Staff burnout refers to extreme work stress that the employees go through. It has serious implications such as reduced productivity, task delays, and depleted morale. Burnout spreads like fire amongst your employees. If you are not careful, it can wipe out your entire team.
Employees are the most integral asset when it comes to running a stable business, especially in uncertain times. To avoid wide-scale burnout, you must get ahead, know the root causes, and try to mitigate the problem.
Employee burnout is the major reason why many businesses lose fresh talent every year. It is your responsibility, as a leader and employer to dedicate yourself to your employees’ well-being. Here are 12 proven tips to avoid employee burnout:
Make your habit to collect feedback regularly on one-on-one meetings. A direct report of an employee’s behavior helps to build a stronger employee-employer relationship. Collecting feedback allows one to share how they feel at work. They can discuss the challenges as well as the burden on them at the workplace.
If you have a telecommuting team (people working remotely), schedule a video meeting so you can speak face-to-face. This ensures that you speak face-to-face with them and stay on the same page when it comes to workplace challenges.
It is a two-way approach where you too, can give constructive feedback to improve their roles at work. Constructive appreciation and criticism impact employee engagement positively. In fact, nearly 70% of employees love getting constructive feedback from their employers. It helps them to improve their efforts.
On the contrary, only 24% of employees would find work somewhere else if they ever receive inadequate feedback from their employers.
The emotional tolls/breakdowns of the employees cost nearly $190 billion each year in the United States. It is challenging for every person to maintain a work/life balance. We are always plugged in the office lives. It is harder for remote workers to schedule their routines as the office and home hours might overlap.
Encourage your employees to take all the wellness benefits that you offer in the package. Not only does it make you a responsible employer but also enhances the company’s culture. Lack of mental stability has a direct impact on productivity. Ask your employees to have mental getaways now and then.
Some employees hesitate to take a rest during the day or even have lunch. They fear falling behind their colleagues. Encourage your employees to participate in interactive activities. Activities just for fun offer a great reprieve from the daily stress of work.
For instance, if your team is meeting the client you have been chasing for 5 years, your employees can meditate and relax. The breathing mantras and exercising to relax the chakras often help to alleviate stress.
Moreover, it is best to incorporate wellness activities as it gives a message that it is okay for everyone to take a little break. Acting serious or critical throughout the day is not a supportive environment. It could cost you millions.
Unattainable goals demotivate the employees and decrease productivity drastically. If an employee feels like he is constantly missing the mark, it will shatter his self-confidence. He would end up doing the worst.
The goals set by the employer should always be attainable, measurable, progressive, and flexible. You cannot always expect an employee with less two years of experience to nail a project management plan.
You must change the targets and key performance indicators to teach a new approach to the employees. As employees progress in their roles, one must always be there to cheer them.
A better onboarding process improves employee engagement by 53%. You need to provide the employee with all the necessary tools and resources to thrive. If you want your employees to succeed in all the objectives, you must invest in and take pride in their work.
Help the recruits to understand your company’s culture, values, and beliefs. Doing so will build an immediate connection between new and old employees. If you have a remote team, do not forget to work on a virtual onboarding process.
Offer your employees the freedom to choose their work. The autonomous environment helps them to maintain the work/life balance. Even the employees need to balance the work and home life, so, a little consideration never hurts anybody.
You must help them customize their schedules. For instance, if the employee feels more productive in the afternoon, you can reschedule his hours and avoid burnout.
Sometimes, leaving the processes for technology avoid burnouts too. For instance, if an engineer creates the same blueprint for every machine, save his time by putting it to default. This way they can modify and complete their work early.
Employees are dedicated if they love what they do. Give them the autonomy to choose their tasks. For instance, if a software engineer likes to develop games rather than editing codes, so be it. Allow them to work on the projects that come under their area of interest.
Initiating interactive and social activities plays a great role in maintaining your company culture. It helps your team to build into a collective unit. At the end of the day, it is the laughter and fun that reduces the work stress. Plan team meetings, lunch, and happy hours to infuse positivity among the employees.
Rewarding or incentivizing is common in the sales team because it keeps the workers motivated to do better than before. Offering incentives does not only motivate but also helps the employees to take pride in what they do.
It is the factor you can control to avoid burnout. Do not leave your employees unmanaged or with more than 2 tasks. This will overburden them and the overall performance of the team will suffer badly. Try to distribute the duties evenly and monitor how each employee reacts to added jobs.
Stress builds up as employees face consecutive workdays. Yes, there are two days to cool them off but they need a break in-between to release stress and regain work energy. Planning a domestic trip or even a lunch near the beach can decrease the chances of burnout.
Avoiding burnout comes to one point and that is, to listen to your employees. They feel more confident, productive, and successful if you are there, as an employer to appreciate them. Furthermore, you should always look out for burnout signs and take immediate action to mitigate the problem.
If you are feeling overwhelmed by the sheer amount of IT-related work you have to get done in a day or even a week, Inventive IT could have a solution that could work for you. Whether it is consulting on IT best practices and technologies you need to implement to streamline your workflow or agile project delivery, we can help you to relieve extra stress on your team so they focus on what they do best.
