anyway, those three booksreally changed my relationship
with the thing in my pocket.
And it's funny.
I was on the tube this morningand I would say at least 80% of
the people were just staring atthe back.
There was one guy reading abook.
I was like love that I haven'tseen that so long.
But we've lost that abilityalmost to just switch off, to
(19:03):
stop.
You know, one guy was watchingjust Instagram and I watched him
just scrolling like scroll,like scroll.
He wasn't even reading what wasthere.
You know, it's clearly one ofthose little bad habits that
we've got and that thing is thenjust becomes a distraction for
the thing that you actually needto do yeah, and the thing you
probably want to do more,because it often leaves you
(19:23):
feeling really dissatisfiedagain.
Cath (19:26):
It's really sort of chewing our brains up doing this
sort of thing.
And, yeah, reading is a reallylovely way of switching off and
slowing down your brain, butactually slowing it down in
order to be able to think moredeeply, more impactfully, and
particularly if we're in roleswhere we need to collaborate, so
we need to relate to others,connect, think, take on board
other perspectives, feed theminto our own, and where we need
(19:48):
to be innovating, thinkingdifferently, then an overloaded
brain cannot think in a freshway, and then that means we're
just creating, we're actuallylimiting performance.
We're creating workplaces wherewe just churn out what we've
always done and what you seethen is the performance levels
actually start to crater.
Of course, disengagementquickly drops off and, again,
(20:09):
gallup surveys show uscontinually the decreasing
levels of engagement in thecompany.
So none of this is actuallyhelping this desperate
performance that we're chasingand we're ending up, sort of
paradoxically, getting furtheraway from performance, even
though we're pushing all thesebad habits and kind of
overloaded working ways in termsof, because it's important for
(20:32):
performance, there's a need tomassively step back, and that
requires leaders actually togive the space to help people do
good work, deep work,meaningful work, and that's just
something that isn't on theirto-do list because they've got
so many other things thatthey've got to get done.
But if we're not having thatrole model from the top and
given permission and proactivelysupported, then it's really
(20:56):
tough for people in the middleof an organization to change
those habits.
So you know, people who aremanagers of teams, people who
are leaders in organizations,it's really important.
This is a huge responsibility.
You have to help ensure thatyour colleagues don't get burnt
out.
Colin (21:13):
Yeah, and we should probably kind of finish with
what can employers do?
And you're absolutely right,it's on leaders.
Toby Lutker, who's the CEO ofShopify.
He copped a bit of flack onTwitter in 2019 by basically
saying, listen, I don't overwork, you know, at the end of the
day, that's it.
I'm done at 5.30.
I am done.
And he said there are only fivecreative hours in everybody's
(21:35):
day and he was happy if onlyfour of those were spent on
Shopify activities.
And you don't have to look atShopify's number to say you know
what.
They might be onto somethingthere.
So I think, leaders, you have toreally you have to demonstrate
what good looks like.
You have to address the rootcause issues.
Forget well, no, wait a minute.
Don't forget wellbeingprogrammes.
Make sure you've got some kindof things in place to help
(21:59):
people, absolutely.
But your employees will thankyou more for less meetings in
the corporate world.
They'd thank you more for lessemails.
They'll thank you more forproviding them with time to sit
and think.
But then, employees, you've gotto use that time to sit and
think you can.
Employees, you've got to usethat time to sit and think you
can't.
Just, you know, take your phoneto the bathroom and scroll on
your Instagram feed.
So you know, yes, we wantcorporates and we want all kinds
(22:22):
of organizations to reallythink about.
What are those root causes ofburnout?
How do we address those?
And then we want people toactively use their time better,
such that they live happier,fulfilled lives.
I would take that?
Cath (22:39):
Yeah, absolutely.
And I want to give a shout outto Leanne Spencer, who's a
colleague, who's become a friend, who went through a huge
burnout crisis from working, Ithink, in advertising world and
now for, yeah, probably the last15 years or so has been very
innovative in this space,written some books her last one
on cadence all the time lookingat deeper angles of how to
support people in a much moreholistic way.
(23:00):
So, yes, it's thinking aboutphysical activity, but also very
much now going to workplacesand helping think about
wellbeing, not just as somethingyou do in a Friday lunchtime,
but actually what does thatwellbeing agenda look like?
You know, threaded throughoutthe way we work.
So I love her work and you canwe'll give the link to her
website there but it's, yeah,time for us to think about what
(23:21):
we're going to leave you with interms of what can you do, what
to get curious about and what touncover.
So what's our do, what's ouraction takeaway?
Colin (23:32):
Well, for individuals listening to this, Cath.
I think what we want them to dois take preventative action to
prioritise your own health andwellbeing.
You know, make sure you'regetting plenty of sleep.
You don't need your phone inyour bedroom.
Make sure good nutrition,exercise when you can,
regardless of what your workloadis.
Try your best to have some goodbalance and plan your day, yeah
(23:53):
be proactive and curious.
Cath (23:56):
have a think about why you , and perhaps your colleagues,
aren't great at looking afteryourselves.
What's going on there in termsof your own habits, your own
upbringing, your own values andthe values of the workplace?
So why aren't you looking afteryourselves when you are your
greatest asset and, lastly,uncover?
Colin (24:16):
Well, I think, if you're a senior leader in a business or
if you're a manager, what arethe root causes in the workplace
of burnout, regardless of whatyou do Really take the time to
understand what is creating thisepidemic where we feel spent at
the end of the working day, andI think that the things that
you want to address are thoseroot causes, because they're the
(24:38):
things that then will change itmoving forward Brilliant.
Cath (24:41):
So take preventative, proactive action to prioritise
your health and wellbeing.
Get curious about why you mightnot be looking after yourself
and uncover the root causes ofworkplace stress in your
environment.
Great, great to be in the sameplace.
Great conversation Thanks verymuch.
Thanks, Cath.
Thanks for listening to today'sInside Out Culture.
Colin (25:05):
Podcast.
Please remember to like,subscribe and, of course, share
with others who you think may beinterested.
Welcome to the Inside Out Culture Podcast, where we look
at insides of working cultureand provide ideas, insights and
actions for you to take on theoutside.
I'm Colin Ellis.
Cath (00:12):
And I'm Cath Bishop, and in each episode we'll examine a
different question or adifferent organization, and
we'll use case studies, researchand our own insights and
experiences to help you changethe way things get done in your
world.
Colin (00:27):
We hope you enjoyed today's episode.
Please like, subscribe and, ofcourse, let us know what you
think.
Hello everybody and welcome toanother episode of the Inside
Out Culture Podcast.
It's really exciting for Cathand I because we're actually in
the same space.
We're in a studio in Soho inLondon.
Cath (00:51):
So it is a real culture shock for us.
I think, yeah, normally we'rerecording literally continents
apart, oceans apart, so it'susually about 6.30am for you and
9.30pm for me.
So we're in the same time zone,in the same place, a few feet
apart.
So, yeah, it's great.
And today we're talking aboutburnout.
Yeah, big topic, burnout.
And actually we were bothsaying, when we were doing some
research for this conversation,how prolific the literature is
(01:13):
around burnout.
It's being written aboutabsolutely everywhere Harvard
Business Review, mckinseyResearch, every organization,
psychology magazines, you nameit everyone is talking about it.
People talk about an epidemicof burnout, and so what we
wanted to do is to, as always,go a little under the surface.
What's going on?
(01:33):
How might we think about thistopic?
How might we sort of break itdown in some different ways and
also give you some helpfulpointers to be thinking about
your workplaces?
So let's start off, colin,thinking about how would you
situate this topic?
What are maybe the key signs ofburnout?
Should we start there?
Colin (01:50):
Yeah, it's probably a good place to start is how do
you know if you're burned out orjust really really tired
Burnout?
So I did some research on whatthe key signs of burnout are.
The first one is exhaustion.
Exhaustion is a word that weuse a lot, but exhaustion is
(02:11):
when you feel physically andemotionally drained even after a
good night's sleep.
You know that feeling when youget up in the morning and
there's just nothing left in thetank where you feel you have to
force yourself just to even getin the shower.
And I know myself, I'vesuffered from burnout just
getting into the showers andeffort.
So that's the first sign.
Second is a lack of motivation.
So you really lose interest inyour work and in your personal
life.
(02:31):
You're constantly having totell yourself to come on, you
can do this.
Things that you used to beexcited about you're just no
longer excited about.
The third thing and I noticedthis in myself particularly is I
suddenly become skeptical orcynical, so quite negative.
That's a real key sign ofburnout for me is that's just
(02:51):
not who I am as an individual.
All of a sudden I'm thinkingnegatively about stuff and you
start to withdraw and people areasking you are you okay.
Fundamentally, you know you'reokay and you probably say you're
okay.
You know you're okay and youprobably say you're okay, but it
doesn't feel right.
The fourth one is irritability,which just the little things
(03:12):
that just start to really irkyou and really bug you and you
feel that feeling of fear, angerand hostility.
And then the last one is healthissues.
And this is the big one,particularly for sustained
burnout, is it can reallymanifest itself physically
Headaches, migraines, stomachissues, irritable bowel syndrome
is always linked to burnout.
(03:34):
Muscle tension, you feel likeyou need a massage every single
day, changes in appetite andobviously a lack of sleep.
So they're just some of thesigns.
And the other thing that I read, Cath, when I was doing the
research, is what medicalprofessionals say is it takes
six weeks of rest to reallyovercome extreme burnout, which
(03:56):
is why we probably struggle withit.
Who can take six weeks off you?
Cath (03:59):
know.
Yeah, the whole concept of thatfeels both beautiful and
frightening.
So it's one of those thingsthat we are seeing so much more
and there are a whole load ofreasons why.
So it can be partly, as you cantell from those signs that you
read out, it can be partlythings in our own minds.
So the way we're drivingourselves, the way we are
focusing, the goals we're givingourselves, but there's also
(04:21):
lots of social factors.
So in the environment around us,of course, the overload we get
from technology, from our phonesbeing on the whole time and
piling our brains with tons ofinformation, there's a sense of
demands from companies wantingto speed up work and putting
pressure, and there's ashort-termism, trends that push
us in that direction.
There's a sense of perhaps someof our organizations not caring
(04:44):
about us as people but reallyjust seeing us as machines
churning stuff out.
That starts to again leave usin a space of why am I doing all
this work and I'm working everharder?
And there's an isolation andthat's something that I think we
all experience in differentways.
During the pandemic, thatreally showed us how a lack of
connection to others can leaveus, you know, bewildered, burnt,
(05:07):
feeling, quickly, you know, ata loss.
So there were lots of thingschanging both in the way we all
think and live in modern societyand there are lots of things in
the environment around us thatare leading us in this direction
.
So it's quite hard to find apathway through all of those.
What would you say in your?
You mentioned there your ownexperiences of burnout.
What were the things that ledto that for you?
Colin (05:29):
I think some of it was choice, Cath, is I overworked, I
felt like I had to be doingthings and unfortunately, I have
one of those personalitieswhere I feel like I have to
always be on the go.
If my wife listens to thispodcast, she'll be like, oh yeah
, he's that guy.
We'll always have to be doing,always have to be writing,
(05:50):
always have to be researching.
But actually in my you know,when I was an employee, the need
for almost to make sure that Iwas conforming to the culture
that existed, one ofback-to-back meetings where I
had no time for my job and I wasthen choosing to work in the
evening and at weekend, and Ithink one of the ways that I
(06:13):
coped with that is then to saywell, I don't have to conform to
those things.
And that was almost a light bulbmoment for me in the kind of
around about 2008.
It feels like a long time ago,16 years ago now, but for me
that's when it changed, becauseall of a sudden I'm like feels
like a long time ago, 16 yearsago now, but for me that's when
it changed, because all of asudden I'm like oh, wait a
minute, I don't have to conformto some of these things, and I
think that's a trap that manypeople find themselves in is
(06:34):
that they conform to culturalnorms because they feel a sense
of rejection.
They feel that you know it'llbe seen as they're not part of
the team.
Maybe there's an expectationfrom managers, and I still do
think that some organizationsplace undue, put undue influence
on people to conform toridiculous cultural norms,
(06:55):
particularly around you know,kind of the time that they spend
doing things and there's nevera time for a break, which is
probably something that you'veseen as well in the sporting
world, Cath.
Cath (07:04):
Yeah, hugely.
And I think I mean in one way,sport shows us that you can't
have performance withoutrecovery.
It's such a crucial part oflife, the sort of human cycle
and the human ability to achieve, and so I always think you
wouldn't cut recovery typicallyalthough some sports
environments do get pretty closeto that at times and the
desperation to get the nextresult.
(07:25):
But this principle of recoveryis one that we've lost in life
in work.
Who talks about when are wegoing to recover as a team and
how are we going to recover inorder to do even better in the
next project?
So I think that concept is onethat we need to re-educate
ourselves about.
Remember, plan involve.
It is part of how we canfunction at our best and
certainly if we want to sustainthe work that we do.
(07:48):
It was interesting.
The World Health Organizationhas added it into its
international classification ofdiseases and says that chronic
workplace stress it's aboutchronic workplace stress that
has not been successfullymanaged.
So it is very much somethingthat we need to think about for
ourselves, but we also can'ttake it out of that context of
(08:09):
how we're being managed, and I'mjust not sure that line
managers necessarily see thingsthrough this lens.
Always, we tend to focus on thetasks, so my job is to make
sure my team delivers X numberof tasks and hits X number of
objectives, rather than actuallymy job is to make sure that my
team are healthy, that they'reable to work, that they are
recovering in order to completethe next set of objectives and
(08:32):
the set of objectives after thanthat, rather than, oh my God,
we've just got to get throughthis month's objectives.
So I think there's a huge piecearound needing to reshape what
we think good line management isabout and how we might train
line managers I actually hatethat word, line managers, but
anyway it's the one we still use.
I mean as if we're managinglines, we're the people in all
this.
You know that indicates there'sa lack of humanization of our
(08:55):
environments and that's verymuch been part of the increase
in burnout.
I think and you know, comingback to that sports piece, for
me when I experienced it waswhen I was just being turned
into a rowing machine.
I couldn't be human, I couldn'tbe have an off day, because you
can't have an off day on theOlympics.
You're not allowed to have anoff day.
So you're not allowed to saywhen you're not feeling great
(09:17):
when you need a bit of help,when you're struggling, you're
also kind of you know, in thefirst part of my career as an
Olympic athlete then there wasthis focus on more and more.
More is good If you can do anextra exercise in the gym, if
you can do some more here, thenof course that, you know, gets
to a point where you're thencutting into your recovery,
where you're then cutting intoyour recovery, where you're
actually pushing your bodyconstantly and not enabling it
(09:38):
to get stronger each time.
And also there was a culturewhere there was very little joy.
You were only as valuable asyour results.
And so then I kind of foundmyself, after a really poor
performance in the SydneyOlympics, just feeling really
destroyed, burnt out from theexperience of four years of
trying to train harder all thetime and actually not even being
(10:01):
able to deliver my bestperformance at the end of it.
So yeah, I think about it quitea lot on a personal level and in
terms of how to helporganizations that have got into
sort of such a cycle of beingtrapped into asking for more,
more, more all the time.
What's the sort of work that?
What are the sort ofrecommendations that you make
(10:23):
when you're talking toorganisations.
What are the things that youtry and help people with, colin
on this?
Colin (10:27):
Well, you, touched on it, Cath is middle managers really
are the difference.
You know the OCS had a globalculture report in 2023.
They found that a vibrantculture reduces burnout by 66%,
increases tenure by 63% andincreases job satisfaction by
28%.
All of these things and a bigpart of that is actually being
(10:47):
able to be your best, mostproductive self in the office.
Middle managers really createthe foundation for that, and so
we need to teach them not onlyhow to build great culture, but
also how to make sure thateveryone isn't feeling
completely spent Even halfwaythrough the day.
The global leadership forecastlast year burnout rates are
increasing 72% of people whowere surveyed felt used up by
(11:11):
the end of the day.
That's almost three quarters ofemployees and that's an
increase of 12% in just threeyears.
But only 15% of leaders feelprepared to prevent employee
burnout, which goes back to that.
You know really teachingmanagers.
You know certainly for me, theprograms that I run and talk
very much about the importanceof making sure that people have
(11:32):
time in their day to do theirwork and have time in their day
to stop and have a break.
But most corporateorganizations their day to do
their work and have time intheir day to stop and have a
break.
But most corporate organizations, their response to burnout is
to implement wellbeing programs,not to address the root cause
right, and so the wellbeingprograms.
You know.
Companies around the worldspend, you know, over $60
(11:57):
billion on wellbeing programs.
It's expected to be about $95billion by 2026.
And yet what Oxford Universityfound is none of that.
None of those interventions hada significant impact at all on
well-being, sense of belonging,job satisfaction, nor did they
improve the culture.
(12:17):
The most effective way toimprove how people feel and
burnout is to actually reducethe stress, rather than
implement new ways to helppeople cope with the stress.
It's crazy.
Cath (12:30):
Yeah, this is a sort of initiativitis that then comes in
oh, let's fix it.
Let's not look at any of thecauses.
The root causes of burnout willjust bring a little fix, a sort
of temporary, shallow,superficial thing that we do.
And I saw a lovely phrase,actually when I was reading some
articles that said you can'tyoga your way out of burnout,
(12:51):
which I thought was a greatphrase.
And it sums it up yes, we alldo yoga on Thursday lunchtimes
and therefore everything will beokay.
I mean, how ridiculous is that?
Because it actually reallyundermines the culture, it's
really not valuing your peopleand it's not understanding how
our bodies work, how our mindswork, how our emotions work, and
(13:11):
ultimately, that will affectyour performance, if not this
week, the week after, the weekafter, after that.
And then you're into a wholeworld of pain, of retention
issues, of people going off sick, the number of times now I find
it's quite a regular thing whenI'm working with the team oh so
and so's not here becausethey're they're off on stress,
and, of course, again, when youadd that together and there are
lots of research papers thathave added all of those costs of
(13:35):
burnout you see, well, somehowit's cost you more than you
thought you were gaining byhitting this month's targets.
So there's a short-termism thatstops us seeing the long-term
damage here, and so for me, ahuge part of this is getting
much more long-term strategiesfor looking after your people,
and they must be prioritizedover short-term gains, because
(13:55):
the cost is so high and even I'mnot even thinking that
long-term, I'm thinking over ayear, over two years the costs
are so high if you don't lookafter people this week.
So there's some things that arecoming back to some of the
themes we've talked before abouthaving much stronger listening
cultures, having thatpsychological safety where
people can say I'm strugglingwith something.
Those become really core toenabling us to shift into a
(14:18):
different place on this.
Colin (14:20):
Those social supports are crucial.
There's some research by Hammerand what they found was that
kind of prolonged wellbeingreally relies on three factors.
The first you know one of themis social supports is creating
that environment where peoplecan say, hey, listen, I need
help.
Where you feel able to do thatin a way where people don't
judge you.
Some people listen to thepodcast like, oh, I probably
(14:43):
feel I could tell my teammatesthat, but they'll probably then
talk behind my back and say, gee, what's wrong with Colin?
He needs to get his head in thegame, those classic phrases.
The second one is, for me, whichis the most important one is
decreasing the demands of work,and one of the phrases that I
use all of the time is that ifyou want to do more, you need to
do less, which soundscounterintuitive.
(15:04):
But what you know, again, whatthe research has proven, what
science proves, is that actuallyif we focus on fewer things,
they get done faster, to ahigher quality, than if we have
20 things on our plates.
You know people get into thesereally bad habits of writing
task lists, daily task lists,with 15 things on them and
immediately they feel this senseof I haven't done enough, I'm
(15:24):
not getting through my task list, and I'm a big fan of creating
a master task list but then onlyhave the tasks on your list for
your day.
You know that.
Focus on, well, what do I havetime to do?
And then the third thing thatHammer found was really giving
you know, kind of empoweringemployees to say who do you need
to be with, where do you needto be, what's the environment
(15:44):
that you need right now in orderto do your best work.
And then, when we have thatchoice, it's up to us as humans
not to fall into bad habits,which also plays a part into
burnout.
You know, once you've got that,I'd say this is what I need to
do, this is what I need to getdone, I'm going to focus on that
and then away we go.
Cath (16:04):
Yeah, and of course, part of those bad habits is not being
able to switch off, and youmentioned it there and I'm
guilty as well.
I've been quite an obsessivepersonality who always wants to
read another book and writeanother article, and I've always
got these things swellingaround my head and there is then
no switch off point.
I have lost the habit ofswitching off, which would help
me to recover, and I thinkthat's something that you can
(16:26):
get away with it.
There's almost a bravado of Inever switch off and that is so
damaging for any of us asindividuals, but also as teams,
as workplaces, for us to havethat sort of oh yeah, you can
always catch me, I'll alwaysrespond really quickly and
actually, over time, we'redecreasing our capacity.
So I love that message of lessis more and it reminds me of
(16:46):
some of the brilliant work thatI think is really starting to
come into the mainstream, morefrom Cal Newport, who's written
some great books around digitalminimalism, the concept of deep
work, and his latest one iscalled Slow Productivity.
So he's leaning into challengingall of the myths that we have
(17:06):
that you've got to go faster andharder and do more all the time
and, as you say, the way to domuch higher quality work is to
do less things much better.
So that means you're paringback your to-do list.
You're also thinking about whenyou do things.
So first thing in the morning,when you're off and freshest and
have got the biggest capacityfor thinking, then you don't sit
(17:27):
at your inbox for an hour,which will just drain you and
then leave you in a sort ofshort-term headspace of pinging
things back and forth.
You actually sit down and dokind of something where you make
much more meaningful progress.
And I think that people arelooking towards how the hell do
we get out of what we're doingand what does good now look for?
(17:49):
And I think he offers lots oftips, although they feel really
challenging to the way.
Now we've set our organizationsup.
Colin (17:56):
Yeah, there's the three books that I read that changed
the way that it changed myrelationship with technology.
So I read the 4-Hour Workweekby Tim Ferriss, which has got
some really great stuff in there.
I read Stolen Focus by JohanHari, and I read, but then kind
(18:17):
of slightly.
And there was a Christmas book,you know, one of those big,
thick books.
I read the Age of SurveillanceCapitalism by Harvard Business
School professor Shoshana Zuboff, which talked about how
technology companies are usingthe information that we provide
them with for all manner of justnefarious activity.
(18:38):
So anyway, those three booksreally changed my relationship
with the thing in my pocket.
And it's funny.
I was on the tube this morningand I would say at least 80% of
the people were just staring atthe back.
There was one guy reading abook.
I was like love that I haven'tseen that so long.
But we've lost that abilityalmost to just switch off, to
(19:03):
stop.
You know, one guy was watchingjust Instagram and I watched him
just scrolling like scroll,like scroll.
He wasn't even reading what wasthere.
You know, it's clearly one ofthose little bad habits that
we've got and that thing is thenjust becomes a distraction for
the thing that you actually needto do yeah, and the thing you
probably want to do more,because it often leaves you
(19:23):
feeling really dissatisfiedagain.
Cath (19:26):
It's really sort of chewing our brains up doing this
sort of thing.
And, yeah, reading is a reallylovely way of switching off and
slowing down your brain, butactually slowing it down in
order to be able to think moredeeply, more impactfully, and
particularly if we're in roleswhere we need to collaborate, so
we need to relate to others,connect, think, take on board
other perspectives, feed theminto our own, and where we need
(19:48):
to be innovating, thinkingdifferently, then an overloaded
brain cannot think in a freshway, and then that means we're
just creating, we're actuallylimiting performance.
We're creating workplaces wherewe just churn out what we've
always done and what you seethen is the performance levels
actually start to crater.
Of course, disengagementquickly drops off and, again,
(20:09):
gallup surveys show uscontinually the decreasing
levels of engagement in thecompany.
So none of this is actuallyhelping this desperate
performance that we're chasingand we're ending up, sort of
paradoxically, getting furtheraway from performance, even
though we're pushing all thesebad habits and kind of
overloaded working ways in termsof, because it's important for
(20:32):
performance, there's a need tomassively step back, and that
requires leaders actually togive the space to help people do
good work, deep work,meaningful work, and that's just
something that isn't on theirto-do list because they've got
so many other things thatthey've got to get done.
But if we're not having thatrole model from the top and
given permission and proactivelysupported, then it's really
(20:56):
tough for people in the middleof an organization to change
those habits.
So you know, people who aremanagers of teams, people who
are leaders in organizations,it's really important.
This is a huge responsibility.
You have to help ensure thatyour colleagues don't get burnt
out.
Colin (21:13):
Yeah, and we should probably kind of finish with
what can employers do?
And you're absolutely right,it's on leaders.
Toby Lutker, who's the CEO ofShopify.
He copped a bit of flack onTwitter in 2019 by basically
saying, listen, I don't overwork, you know, at the end of the
day, that's it.
I'm done at 5.30.
I am done.
And he said there are only fivecreative hours in everybody's
(21:35):
day and he was happy if onlyfour of those were spent on
Shopify activities.
And you don't have to look atShopify's number to say you know
what.
They might be onto somethingthere.
So I think, leaders, you have toreally you have to demonstrate
what good looks like.
You have to address the rootcause issues.
Forget well, no, wait a minute.
Don't forget wellbeingprogrammes.
Make sure you've got some kindof things in place to help
(21:59):
people, absolutely.
But your employees will thankyou more for less meetings in
the corporate world.
They'd thank you more for lessemails.
They'll thank you more forproviding them with time to sit
and think.
But then, employees, you've gotto use that time to sit and
think you can.
Employees, you've got to usethat time to sit and think you
can't.
Just, you know, take your phoneto the bathroom and scroll on
your Instagram feed.
So you know, yes, we wantcorporates and we want all kinds
(22:22):
of organizations to reallythink about.
What are those root causes ofburnout?
How do we address those?
And then we want people toactively use their time better,
such that they live happier,fulfilled lives.
I would take that?
Cath (22:39):
Yeah, absolutely.
And I want to give a shout outto Leanne Spencer, who's a
colleague, who's become a friend, who went through a huge
burnout crisis from working, Ithink, in advertising world and
now for, yeah, probably the last15 years or so has been very
innovative in this space,written some books her last one
on cadence all the time lookingat deeper angles of how to
support people in a much moreholistic way.
(23:00):
So, yes, it's thinking aboutphysical activity, but also very
much now going to workplacesand helping think about
wellbeing, not just as somethingyou do in a Friday lunchtime,
but actually what does thatwellbeing agenda look like?
You know, threaded throughoutthe way we work.
So I love her work and you canwe'll give the link to her
website there but it's, yeah,time for us to think about what
(23:21):
we're going to leave you with interms of what can you do, what
to get curious about and what touncover.
So what's our do, what's ouraction takeaway?
Colin (23:32):
Well, for individuals listening to this, Cath.
I think what we want them to dois take preventative action to
prioritise your own health andwellbeing.
You know, make sure you'regetting plenty of sleep.
You don't need your phone inyour bedroom.
Make sure good nutrition,exercise when you can,
regardless of what your workloadis.
Try your best to have some goodbalance and plan your day, yeah
(23:53):
be proactive and curious.
Cath (23:56):
have a think about why you , and perhaps your colleagues,
aren't great at looking afteryourselves.
What's going on there in termsof your own habits, your own
upbringing, your own values andthe values of the workplace?
So why aren't you looking afteryourselves when you are your
greatest asset and, lastly,uncover?
Colin (24:16):
Well, I think, if you're a senior leader in a business or
if you're a manager, what arethe root causes in the workplace
of burnout, regardless of whatyou do Really take the time to
understand what is creating thisepidemic where we feel spent at
the end of the working day, andI think that the things that
you want to address are thoseroot causes, because they're the
(24:38):
things that then will change itmoving forward Brilliant.
Cath (24:41):
So take preventative, proactive action to prioritise
your health and wellbeing.
Get curious about why you mightnot be looking after yourself
and uncover the root causes ofworkplace stress in your
environment.
Great, great to be in the sameplace.
Great conversation Thanks verymuch.
Thanks, Cath.
Thanks for listening to today'sInside Out Culture.
Colin (25:05):
Podcast.
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