Employee burnout saps productivity and fuels absenteeism, and causes an organization’s top performers to leave the business. Employee burnout is a widespread problem for businesses and no industry is immune from it. Here are the common causes of burn out and what you can do to combat them.
Unfair compensation
One of the leading causes of burnout is the result of underpaying an employee. Employees work for money. Employers that are not paying their staff competitively, or in line with the industry standard will cause negative feelings in their employees. Company culture and exciting perks do not pay their bills. Competitive pay can save you in the long run. Replacement costs for an employee can reach as high as 50 to 60 percent of an employee’s annual salary, while the total cost associated with turnover can vary from 60 to 200 percent of their annual salary. If you are unsure of the industry standards, consider hiring an outside consultant to review workers’ pay levels to ensure employees are compensated competitively.
Unreasonable workloads
Managers should pay close attention to make sure employees aren’t overworked. Even the most industrious worker in the world will burnout if they receive ever-increasing amounts of work. Employees that feel they’re unable to get all their work done each week will end up burned out, and hopeless. Prevent your employees from burning out by maintaining reasonable workloads. It is important that employees also have all the tools, resources, and technologies they need to do their jobs the right way.
Micromanaging employees
The last thing an adult who’s skilled and educated wants is for their boss to manage every aspect of their job. You hired your qualified employees to do a specific job. Let them do it. Let your workers operate as autonomously as possible. So long as they are doing their jobs well, do you really need to look over their shoulders constantly?
Toxic culture
People want to feel that their managers and co-workers are supportive. Toxic managers and co-workers see talented staff as threats. Toxic managers can actively try to thwart the efforts of their subordinates. This leads them to play the blame game when errors occur, or take credit when things go well. Burnout is enviable if employees are under bad management, or subjected to bullying, and ridicule. Make clear that this behavior won’t be tolerated.
Lack growth potential
Employees that feel they have no way to move forward will be stifled by their environment, and burnout. Personal growth and development are a crucial element of what your organization can offer to any employee, and the benefits extend in every direction. Your top talent will leave for better opportunities. It’s not due to a lack of loyalty, and it’s not their fault. Many times, when employees leave they are looking at the future career potential of a new position and the skills they will gain from that position.
Most important factor to combatting burnout is a commitment to being proactive. You will help prevent burnout in your business and avoid turnover and undermining employee engagement initiatives for years to come. Burnout cannot be completely eradicated from the workforce, but it can be drastically mitigated so that it only touches the smallest portion of employees.
