Kristen Knowles is Director of People and Culture at ²ÝÝ®ÊÓƵÔÚÏß. For the last decade, she has coached leaders all around the world about leadership and organizational development, curating culture, and how to become better leaders in the workplace and at home. Her award-winning programs are recognized as some of the best leadership development and coaching programs in the world. She now uses her expertise to help empower the team at ²ÝÝ®ÊÓƵÔÚÏß to lead and live from a place of purpose.

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At ²ÝÝ®ÊÓƵÔÚÏß, mental health and wellbeing are really important to us. We want every member of the team to feel safe and supported at work. This Mental Health Awareness Month I wanted to address a topic that deeply impacts mental health in the workplace: burnout.

In a study conducted from 2020 to 2021, over 87% of people said they were experiencing some level of burnout. Out of that 87%, over 90% said it started before COVID. What’s fascinating about this is that early on in the pandemic, most people got vast amounts of time back. Our calendars freed up, agendas paused, and deadlines got extended. This should have provided us with a chance to catch our breath and reset.

However, that’s not the case. People are reporting that stress has greatly increased over the last couple of years.

The pandemic has handed us a unique opportunity to explore our relationship with burnout and resilience.

It’s a hot topic because it is so common. I often think of burnout as work cancer. It starts in one place, and over time it slowly spreads into more areas:

• Your projects

• Your co-workers

• Your relationship with your manager

• Your energy levels

• Your ideas and problem solving

• Your focus and motivation

• Your mental health

• Your physical health

• Your family and relationships

Eventually, it takes over. You might think you can manage it while you figure out how to make a change. But quickly, and almost silently, it starts to creep into your personal life. Before you know it, you’re unhappy at work and taking it out on your friends and family, and start looking for things to numb the unhappiness. This is where the signs of extreme burnout start to show up and our mental health is at risk.

Lots of people speculate about what causes burnout, but I’ve spent a good portion of my career researching and studying it. Through my interviews and research, what I’ve come to find is one of the leading causes is disconnection from purpose.

Independent research and consultancy firm, , has been performing research for over 60 years by conducting assessments in the area of motivation and unique work style. What they found is when we work outside of our inborn personal traits around our motivation style, we can only adequately perform for about six months before our performance drops or we burnout. So much of our motivation is tied to our purpose, so it is no surprise that disconnection from purpose accelerates and causes burnout.

We are not meant to live outside of our purpose or out of alignment with our strengths, values, and motivation. And the result isn’t just unfulfillment in our work. Burnout has also been linked to physical and mental health problems. Not only does our health suffer, but research shows that our relationships suffer too — leading to higher divorce rates and reports of isolation and loneliness.

There’s a misconception that people can still perform well, in spite of experiencing burnout. However, all of these issues are linked back to poor performance, missing goals, and increased turnover. Combating burnout is essential for high performance, self-motivation, and overall success. To do this, we have to address both the cultural issues that may be causing employee burnout and develop burnout resilience within ourselves.

Here are some ways to develop resilience and combat burnout:

1. Shift your mindset. For centuries, stoics have understood the secret of resilience and the incredible power that it holds. But resilience isn’t the ability to be optimistic in every situation. A psychologist who worked with war survivors explained resilience like this: People with resilience often experience great amounts of trauma and deep painful emotions. Resilience is what helps them to not just face difficult situations but accept them and navigate through them successfully. One of the main ways to work on developing greater resilience is to develop a growth mindset. The two are very deeply connected. A growth mindset is not ignoring struggles or painting them with rose-colored glasses. Instead, it allows us to accept them and grow from them.

2. Reconnect to your purpose. Purpose is deeply etched inside who you are, your mindset, and your values. Those who live intentionally from that place report higher levels of satisfaction and happiness in their work and personal life. The thing that holds most people back is they think something has to shift in their life in order for this to happen, but the reality is that you can start doing this without anything in your present circumstance changing. In fact, doing this often helps the places that are out of alignment with your purpose start to shift and you start to see change happen naturally, without forcing anything. Take steps to rediscover and make decisions from your purpose.

3. Set boundaries and respect them, for yourself and others. We can not let our drive to be successful cause us to bankrupt the other areas of our life. We have to realize that setting healthy boundaries benefits both our work and our personal life. Create a culture within your team that sets and respects boundaries.

4. Stop reacting and start responding. One of the biggest causes of stress is that we are programmed to react. When something stressful happens our adrenaline kicks in and we go into fire-fighting mode. The problem is that we rarely make the best choices in those moments, which causes a bigger mess to clean up later. A simple way to combat hyper-stress and develop resilience is to train yourself to pause in those moments. Give yourself permission to weigh your decisions carefully. Consider all the sides, the ripple effects of each decision, and how those involved will be impacted. Then respond, don’t react.

5. Acknowledge what’s happening and talk to others. Experts stress that acknowledging your burnout level is key in terms of effectively addressing it. Taking 5-to-10-minute ‘recovery breaks’ for stress relief throughout the day and talking to loved ones about how you’re feeling is a good starting point.

The industry we work in is at high-risk for employee burnout. More than ever, it’s vital to consciously address the cause of burnout and recognize when we are on the path toward it. Here are a few ways we are taking steps to help address it and promote overall wellbeing at ²ÝÝ®ÊÓƵÔÚÏß.

• Holding regular 1:1s with leaders and informal check-ins by a member of the People & Culture team to coach employees and help address challenges at work, before they become a deeper issue.

• Encouraging taking time off by providing flexible and generous PTO to our employees.

• Flexible working — hybrid and work-from-home arrangements.

• Encouraging employees to step away when they need it and take mental health days.

• Team building gatherings to promote belonging and connection.

• Investing in diversity and inclusion training to address signs of bias and discrimination, so we can create a safe and inclusive work environment.

We’re always looking for ways to improve our workplace culture and promote health and safety, the work is never done. We cannot eliminate stress in our work or lives, but we can learn how to have a healthy relationship with stress and prioritize health — both physical and mental — in the workplace.