Skip to main content

How Leaders Can Reduce Employee Burnout Within The Workplace

The constant pace of change and a variety of new demands are contributing to widespread burnout among both employees and managers today. 

According to new research from a Harris Poll survey done on behalf of The Grossman Group, more than 75% of employees and 63% of managers report feeling burned out or ambivalent in their current position.

 

And surprisingly managers are not recognizing just how overwhelmed their employees feel, with 89% saying their employees are thriving compared to the actual thriving figure of 24%. That is more than a 3-to-1 discrepancy.

 

Today, I asked David Grossman of The Grossman group:

 

Question: Why do you believe so many managers do not recognize burnout in their employees?

 

Grossman: Managers may struggle to identify burnout due to various reasons such as lack of training, high workload themselves, or simply not knowing the signs and symptoms of burnout.

 

Some signs and symptoms of employee burnout may include exhaustion, lack of motivation, decreased productivity, increased fatigue, increased cynicism or negativity, difficulty concentrating, physical symptoms such as headaches or stomach issues, detachment towards work, and changes in sleep patterns.

 

Other signs may include withdrawal from social interactions and decreased satisfaction with work. It is important for both employees and managers to be aware of these signs and take action to address them to prevent burnout among employees.

 

Companies and their leadership can help managers get better at this by providing proper training on recognizing burnout, encouraging open communication between managers and employees, promoting a culture of work-life balance, and offering resources for mental health support. 

___

 

As you will discover when you download the research findings there are additional specific tactics leaders and managers can take to help combat burnout among their employees include: 

  • Have a plan to conduct regular employee monitoring and check-ins.
  • Ensure managers are committed to their employees’ success and are empathetic to their challenges—on top of ensuring communication from senior leadership that is direct, clear, and authentic.
  • Confirm communication reinforces action.
  • Ensure there is a plan to manage change fatigue.
  • Help managers to translate business strategy to employees’ goals.
  • Provide approachable and accessible access to senior leadership. 

For background, Harris’ and Grossman’s new research comes from the survey of 2,086 employees, conducted over two waves in January 2024. The research finds the biggest driver of burnout (checked out, ambivalent, languishing, quiet quitting) for both employee and manager groups is "a great deal of constant change."

 

Other factors include unnecessary work from senior leadership, employees frequently having to shift focus throughout the day, and high turnover rates that often lead to even more work for those left behind.

 

"These findings are a wake-up call. Clearly, employees are not okay and yet that is often not recognized by senior leadership or the frontline leaders whose job it is to support and engage their teams," explains Grossman.

 

Discover the summary of the research by downloading your complimentary copy here. You will also learn more about what leaders can do to help reduce burnout among their employees.

 

About The Grossman Group

The Grossman Group is an award-winning Chicago-based leadership and communications consultancy focusing on organizational consulting, strategic leadership development, and internal communication.

 

About David Grossman

A leading consultant, speaker, and author, David Grossman ABC, APR, Fellow PRSA, CSP is one of America's foremost authorities on communication and leadership inside organizations. He is Founder and CEO of The Grossman Group, an award-winning Chicago-based leadership and communications consultancy.

 

About The Harris Poll

The Harris Poll is a global public opinion, analytics, and market research consultancy that strives to reveal society's authentic values to inspire leaders to create a better tomorrow. With a global research reach of more than ninety countries, Harris offers advisory services across sectors to world leaders, CEOs, and business decision-makers.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

6 Ways To Seek Feedback To Improve Your Performance In The Workplace

Getting feedback is an important way to improve performance at work. But sometimes, it can be hard to seek out, and even harder to hear.  “Feedback is all around you. Your job is to find it, both through asking directly and observing it,” says David L. Van Rooy, author of the new book,  Trajectory: 7 Career Strategies to Take You From Where You Are to Where You Want to Be . As today's guest post, Van Rooy offers these  six tips for how to get the feedback you need to improve performance at work . Guest Post By David L. Van Rooy 1.       Don’t forget to as k :  One of the biggest mistakes people make is assuming things are going perfectly (until they make a catastrophic mistake). By not asking, you’re missing out on opportunities for deep feedback: the difficult, critical feedback that gives you constructive ways to improve. 2.       Make sure you listen :  Remember, getting fee...

Learn The Extraordinary Power Of Caring For Your People Like Family

“Everybody truly does matter. No idea could be simpler or more powerful. It is an idea that has unlimited potential, because people have unlimited potential—to surprise, delight, and elevate themselves, one another and all around the world,” profess Bob Chapman and Raj Sisodia , authors of the newly expanded 10 th anniversary edition of Everybody Matters: The Extraordinary Power Of Caring For Your People Like Family .   The book’s first edition, premiered in 2015 and has sold more than110,000 copies and is available in seven languages.   This book is about truly human leadership that creates off-the-charts morale, loyalty, creativity, and business performance. It manifests the reality that every single person matters, just like in a family. It’s not a cliché on a mission statement; it’s the bedrock of a company’s success.   “The startling truth, supported by research, is that your leader has a greater impact on your health than your doctor, therapist, or even your par...

Alyssa Freas: 8 Insights On Leadership And Executive Coaching

Alyssa Freas is a pioneer in the field of executive coaching . She is Founder and CEO of Executive Coaching Network® (EXCN) , a global company whose mission is to help organizations achieve results by improving the effectiveness of their executives and their teams. Recently, she answered for me the eight questions I hear the most about leadership, leaders and  executive coaching . Question :  What is the most common leadership challenge you see that executives face? Alyssa :  Executives are challenged by prioritization; that is, getting their work done and having enough time for reflection and rejuvenation. The vast majority of executives today have too many plates spinning and they feel imbalanced. The successful leader of the future will be one who understands how to prioritize in a framework of their company’s vision, values, and strategic objectives and financial results. Executives will always be challenged by the need to focus on building the busines...

How Businesses Hone And Also Avoid Drift

  “Honing, not sharpening is a metaphor for how successful businesses keep their competitive edge,” explain authors Geoff Tuff and Steven Goldbach , authors of the new book, Hone: How Leaders Defy Drift . “Today’s leaders seem to be highly focused on increasingly frequent transformation (akin to knife sharpening), when in fact they would be better served by building daily habits to hone their organization like a chef hones a knife.”   Sharpening : This process restores a dull knife edge by removing material to create a new, sharper edge.   Honing : This process realigns the existing edge of a knife, maintaining its sharpness without removing material.   The book is a call to action for leaders to build the capability and mindset to hone their organizations, minimizing—but not eliminating—the need for transformation.   “Choosing and honing the set of management systems that promote an organization's desired outcomes (and uninstalling them when they are past the...

Discover How Ken Blanchard Changed The Way The World Leads

I would be hard pressed to find a leader, someone who studies leadership, or an aspiring leader who during the past 43 years hasn’t read the iconic and business classic The One Minute Manager (1982) or the updated new addition, The New One Minute Manager (2015).   For decades, these two books, both co-authored by Ken Blanchard and Spencer Johnson , have helped millions achieve more successful professional and personal lives.   Now, in Chapter 9 of the new biography of Ken Blanchard, you’ll discover the story behind the idea and ultimate launch of the original The One Minute Manager .   Chapter 9 is in the insightful and intimate biography, Catch People Doing Things Right , authored by Martha C. Lawrence . In it and through extensive access to personal papers, letters, and interviews spanning six decades, she reveals how Blanchard became a leadership guru and bestselling author of more than 70 books.   Lawrence shares insights and intimate details about Blanchar...

How To Survive And Then Reset To Ultimately Thrive

“Uncertainty is here to stay. Rather than seeing it as an obstacle to overcome, integrate it into your strategic approach to invigorate your high-growth potential and outperform competition under any market condition,” explains Rebecca Homkes , author of the new book, Survive, Reset, Thrive .   “Most books aren’t honest enough about how hard it is to reset ,” adds Homkes. Yet, resetting and leaning into change is essential. “If you are ready to embrace change as a central element of your growth strategy, this book is for you.” Homkes’ book is a timely, comprehensive, and essential read for business leaders looking to take the next step toward ensuring high growth for their companies. The book brings together more than 15 years of Homkes working directly with high-growth companies of all sizes and across a wide variety of industries.   Survive, Reset, Thrive (SRT) is a practical and innovative interconnected three-mode approach :   Survive : Stabilizing ...

10 Quotes From The 5 Levels Of Leadership -- John C. Maxwell

Soon I'll post my full review of John C. Maxwell's latest book, The 5 Levels of Leadership .  In the meantime, here are some of my favorites quotes from the book that I believe should become a must-read book by any workplace/organizational leader: Good leadership isn't about advancing yourself.  It's about advancing your team. Leaders become great, not because of their power, but because of their ability to empower others. Leadership is action, not position. When people feel liked, cared for, included, valued, and trusted, they begin to work together with their leader and each other. If you have integrity with people, you develop trust.  The more trust you develop, the stronger the relationship becomes.  In times of difficulty, relationships are a shelter.  In times of opportunity, they are a launching pad. Good leaders must embrace both care and candor. People buy into the leader, then the vision. Bringing out the best in a person is often a catal...

4 Ways To Make Your Executive Coaching Experience More Successful

If you are a leader already engaging with an executive coach, or contemplating engaging one, here are four ways to make  your coaching experience a success, as reported in a relatively recent issue of Fortune magazine: Find the right match .  Find someone to push and challenge you.  To encourage you and to hold you accountable.  Be sure the person you engage with is a person you can trust and can talk to easily. Be aware of your company's expectations .  If your boss hired the coach to work with you, make sure your boss, and your boss's boss, share their expectations and hoped-for outcomes with you.  Then, make sure your coach knows that those things belong at the top of your goals list. Get your money's worth .  Work with your coach on issues or questions that have a direct correlation to success in your job.  Be sure your coach sees you in action .  Allow your coach to observe you interacting with your peers or dir...

Step-by-Step Guide To Making A Hybrid Workplace Successful

The new book, Thrive With A Hybrid Workplace , provides a way forward to understand the changing world of work, to dispense of old biases, and to establish trust between the enterprise, its leaders, and its employees.   “Our goal is to provide organizations, leaders, and employees with guidance as to how to sort through what feels like a ping-pong argument about whether to embrace a hybrid workplace, explain the authors Felice B. Ekelman, JD and Jullie P. Kantor, PhD .   More specifically, the book will help you:   Understand flexible work options, and how to assess which options are best for your organization. Develop a thoughtful approach to hybrid work that is consistent with your organization’s core values. Identify how to best lead in hybrid work environments with the tools and competence to succeed. Identify pitfalls that may hinder success in implementing hybrid work protocols from both an individual and an enterprise point of view.   Both Ekelman...

How To Be An Inspirational Leader

Today, I bring back one of my most-read blog posts from 2017. It read as follows: At the end of each year, I select my choice for the  best new leadership book  for that year and then highlight that book on my blog. Well, we're only five months into 2017 and there is a new leadership book so good that I can't wait until year-end to share it with you. And it's likely to be among the select few options for best new leadership book of 2017. It's called,  The Inspiration Code , by  Kristi Hedges . Perhaps now more than any other time, the need for inspirational leadership is critical in the workplace. Filled with profound insights and compelling data and based on a commissioned survey on who and what inspires people, Hedges uncovers a set of consistent, learnable behaviors that dramatically enhance leadership success. And shows you  how to inspire those you lead. And, how to energize people every day . Kristi Hedges But, first, what exactly is inspiration? Hedges ex...