Overworked, burnout, stress & anxiety…

What are you doing about it?

Health, wellbeing, energy management – these all seem to be an unconscious focus emerging in 2022. I’m repeatedly hearing messages of burnout, overworked, stress and anxiety. So what’s contributing to it and what can we do about it? What are you doing about it?

A few of the common themes I see in organizations contributing to this exhaustion are the following:

1. Reacting to the urgent versus responding to the important. This happens when we are understaffed, don’t have a transparent plan and are saying yes to everything. One of my most frequent sayings is “Just because you can doesn’t mean you should.”

What are the topmost important priorities and objectives in your organization this quarter? Have they been clearly communicated to everyone? Can you measure their success? 

2. Inability to delegate. As leaders, we all understand the principle of “teach a man to fish”, yet many leaders still want control and final say. What tasks are you currently doing that you could delegate to someone else? Don’t have anyone to delegate to? Go back and visit point #1. What are you saying yes to that might not fit a key priority right now?

What tasks could be delegated? What other resources might you consider that could help with delegation and efficiency…even if they are only temporary?

3. Not taking proper time off and unplugging. Technology has allowed us to be constantly on. Even when we don’t want to be on, our brains somehow find a way for us to check in on that ‘just one thing’. Employees are not taking time off…because there wasn’t really anywhere for them to go, or there’s just too much work to do. Stressed employees doing more work does not bode well for productivity.

Holiday audit check: Who has used their vacation time and who hasn’t? Time to get your people fully unplugging so that they can come back refreshed, energized and resourceful. 

Here at Better Your Best, Q2 is about putting your health and planning as a top priority. A core value for us is that we support our clients to be at their best to do their best work. Join us next week to hear from a dear friend and mentor Dr. Larry Ohlhauser as he talks about taking your leadership from Success to Significance.

Then, join us next month for our book club meeting. We are reading The Stress Code by Richard Sutton. I first met Richard when he was working with my husband Rik on tour. A fellow South African he went on to advise many top athletes, Olympic teams and international sporting federations.

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