Editor’s note: This article was first published in May 2013. The references to the economic crisis and to having a job being “a blessing” reflect the situation in Spain in 2013.
Although there is still no official scientific study on it, job burnout is the biggest challenge facing the global health system, and stress-related symptoms are expected to get worse as work becomes more global and competitive.
When someone starts to burn out at work, there can be many reasons: too much overtime (which can backfire, lowering productivity and leading to chronic stress), working conditions, the atmosphere at work, and so on. At that point it is time to start asking some questions, both as a company and as an employee. If you experience any of the following symptoms, you may be heading for job burnout, and it is worth reconsidering your work-life balance, even knowing that with the crisis this is no time to be walking away from jobs.
1. You find it hard to concentrate
Chronic physical and mental exhaustion can lead to various cognitive problems, the most common being an inability to concentrate, pay attention or remember things.
David Ballard of the American Psychological Association says our brains are only designed to handle stress for short periods, so when stress is present all the time we can develop chronic stress, and stress is one of the greatest ills affecting the population.
2. You feel there is always much more to do
Even though you spend more hours at work than you should, you feel that you ought to work even more. According to a study by the University of Zaragoza, people with this symptom tend to be frantic, overly involved and ambitious types who sacrifice their personal lives and their health for their jobs, especially when they are fighting for a promotion. If the promotion is slow to come, or they never see a reward for their sacrifice, they could end up suffering from some kind of mental disorder.
(Read: 10 signs that you, or anyone at your company, could be a psychopath)
3. Feelings of guilt
You are working all the time but not getting the results you want, perhaps because you have too much work or the work itself is too heavy. This makes you feel guilty, so you end up working even more. You enter a vicious circle in which you devote more and more time to work, but your hours become less and less productive.
4. You are physically and emotionally exhausted all the time
Stress can wear us out in every way. Our vitality can vanish and give way to constant tiredness. Over time, chronic stress can lead to other health problems, such as digestive problems, heart disease, depression…
5. Your mood keeps changing
Physical and mental exhaustion can lead to emotional exhaustion and a loss of our sense of humour. We simply feel bad, and that makes our temper more and more “explosive” with our loved ones, while at the same time we become more docile at work. In the case of leaders, when they are mentally exhausted they may take it out on their team, developing what in Granada we call malafollá (the famously grumpy, sharp-tongued manner locals joke about) 🙂
6. Social isolation
When people burn out, they tend to withdraw from social relationships. They feel a growing need to stay at home and stop doing the things they used to do with their friends. Add to this the physical and mental exhaustion that keeps us longer in bed or on the sofa, even when we can’t sleep… Watch out for this one! It could be the first step towards depression. Get out of there quickly.
7. Your health gets worse
Edwin R. Shirley, a professor of psychiatry at Case Western Reserve University, says that when you have neither the energy nor the interest to face your working day, because of tiredness, mental exhaustion or chronic stress, the immune system starts to suffer, opening the door to illness. Tiredness will make you arrive late to work more and more often after “a bad night”, and at the same time you will call in sick or put things off at work more often.
8. You can’t sleep
Despite the tiredness and exhaustion, when bedtime comes you can’t fall asleep. Insomnia tends to appear when our heads are full of worries, and lack of sleep will gradually leave us in worse and worse health.
9. You are drinking more and more
Sometimes drinking appears as a way to escape stress or problems at work, so we drink more and more and the problems keep growing. That is how the worst addiction problems begin. Remember the old saying: “If you drink to forget your sorrows, you may end up a sorry drunk.”
10. You are burned out
I think we all know when something is not right. We don’t feel fulfilled, we feel depressed, and we have already recognised many of the points above. Just ask yourself two questions:
- Am I burned out? The answer is simple, yes or no, although bearing in mind that 90% of the population (there is no official study) is not happy with the life they lead, ask yourself a second question.
- If I changed jobs, would I stop being burned out? Given that having a job these days is a blessing you have to hold on to tightly, the truth is that when we are putting our health at stake for our work, we need to think about what we should do to feel more fulfilled.
Companies should sometimes pay more attention to the occupational health they offer their staff. I don’t think the term productivity is being used correctly in companies: productivity does not mean that your company will do better with fewer employees working longer hours. That may happen in the short term, but in the long term we are undermining our competitiveness as a business.
Since a company’s health depends on the health of its workers, a company where everyone is burned out will soon fall unless it changes its policies and works to keep its staff motivated.
Further reading
Featured image: Franck Michel, CC BY 2.0, via Flickr.
