Category Archives: Burnout
Burned Out? It Might Be Time to Look at Your Goals (IO Psychology)
Topic: Burnout, Stress, Goals
Publication: Journal of Applied Social Psychology
Article: The 2×2 model of goal orientation and burnout: The role of approach-avoidance dimensions in predicting burnout
Authors: Naidoo, L. J., DeCriscio, A., Bily, H., Manipella, A., Ryan, M., & Youdim, J.
Reviewer: Neil Morelli
There have been times when we’ve all felt a little burned out from work. When we feel burned out the usual suspects are situational factors like the job, occupation, organizational characteristics, leadership, and individual differences. But there is one variable that has typically been ignored in the literature—our motivational dispositions, or in other words, our goals.
Burnout is typically defined as having three components: emotional exhaustion, cynicism, and reduced personal efficacy. Dispositional preferences, or our goal orientation for certain kinds of goals may, be linked to burnout because burnout is often viewed as environmental or work demands getting in the way of achieving our personal goals.
Naidoo et al. suggested thinking of goal orientation as being broken down into a 2×2 table. On the one side is mastery-orientation, the people who think they can improve and often set goals that are challenging or developmental; and performance-orientation, the people who think ability is fixed so they set goals that are attainable and not as challenging. The other side of the table is approach versus avoidance, or striving toward a goal out of anticipating its positive outcomes, or out of avoiding negative outcomes associated with failing to attain it.
Naidoo et al. gathered student responses to questions regarding goal pursuit and burnout measurement. Using structural modeling, the authors found that avoidance goal orientations were positively related to the three aspects of burnout and approach goal orientations were negatively related.
In light of conservation of resources theory, these findings suggest that people with avoidant goal orientations are more sensitive to resource loss (not reaching goals) and less likely to seek help when they fail. Whereas those with approach goal orientations may be more resilient to burnout inducing conditions.
What does all this mean? The authors suggest that to help reduce burnout, organizations and leaders that help the goals of their employees become more mastery-approach oriented could help them become more resilient to stressful conditions when it isn’t realistic to change the situation. This is a prudent suggestion for any leader who can help define goals for their team members or who can help determine the cultural norms of goal setting.
human resource management, organizational industrial psychology, organizational management
Keeping Your Hottest Performers From Burning Out (Human Resource Management)
Topic: Burnout
Publication: Academy of Management Review (JUL 2012)
Article: Catching Falling Stars: A Human Resource Response to Social Capital’s Detrimental Effect of Information Overload on Star Employees
Authors: James B. Oldroyd and Shad S. Morris
Reviewer: Susan Rosengarten
Every organization has its “star employees”—those people whose performance seems to outshine the rest. People are drawn to star performers because of their great importance within their firms and thus stars tend to have more social capital than the average employee. Through their interconnected webs of contacts and connections, stars gain access to more information than average employees, which can be overwhelming. Furthermore, information overload can negatively impact star employees’ performance and can make them less likely to share valuable information with other employees, ultimately hurting their organization’s bottom line. Even worse, frustrated stars who feel inundated by information requests may feel the need to leave for firms with less demanding environments.
So how do HR professionals prevent star employees from “burning out” and “overloading?” Well, one possible remedy is to increase star performers’ information processing abilities by providing them with varied work experiences and projects. This enables stars to better perceive and pick up on subtle informational cues and acquire more knowledge, which stars will then pass along to others. Furthermore, stars should allocate specific times to checking email, voicemail and texts, and then spend the rest of their time focusing on work, uninterrupted.
HR professionals can also lessen their stars’ loads by using technology to share information. For example, a company’s intranet can house a catalogue of “lessons learned” written by star performers so that employees can easily access and apply them when needed, without having to reach out to their star performers directly. Finally, if organizations really want to keep stars from being bombarded by informational requests, they should consider providing them with support staff, or “gatekeepers,” who can monitor and prioritize their flow of information requests.
human resource management, organizational industrial psychology, organizational management
Work Out at Work: Avoid Worry and Worthlessness (IO Psychology)
Topic: Burnout
Publication: Journal of Applied Psychology (2012)
Article: Job burnout and depression: Unraveling their temporal relationship and considering the role of physical activity
Authors: Toker, S., & Biron, M.
Reviewed by: Larry Martinez
Feeling stressed? Tired? Depressed? Burnt out at your job? Conventional wisdom would suggest that you need more sleep or at least a more tranquil environment. However, research by Toker and Biron (2012) would suggest a very different and somewhat more surprising prescription: physical exercise.
In their article, the authors define depression as “global psychological dysfunction” and burnout as “chronic, job-specific strain;” two characteristics that are hypothesized to feed off of one another in a downward negativity spiral over time. It works like this: if you continually experience a lot of stress at your job that becomes unmanageable, this stress is likely to manifest itself in other parts of your life, often as depressive symptoms (e.g., insomnia, lack of energy). At the same time, depression is defined by a lack of interest or motivation in general, which can certainly have implications for one’s perceived workload, contributing to burn out. This is exactly what the researchers found, in a large study that tracked more than 1,600 individuals for an average of about 3 years. Their findings? Employees who reported an increase in burnout in the first phase of the study also reported an increase in depression in the second part, and vice versa.
These results are (literally and figuratively) depressing. However, as I suggested earlier, there is hope and it doesn’t involve a prescription or negative side-effects. This study also found that physical exercise (anything that increases your heart rate and breaks a sweat) stops the depression-burnout relation in its tracks. Those who exercised very little were the most likely to fall victim to the negativity spiral and those who exercised frequently experienced virtually no relationship between burnout and depression over time. This makes sense because physical exercise can 1) distract employees from their work duties, 2) increase feelings of self-efficacy, self-worth, and body image, 3) give employees a chance to recover from negative events at work, and 4) increase the resiliency to psychological stressors. In fact, physical exercise releases endorphins (natural mood enhancers) and research has shown that regularly stressing the body through exercise makes people better able to withstand psychological stresses.
So, if you’re feeling overwhelmed, it might not hurt to try scheduling time for exercise. Too often we take care of other obligations before taking care of ourselves. In the long run, this research suggests that routine maintenance of one’s psychological well-being (through exercise) can help you avoid more major negative consequences. Organizations are already offering gym memberships, extra time for exercise, and other health-related perks. Take advantage today!
human resource management, organizational industrial psychology, organizational management
Can Mindfulness Make Your High Potentials Higher Promise? (IO Psychology)
Topic: Burnout, Leadership, Talent Management
Publication: The Industrial-Organizational Psychologist (JAN 2012)
Article: Accelerating the Development and Mitigating Derailment of High Potentials Through Mindfulness Training
Authors: R.A. Lee
Reviewed By: Chelsea Rowe
High Potential employees (HiPos) are the highly sought after, cream of the crop, high performing, next generation leaders. Senior management proactively seeks these stars and then sends them through numerous assessments, coaching, special training, and other rigorous developmental opportunities with the intention of producing a bigger, better, faster, stronger next generation of leadership for their company. Despite confidence and extra investment in these HiPos’ promise, these shining stars often fail to live up to their fabled promise or worse: burnt out. So how can companies increase the likelihood of retaining their stars and develop them without burning them out?
Some researchers are pointing to something called mindfulness. Andy Lee (2012) describes mindfulness as “being fully present and aware of what is going on right now.” Lee ascribes three primary components of mindfulness: 1) present focus – thinking about the here and now, not the past or future, 2) awareness – actively monitoring one’s own thoughts and emotions and, 3) non-judgment – keeping an open mind, allowing one to see things for how they are (without evaluating value). Lee (2012) suggests that developing one’s mindfulness leads to improved personal well-being (also related to increased commitment and reduced turnover intentions) and social functioning. Additionally, increased mindfulness may serve to prevent irrational decision making, lessen the need to defend one’s ego, lead to greater empathy, stress relief, and improved mood.
Sounds great! Now what does mindfulness training look like? Mindfulness is a more widely used concept in the therapeutic setting – only recently is it making its way into the workplace. While Lee says there are no current standards or best practices for this form of development yet, some companies have already developed mindfulness training programs. Quality programs will measure an aforementioned outcome (e.g., improving employee well-being). They will involve some form of coaching and consistent advice towards developing mindfulness, and apply mindfulness principles to work-related challenges. Value is may also be added by working to specifically identify one’s biases, values, and priorities. Lee (2012) emphasizes the importance of patience – mindfulness does not happen over night.
Lee (2012) says that mindfulness training as a HiPo development tool produces several work-related benefits. Because it improves one’s capacity to take in and consider information about the current moment, mindfulness training may hasten learning during challenging and stressful situations. Additionally, mindfulness may help to abate risk of derailment. These are meaningful outcomes for retaining top quality talent and developing a strong succession plan. Who couldn’t benefit from a little stress relief these days?
human resource management, organizational industrial psychology, organizational management
When It Comes to Employee Health, More than an ‘Apple a Day’ is Needed (IO Psychology)
Topic: Health & Safety, Organizational Justice, Fairness, Burnout, Stress
Publication: Journal of Applied Psychology (2012)
Article: Perceived Unfairness and Employee Health: A Meta-Analytic Integration
Authors: Robbins, Jordan M.; Ford, Michael T.; Tetrick, Lois E.
Reviewed By: Lauren A. Wood, M.S.
Practitioners and employers alike have expressed concern around the effects of poor employee heath. When employees are not well, the organization can not only incurs costs due to direct medical expenses, but can also pay for poor employee health in the form of absenteeism, decreased productivity and moral, and even turnover.
Recent research has linked employee perceptions of organizational unfairness to employee health. There are four ways in which perceptions of unfairness are thought to be experienced. These are through feelings of distributive injustice (i.e., fairness of outcomes of decisions), procedural injustice (i.e., fairness of the process of the decisions), interactional injustice (i.e., fairness of the exchanges between individuals in the organization), and psychological contract breach (i.e., failure of the organization to live up to the expectations of the employee).
In general, perceived organizational unfairness was found to be associated with poor employee health indicators such as mental health conditions, physical health conditions, and number of absences. Moreover, unfairness was most strongly related to more proximal health indicators such as employee feelings of burnout, negative mood, and job related stress.
Additionally, the four types of unfairness were related to different health related indicators. For instance, procedural justice was more strongly related to physical health problem, while distributive justice was more predictive of mental health issues. Psychological contract breach was most strongly associated with employee perceptions of burnout. Of the four, interactional justice was the least predictive of the health indicators.
What can be done to promote employee health and well-being in the workplace?Well, one good thing is that perceptions of fairness are malleable aspects of the workplace, meaning that organizations have a great deal of control managing fairness (and unfairness) perceptions. To increase feeling of distributive justice, organizations should strive to make policies with outcomes that are the same for all employees regardless of gender, race, and tenure. While, increasing perceptions of procedural justice can be accomplished by insuring that decision-making processes treat all employees equally. Finally, to increase perceptions of a sturdy psychological contract, openly and clearly communicate to employees, provide them with information, direction, and support in times of change, and treat employees with respect.
source for picture: http://www.freedigitalphotos.net/images/Fruit_g104-Fresh_Apple_p36862.html
Possible intervention to reduce employee absenteeism (Human Resource Management)
Topic: Burnout
Publication: Consulting Psychology Journal: Practice and Research (2011)
Article: EAP utilization patterns and employee absenteeism: Results of an empirical, 3-year longitudinal study in a National Canadian Retail Corporation
Authors: Ashley Spetch, Alex Howland, and Rodney L. Lowman
Reviewed By: Scott Charles Sitrin, M.A.
If time is money, how do corporations reduce the amount of time that their employees miss from work, and in turn, make more money? In addressing this line of inquiry, Spetch, Howland, and Lowman investigated the relationship between the utilization of the employee assistance program (EAP) and absenteeism over a three-year period. In using an archival data set of EAP use by the 3,448 employees of a national Canadian company, it was found that those who utilized EAP services were absent more during they year that they sought assistance and had rates of absenteeism equal to those who did not seek services during the preceding and following years.
One explanation of this finding is that EAP services reduced absenteeism of employees who were struggling with personal, family, and work-related issues. During the year that the employees were struggling with these stressors, they were not able to attend work as much. After receiving EAP services, they were better able to cope with the various stresses of their lives and attend work on a more regular basis.
If EAP services are able to reduce employee absenteeism, businesses should take notice and provide adequate EAP services in order to ensure the mental health of their employees and the most possible revenue for the company.
human resource management, organizational industrial psychology, organizational management
Does Your Brain Get Tired? (IO Psychology)
Topic: Burnout
Publication: Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (MAY 2008)
Article: Making Choices Impairs Subsequent Self-Control: A Limited-Resource Account of Decision Making, Self-Regulation, and Active Initiative
Authors: Kathleen D. Vohs, Roy F. Baumeister, Brandon J. Schmeichel, Jean M. Twenge, Noelle M. Nelson, and Dianne M. Tice
Reviewed By: Scott Charles Sitrin
Does decision-making impair subsequent self-discipline? In other words, after you decide if you want to read this review or not, will you no longer be able to resist the glazed donut in the office kitchen? Though some previous research has shown that making decisions can be exhausting, little research had explained why.
In their study, the investigators found that the more choices people made, the less self-discipline they had. Specifically, as the number of decisions increased, the ability to pursue goal-directed action, perform tasks such as math problems, and persevere decreased. In explaining the results, the investigators said that, similar to physical energy, individuals have a limited amount of mental energy. As mental energy gets depleted by decision-making, there is less energy to perform other mental tasks such as self-discipline.
These results suggest that in order to prevent burnout, the limits of mental energy and capacity should be recognized. Just as a coach does not want to over train an athlete, a boss should not over train an employee.
human resource management, organizational industrial psychology, organizational management
Predicting Burnout: Playing Well With Others Can Go a Long Way!
Topic: Burnout, Engagement
Publication: Journal of Vocational Behavior (SUMMER 2011)
Article: Social strategies during university studies predict early career work burnout and engagement: 18-year longitudinal study
Authors: Salmela-Aro, K., Tolvanen, A., Nurmi, J. E.
Reviewed by: Larry Martinez
Sure, there are days when we just don’t want to go to work. In these times, the very thought of going in to the office can make one cringe…we feel like we need a long, isolated vacation. In short, we’re burned out. This is a big problem for companies, who rely on employees to be actively engaged and energetic at work. However, it may be that some people are more or less intrinsically susceptible to burnout and disengagement at work. That is, some people just have burnout-prone personality characteristics and thus may be unwise investments for employers. Wouldn’t it be nice if we could figure out who these people are likely to be? Salmela-Aro and her colleagues (2011) address this issue directly.
These authors followed 292 university students through their academic and subsequent careers (sometimes for as long as 18 years) to find personality characteristics that might predict burnout and disengagement. Specifically, they found that social strategies used during college were indicators of later reported levels of burnout and engagement. Social strategies include the extent to which someone is positively (optimism) or negatively (pessimism) inclined to value and approach social relationships. So, if you have an optimistic social orientation, you are likely to 1) build relationships with coworkers who can act as resources, 2) ask for help when problems arise, and 3) have support from others when the going gets tough. The opposite would be true for someone with a pessimistic (avoidant) social orientation.
Stop Burnout, Increase Engagement & Improve Safety…by Providing Supportive Environment?
Topic: Health and Safety, Motivation, Human Resources
Publication: Journal of Applied Psychology (JAN 2011)
Article: Safety at Work: A Meta-analytic Investigation of the Link Between Job Demands, Job Resources, Burnout, Engagement, and Safety Outcomes
Authors: Jennifer D. Nahrgang, Frederick P. Morgeson, David A. Hofmann
Reviewed by: Mary Alice Crowe-Taylor
These days, the workplace is generally quite demanding! This study used a meta-analysis approach, with 203 independent samples, to assess how detrimental job demands are, and how helpful job resources are, in terms of burnout, engagement and safety outcomes. These researchers wanted to know how well the job demand-resources theory (JD-R) by Bakker & Demerouti (2007) explains these relationships.
According to this analysis, pretty well actually! The model that best fit the data supported the JD-R’s theoretical links between job demands-health impairment-burnout-negative safety outcomes. Burnout was harmful to safe work practices! It also supported the theory’s links between job resources-motivation-engagement-positive safety outcomes. Engaged employees are motivated to work safely.
Job demands included variables like job complexity, role overload, cognitively challenging work, physical demands, and risks and hazards. Draining to employees both physically and psychologically, these result in burnout, health impairments, and a greater number of unsafe outcomes, as this study showed. Only the variable “physical demands” was not related to burnout or engagement.
Emotionally exhausted? Are you working the night shift?
Topic: Burnout
Publication: Journal of Business and Psychology (WINTER 2010)
Article: Emotional exhaustion among employees without social or client contact: the key role of nonstandard work schedules
Authors: J. L. S. Wittmer, J.E. Martin
Reviewed By: Rebecca Eckart
With close to 40% of Americans now working nonstandard schedules (part-time and full-time), defined as shifts outside the normal Monday through Friday day time schedule, there is an ever pressing necessity for managers to understand the needs of these employees. One area of recent exploration around nonstandard schedules is burnout. Emotional exhaustion, a core component of burnout, is typified by a general lack of energy, tiredness, fatigue, and frustration. New findings suggest that working a nonstandard shift (i.e., night time or evening) can further exacerbate the factors leading to emotional exhaustion.
Wittmer and Martin (2010) report that employees on the night shift suffer from significantly higher emotional exhaustion than either the employees on the day or evening shifts. These researchers speculate that night shift workers experience high job demands (e.g., role conflict, unfavorable working conditions) and also have significantly lower resources (e.g., higher work-family conflict) than day or evening shift employees. It is also interesting to note that this study used employees that had little to no contact with customers and little contact with coworkers. Does this sound like your workforce?
