Feeling emotionally drained at work? Is your patience exhausted? Your energy low? If so, you’re showing clinical markers of burnout.
And you’re not alone. In a January 2024 mental health survey conducted by NAMI, more than half of all managers (54%) indicated that they had felt burned out during the past year because of their job. Among employees of all levels, 36% said their mental health had suffered due to work demands. Even folks in the C-suite are heading for the exits.
No one ever said leadership was easy. But in recent years, as with so many jobs, being a leader has, in fact, become harder. Leaders rush from meeting to meeting feeling like lunchroom attendants for an unruly junior high. With exponentially escalating business complexity; diminished civility; and intrusive, pervasive technological interruptions, you may feel like it’s barely possible to keep order, let alone lead employees on an inspiring journey.
We wear a lot of hats as leaders: cheerleader, detective, strategic general, and human being. It’s OK to say that your head feels heavy. Acknowledging the strain is the first step toward holding our heads a little higher.
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By Melissa Swift / MIT Sloan Business Management
