Äripäev Personnel news. Helen Haava: Burnout often happens to employees with a high need for achievement.
One of Rikardia’s founders, Helen Haava, acknowledges that increased sensitivity to stress or reduced resilience may be caused by previous traumatic experiences. She believes that while trauma-related experiences can increase an individual’s likelihood of burnout, organizations have the greatest ability to prevent burnout for all their employees.
Burnout has five phases
Helen has her own experiences with burnout. In her twenties, she was a chief accountant who, at one point, also took on a regional role in the company. Since there was a lot of work and learning took time, her workdays were long, and she often worked on weekends as well.
She describes that in the first phase of burnout, everything was great – she was riding the wave of positive stress, extremely passionate and excited. The work was interesting, and she was highly motivated.
In the second phase, a need for achievement and workaholism developed. Stress turned negative, and sleep disorders appeared.
In the third phase, carelessness and memory problems emerged, and she was constantly tired.
In the fourth phase, her self-esteem dropped, her immune system weakened, and she experienced numbness, pessimism, and became slow.
In the fifth phase, she was extremely exhausted and could only think about staying at home (she was expecting her first child at the time), and every small work effort was overwhelming. Fortunately, Helen stayed home and had two children. For her, the desire to return to work reappeared only after three years.
Helen says that burnout often happens to employees with a high need for achievement or to people who want to make a difference in society, who believe they can do everything, and are passionate and thorough in their work. However, when the expected results do not follow, passion turns into disappointment.
The most common work environment-related causes are:
Overload: People who feel they have too much work, family responsibilities, and too little time to do it may lose motivation and interest in their work or life.
Poor work environment: An unpleasant work environment, problems with colleagues or management, lack of support, recognition, or resources. If a person has no say, they do not feel secure, which creates a feeling of powerlessness.
Constant changes in work arrangements: Constantly adapting to new demands and conditions can cause stress and uncertainty.
Constantly changing work schedules: Disrupts personal life planning and increases stress levels.
Inadequate employee onboarding program: If a person is not sufficiently trained for their job and has to learn “on the fly,” it generally results in low self-confidence, low motivation, higher risk of mistakes, and resulting tensions in the team.
Emotionally exhausting work: May include positions where employees encounter stressful situations or people who need emotional support.
High number of high-risk or difficult cases: For example, medical staff in intensive care units.
Work-life imbalance: If a person cannot maintain a balance between work and personal life, it can lead to burnout. It does not matter whether overwork is the person’s conscious choice or dictated by job demands.
Serious consequences for mistakes: Jobs where employees’ decisions or actions can lead to serious consequences.
