“Burnout is not merely a measure of hours worked, but a reflection of the connection we feel to our purpose; when our work aligns with our passions, we find resilience even in the face of relentless demands.”

Key Insight: A clear sense of shared purpose within a team can significantly alleviate burnout by providing direction, drive, and resilience, ultimately enhancing productivity and engagement.

Food for Thought: 

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In today’s work environments, change is the only constant and many of us are struggling to keep up.

Burnout is becoming more widespread, particularly since the pandemic. And while the end-stages of burnout are well known and recognized, the earlier phases tend to fly a little more under the radar and get mistaken for skepticism and general negativity.

These kinds of attitudes among your team members can sabotage projects and undercut performance. That’s why a clear sense of shared purpose — both as a group and individually can be one of the best antidotes.

While purpose won’t cure burnout, there is increasing evidence to show that it lifts people up, giving them drive, resilience and perseverance in the face of ongoing change.

Catching It Early In Your Teams

Emotional fatigue is one of the classic signs of burnout. You may then start to see signs of increasing cynicism and detachment in your team members. Pay attention to people growing increasingly apathetic toward their jobs, coworkers, and obligations.

According to the work of leading psychologists, when people are in the early stages of burnout, a process begins where disengagement leads to feelings of inadequacy, which in turn lead to a sense of being less successful or effective. And this can snowball quickly, having a really destructive effect on both the individual and the organization as a whole.

Why This Matters

It’s fairly obvious from both an individual perspective that burn out can have a seriously deleterious impact for individuals. But leaders often underestimate the impact it can have on the broader team.

I often say to leaders that the person with the biggest context in the room always wins. Another way of saying this is that the person who is most committed to the way they are showing up is the one who will dictate how the rest of the room shows up.

If the person with the strongest context is inspired, connected to their purpose, passionate and operating in what I call their zone of leadership excellence (ZLE)–the space where your personal purpose intersects with that of the organization as a whole–then the rest of the team will show up in a similar way. But if the person with the strongest context is negative, skeptical and disengaged, then that attitude will spread across the rest of the team like a virus.

Productivity, performance, retention and more all suffer. And this happens quickly. Much more quickly than most leaders believe.

As the person facing burnout struggles to balance the demands of their work with their decreasing mental (and possibly physical) health, then absenteeism increases. One or two sick days taken here or there do not tend to overly impact co-workers. But when a colleague is starting to be off-work regularly, then the rest of the team has to step up. And that can breed resentment and become a trigger of burnout in other team members.

And, finally, while there has been much debate about Conscious Quitting, one of the trends behind this phenomenon is younger team members choosing to prioritize their own health and well-being because they feel their employer will not. If your team does not have faith that you have their back then they really have no reason to stay and work for you.

How Purpose Alleviates Burnout

Purpose is a powerful tool to include in your toolbox. Not the only one, by any means, but a pretty effective one.

Why? A well-defined sense of purpose helps shield people from burnout by giving people direction, drive, and resilience in the face of seemingly endless challenges. Purpose-driven people are more likely to find fulfillment in their work and be satisfied, engaged, and well-off at work.

There is one thing I’ve observed about burnout which makes me believe that purpose is really important here. Burnout is not — in my experience — just about the number of hours worked. It is actually more about the state of mind and relationship to the work itself.

Now, for sure, if you’re working 85 hour weeks for months on end with no break then you’re clearly increasing your risk. But I’ve seen leaders put in hard slogs and still feel lit up, energized and passionate about what they are doing, just as I’ve seen others find it increasingly hard to just do the bare minimum to keep up.

As a result, I have come to believe that the level of connection that you feel to your purpose, and then the way that purpose lines up with your work, are both significant contributors to a propensity to burnout.

Three Things To Do to Prevent Burnout

If you are a leader in an environment where change is relentless (and who isn’t?!), it’s becoming increasingly important to do three things:

Firstly, give your team members the opportunity to get clear on their purpose (if they are not already). Programs like our Purpose-Driven Leadership Journey exist to do just that, creating spaces for team members to figure out what is “calling them”. You also want to help them identify their Superpowers — the three or four areas where they truly excel and which align naturally with their purpose.

Secondly, as part of your ongoing employee evaluation processes, work proactively to align your team members’ purposes with their job descriptions. This may involve shifting some things around — workflows may change, and roles may even evolve.

Thirdly, ensure every team member is clear on their zone of leadership excellence, or where their purpose intersects with that of the organization. This will be a unique space for each person. And this of course precludes the fact that your organization is clear on its purpose. 

If you happen to be among the many at risk of burnout at work, or the leader of a team that wants to learn more, I’m hosting a free webinar this Wednesday, May 22 at Noon EST.

And you can register right here.

If you can’t attend the webinar and want to talk more about how burnout is affecting your team and how bringing a more purpose-driven approach to your team could help build resiliency, performance and profitability/impact — please reach out.