Understanding Job Burnout - Dr. Christina Maslach

DOES18 Las Vegas — Burnout is a hot topic in today's workplace, given its high costs for both employees and organizations. What causes this problem? And what can be done about it? Empirical findings show that burnout is largely a function of the social environment in which people work. The key sources lie in 6 critical areas of mismatch between the person and the job. This talk will review major new insights into the causes and effects of this problem, and will discuss the most promising strategies for dealing effectively with it.

Understanding Job Burnout

Dr. Christina Maslach
Professor of Psychology, Emerita
University of California, Berkeley

Dr. Christina Maslach is a Professor of Psychology (Emerita) and a researcher at the Healthy Workplaces Center at the University of California, Berkeley. She received her A.B. from Harvard, and her Ph.D. from Stanford. She is widely recognized as one of the pioneering researchers on job burnout, who has written numerous articles and books, including The Truth About Burnout, and has developed the leading research measure (the Maslach Burnout Inventory). Several of her articles have received awards for their significance and high impact, including her longitudinal research on early burnout predictors, which was honored in 2012 as one of the 50 most outstanding articles published by the top 300 management journals in the world. Recently, she received the 2017 Application of Personality and Social Psychology Award, as well as a lifetime career achievement award for her work on burnout. Christina received national recognition as Professor of the Year by the Carnegie Foundation and The Council for the Advancement and Support of Education. She has been president of the Western Psychological Association, is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and of the European Academy of Occupational Health Psychology, and has received the Berkeley Citation and the Distinguished Teaching Award from U.C. Berkeley.

DOES18 Las Vegas
DOES 2018 US
DevOps Enterprise Summit 2018

[Me]

After 50 years in a career…I still loved the actual work. What burned me out was workplace politics, lack of appreciation or recognition, being expected to do more and more work for less and dishonest bosses.

[nellifedorova]

This is a pretty good description of job burnout. Unfortunately, it doesn't suggest any remedy for people who are already so burnt out that they can't and don't want to work any more either in their current profession or any other, but need to work somewhere in order to support themselves and their families.

[clp]

My philosophy to avoid burn out is simple. I do my best work and do a hard days work within reason. If I fail to meet impossible goals set by my bosses then that’s their problem. Let them fire me I refuse to lose 1 second of sleep over work its just not worth it.

[nudesoftheworld]

Ive been off work for 7 months. I wasnt receiving any help from the health service or my work so I paid for private counselling sessions which were costing upward of 60 pounds a session. I did 5 sessions and learned that my burnout over the past 2 years had triggered depression. I asked work if they could help fund some more sessions and they refused. Work are now scheduling meetings for me to return. I am watching this as I write my resignation. Work isnt supposed to take your life- its supposed to support it. And dont work for organisations that see you as expendable. My depression has settled and now i couldnt give a shit about work. Greener pastures.

[BD-xwdg]

I'm burnout. Badly. The other day I locked myself in the bathroom at work and cried. Too much demand on my sholders. I dont know how to recover from this. People saying well look for another job. How? I'm burnout for any job. I just wish I was rich enough so I dont have to work anymore.

[elle]

I've just resigned from my job because of burnout. The last straw was manager related dispute. I'm beyond caring. That was exactly what I was feeling.

[almulla]

I'm still listening to this after working an extra 2 unpaid overtime hours for the 4th time this week iny car driving home, having to cancel my gym session again because of how tired I am, tearing up listening to her. Hating my life now. Being blamed for how hard it is to get out of bed from my managers. When I explain my mental health, it sounds to them like empty excuses. I'm dying here. No one understands.

[Acts-hwzs]

I wish they would teach you this as soon as you start working. I’m straight of college, working 2 yrs straight and burned out at 25.

[sweetlaughter]

I quit my job 2 years ago due to burnout. I didn't know it at the time. It has taken me 2 years to recover because I didn't know what needed healing. I am so glad I made the right choice.

[SpookMrsSpooky]

I can't like this enough, sharing with some colleagues because we ARE burned out. Vacations are great, but if we have to go back to what we are vacationing from, we are not helped. Only solution is to find another profession. That's where I am right now. This is the best description of burnout I've seen.

[angelocatapang]

from a well oiled machine to being a worn out machine.that's a burnout.

[almulla]

Thinking of sending this to my HR manager and see what happens

[DaisyAruba]

I have scars psychically and mentally from a job I worked for 9 years. The pandemic forced me to leave, and that was a blessing in disguise. I was too afraid to leave on my own. In no way am I saying the pandemic was a good thing to happen. I was insightful of my mental health problems before the pandemic and already diagnosed and on meds for years. It is sad that a pandemic is essential for people to realize the mental health struggles they have and thought were just normal every day problems. And now places are trying to pay soo much more to employees because I hope the wave of paying sh*t and expecting perfect work is BS. I MEAN “employees at will” there is barely anything to protect most people and it causes the lower/middle class to give up on rising higher. Or to die trying or maybe get lucky with a family member (nepotism) or they have a great boss! *I learned so much from awful management that I can be the world’s best damn boss at this point*

[wintrywinter]

This is the clearest, most detailed and most accurate description of burnout i heard so far. And I've listened to a lot to try and understand what i am experiencing.
The worst aspect is the loss of effective cognitive function and starting to not care about a job i loved. My cancer advocacy role is something so worthwhile, so necessary and important, but I've started to not care, to be indifferent, impatient, envious and cynical re those people who are still passionate.
This is not me anymore.
And i desperately want to get back to the energetic, eager, excited person that i was 2 years ago.
I took on too much and not got any help. Worked longer and harder to get stuff done, but never enough.
And not a lot of thank you's.
I now also feel shame that I am failing and thinking i am not the right person for the job.
I can't even think straight any more, let alone have any impressive or coherent conversation with people.
Not sure how to fix it.🙁

[thebanana]

And then post-burnout you reach a point I've reached a few months in: Not giving a single duck. It's a form of nirvana and numbness lol. I'll give a ted talk on it soon ;)

[zaskarclf]

So glad I found this and know I'm not the only one or crazy. Hit 50 this year and I've been feeling this way for the last 5-10 years. And I used to LOVE my job, but realized I could be dead tomorrow and I wouldn't have spent any time watching my kids grow up.
And everything this Dr mentioned about toxic workplace is spot on.

[Ruab]

The problem in America in IT is that you're expected to be available 24/7/365 and always respond within 5 minutes to any single incident.
You're expected to be a constant problem solver for multiple tools, multiple products, multiple platforms. You cannot have the answers to everything every single day of the week, at all hours of the day.
My phone rings at 3am if a server loses ping, I'm now expected to respond to this incident at 3am and be up at 8am to scribe the issue to leadership, if you aren't awake and available by that time to explain what the issue was, no matter what time you got back to sleep you are fucked. Management will think you are a slacker, your performance reviews will suffer.

It's beyond exhausting, not to mention we are not paid hourly.

[linkV]

I had to work in a call centre for 6 months. My friends think I'm joking or exaggerating when I say that I was really close to killing myself. I hated every second of it. I just rode it out until they fired me.
One thing I'm proud to say is that I never made a profit for them. Evil, soulless company.

[GSoFyne]

I suffered burnout so severely I cannot return to work at all. The workload and toxicity were astronomical along with continued loss of control and influence. Things went from bad to worse until my body quit. Every day I felt like I would have a heart attack or stroke until my doctor pulled me out. I was so so sick I can not ever work again.

[MelindaLongoria]

I am NOT surprised that customer service is on this list. .... kind of crying right now. There is so much truth in your message.