Burnout In the Workplace

Speaker 1 Good day to my listeners. My name is Jennifer white. I am a communication studies major at Loyola, Marymount University with a double minor in French and dance. I have worked in food service and Retail and have an interest in how organizations can cultivate positive workplace environments for their employees, so that they Speaker 2 continue to be Speaker 1 hard-working motivated and enjoy that work. Today, I'll be discussing how employees can structure themselves. So that the corporate culture that follows does not lead to burnout, burnout is caused by stressors in an environment that create a strain on the Speaker 2 individual. According to researcher, Katherine Miller Speaker 1 burnout can lead to negative psychological physiological, and organizational outcomes. I'll describe a few ways in which burnout can occur and then Speaker 2 how it can be Speaker 1 avoided. Lee. I will compare the notion of positive Speaker 2 corporate corporate culture with my Speaker 1 own personal experience working for GAP Incorporated during my time working at Gap, I worked as a retail sales associate at Banana Republic and Athleta which are both owned by Gap and had very different experiences on the job and with the management and corporate culture This podcast is for employees or managers who want to learn how to develop Speaker 2 positive work environment in Speaker 1 order to advocate for themselves to structure their own organizations, positively for their employees and thus their own success. Avoiding burnout is extremely important. Burnout is caused by environmental factors that are difficult for an individual to deal with. And those factors include will ambiguity life events and work home. Speaker 2 It can cause employees to feel emotional Speaker 1 exhaustion depersonalization and a decreased sense of personal Speaker 2 accomplishment, studies, such as the work Speaker 1 of Muslim in 1982 which are based on the work of freudenberg er who first coined the term burnout in 1974, Speaker 2 show that individuals who experience burnout began to see themselves as failures and began Speaker 1 expecting the worst from their company, and their co-workers or clients. Speaker 2 According to Miller and contributors in research in 1982, burned-out workers often have lower levels of commitment as they become disenchanted, with the stressful Speaker 1 Organization for occupation. On Speaker 2 the other hand, Speaker 1 individuals who don't develop, burnout experience a higher commitment to their jobs, which in turn makes them more productive and successful organization. Speaker 2 It is extremely important for you. If you are an employee to Speaker 1 understand what a positive corporate Looks like so that you can take Speaker 2 that knowledge and advocate for Speaker 1 yourself in your own workplace environment. Additionally, if you're CEO a manager or director within an organization, it is actually up to you to organize in a way that supports both your employees and your success. Thank you for listening today, let's get started. First, I'll just ask us how Corporate culture developed Speaker 2 positively can avoid causing Speaker 1 burnout. there are two ways in which communication can impact Brown, if workplaces adopt and pathetic, contagion, which is an effective response in which an observer experiences emotions, parallel to those of another than they are more likely to see burnout in individuals and that it concern, however, is a communication approach Speaker 2 and an effective response Speaker 1 in which an observer has a non parallel, emotional response to that of another Speaker 2 companies, that Focus It's on empathetic concern in their communication. Find higher job Speaker 1 satisfaction in comparison with an emotional contagion approach, which tends to cause Speaker 2 burnout according to Miller and colleagues in 1988 empathetic concern, enhanced communicative responsiveness or as emotional contagion in decreased responsiveness and communicatively, responsive workers were less likely to Speaker 1 experience. Burnout, if burnout is already occurring, there are three individual and Organizational, strategies researchers propose to cope with it. Firstly, there Speaker 2 is problem-centered coping which according to folkman, and colleagues in 1986 involves dealing directly with the causes of Speaker 1 burner. For example, if an individual experiences burnout from too large of a workload, a problem centered approach would include decreasing that workload. Next, there is appraisal centered coping which involves changing the way one thinks about the stressful situation. For example, if a Place required employees to work from home during covid-19 and employees experience burnout from that lack of home. Work balance, a company might approach the issue of working from home with A New Perspective by regularly communicating that it is for everyone's safety and that it is temporary. Lastly there is an emotion centered coving which deals with the negative outcomes of burnout such as relaxation techniques or addressing health concerns associated. There is also communicative coping which involves participation in decision-making and different kinds of Speaker 3 social support. Speaker 2 If you are in a leadership position and have the ability to create Speaker 1 corporate culture Speaker 2 here is how you can communicate in ways that do not cause burnout for your employees, and even yourself, communicate and teach workers with empathetic concern, rather than empathetic contagion. So that they are empathetic without taking on the emotional burden of work, if you're in a position, And closer to Speaker 1 the employee side, you can advocate for yourself. If you feel that your organization does not structure itself in a way that creates success for you and the organizational purpose, Speaker 2 go to your supervisors and communicate what can be Speaker 1 done argue with your supervisors. That burnout is important Speaker 2 for them to address because it impacts organizational success. Speaker 1 According to Speaker 2 participation in decision-making or PDM Theory PDF can improve Speaker 1 both worker satisfaction and productivity through enhanced information flow and the satisfaction of workers higher order needs when I worked at Banana Republic which like Athleta is owned by GAP Incorporated and majorly influenced by the Gap. Corporate culture, I noticed that very few of the employees including store, managers had a lot of control over decision-making. The model of communication was top down from corporate and the stores had to operate entirely as they were told. It didn't work there very Speaker 2 Long as it Speaker 1 was a summer position. But I could picture myself getting bored and unmotivated quickly and I could see that employees would work there for years. Came to work to get paid rather than out of job satisfaction at the time. I didn't think much advocate for change because it was temporary Speaker 2 for me. And I didn't realize what needed to change Speaker 1 when I worked at Athleta. However, I had a somewhat different experience and started to notice the negative ways in which GAP Speaker 2 Incorporated organized, its corporate offices, Has, I also noticed the ways in which I've led a leadership made changes to its own processes, so that athletic employees were taken care of, in ways, that Gap had not taken consideration up at Athleta. Employees, were frequently asked, what could be made better about. Not only the products be sold, but Speaker 1 also the organizational culture. Speaker 2 We actually were asked to give feedback to corporate Speaker 1 offices, every month, about product feel and functionality, as well as our own experience on the Speaker 2 job. And with training a sales, Yes, the team leadership was much more empathetic to Speaker 1 each individual and cultivated a motivated fun and communicative work experience. My experience of athletic corporate culture, which had more organizational freedom from GAP Incorporated than Banana Republic was far more positive because I didn't experience met as many of the stressors that cause burnout having worked at both Athleta and Banana Republic, which are both owned and partially operated by Gap. I can attest to the experience of burnout in retail, and the ways, in which it can be Speaker 2 prevented by facilitating a healthy Speaker 1 corporate culture. In today's podcast, I discussed one burnout with Within corporate culture is how it occurs, how it can be avoided, and then I compared my personal experience, with positive and negative attributes to corporate organization. Again, this episode is relevant to both Speaker 2 employees and managers are Speaker 1 leaders as both have the ability to curate, a positive, corporate culture Speaker 2 and avoid burnout. Thank you again for listening and I hope Speaker 1 you can use this information to have an impact on your work experience. Wherever is that you work?