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Burnout: 'Sick and tired of feeling sick and tired'

bbc.co.uk

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Re: Burnout: 'Sick and tired of feeling sick and tired'

#71

Post by astura »

Insanity wrote: post #22
lvturner wrote: post #4

I think the scariest thing about burn-out, is that not everyone is financially able to take the recommended time off to recover - what then? I've certainly been close to being in this boat, had to take a job before I fully recovered, so took one I felt might be a bit lighter on the load and still give me some chance of recovery. Pleased to report it has been mostly successful.

Depends where you are - in many European countries you'll get paid during medical leave (and you'll get medical leave for burnout) plus companies won't fire you.

Many US companies provide white collar employees short term disability insurance for medical leave. You'd need an actual medical diagnosis though, "burnout" isn't one. You'd probably also need to be going to some sort of regular treatment during your leave for a doctor to sign off on a disability claim.

Re: Burnout: 'Sick and tired of feeling sick and tired'

#72

Post by P_I_Staker »

sneak wrote: post #35
epicgiga wrote: post #14

A lot of companies are actively factoring this into their HR model. Their model is to hire fresh people and burn them out. Increasingly this is the direction western corporations are moving. Their ideal model is: place performance quotas above long term sustainability, people then burn themselves out, you then fire them for performance reasons, and you have them on an aggressive noncompete and threaten them with it w…

Slavery is not voluntary, and any individual job is. They are absolutely not comparable. You can always quit and go home. It is insane to compare the two. This is an inaccurate comparison with an agenda.

I agree that the comparison is horrible, but I have to disagree with you also. My job is not voluntary. Within a relatively short period of time, I could go broke without it (and I have pretty robust savings). I may not be a paycheck away from homelessness, due to my cushy job, but a few months and/or an emergency or two... It could get really bad, quick.

Losing employment is perilous for your career. It looks bad to get fired, take time off, or suddenly quit. Then there's the reality that the next job might not be much better. If every job treats you the same, you don't really have a choice. I can't just change my profession on a dime either. This is basically "if you don't like your country, you can just get out" logic... it doesn't work that way in the real world.

EDIT: Added a word. Also, I want to reiterate that I agree regarding the insanity of the slavery comparison.

Re: Burnout: 'Sick and tired of feeling sick and tired'

#73

Post by apocalyptic0n3 »

whywhywhywhy wrote: post #51

Just gonna say it, I doubt the solution is yet more apps on the device that is the real source of anxiety. Putting the thing in airplane mode and leaving it in a different room when you get home is going to do you way more good than staring into your phone and swiping away at more apps.

I've been doing this recently and I do feel like it has helped. Get home, phone goes on the counter in vibrate mode, and I go into another room to relax. I don't check the phone until after dinner usually, which is usually about 3 hours later. Disconnecting for a bit every day has helped with the stress a good amount

Re: Burnout: 'Sick and tired of feeling sick and tired'

#74

Post by thrower123 »

novaRom wrote: post #41
tsukurimashou wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> companies that expect people to work this hard are almost exclusively very well paying entry level jobs wasn't my experience at all, I did get "well paid jobs" in startups, but in the end, combining 3 jobs in one and doing 80 hours a week isn't worth it even if your salary looks pretty high.

How and why someone will work 80 hours a week? Don't they have families, friends, sport, or a hobby? Why is it necessary?

No, because these kinds of places suck the blood out of people in their early 20s. Usually after they have moved to a new area and left behind all their social connections.

When you're 25 and have no ties and no responsibilities, working 12-15 hours a day isn't the impossibility that it is when you are 35 and have a wife, kids, your own house, and social obligations.

Re: Burnout: 'Sick and tired of feeling sick and tired'

#75

Post by bryanrasmussen »

mistermann wrote: post #70
Impossible wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ok torture them into submission then. Still significantly worse than burning someone out in a modern corporate job.

In history, was torture a preferred approach compared to treating them relatively well, considering the absurd circumstances?

Read Huckelberry Finn, Jim was treated relatively well, however his family was sold away from him, he did not get to see his wife or daughter because it was valuable to the Widow to sell them. Finally he was going to be sold anyway, to somewhere where he would have the high probability of not being treated relatively well. To be treated relatively well as a slave was a living hell, or as it is generally called, slavery.

Damn, I suppose now someone is going to complain about long working hours meaning you never get to see your family anyway.

Re: Burnout: 'Sick and tired of feeling sick and tired'

#76

Post by thrower123 »

throwlaplace wrote: post #68
lvturner wrote: post #4

I think the scariest thing about burn-out, is that not everyone is financially able to take the recommended time off to recover - what then? I've certainly been close to being in this boat, had to take a job before I fully recovered, so took one I felt might be a bit lighter on the load and still give me some chance of recovery. Pleased to report it has been mostly successful.

99% of the world has a job they can't afford to take leave from. and if you imagine that 99% of the world doesn't have a job that's taxing enough that they'd be burnt out then you don't understand menial labor and how utterly psychologically exhausting it is to do repetitive boring tasks. So what then? People suffer and struggle and try to improve the lives of their children and then they die. I say all this not beca…

Mindless repetitive tasks are just fine. You don't have to think about what you're doing, so you are free to let your mind wander to better places. I've done this sort of thing for years, I know what I'm talking about.

Mental labor is crushing.

Re: Burnout: 'Sick and tired of feeling sick and tired'

#77

Post by [deleted] »

epicgiga wrote: post #14

A lot of companies are actively factoring this into their HR model. Their model is to hire fresh people and burn them out. Increasingly this is the direction western corporations are moving. Their ideal model is: place performance quotas above long term sustainability, people then burn themselves out, you then fire them for performance reasons, and you have them on an aggressive noncompete and threaten them with it w…

[deleted]

Re: Burnout: 'Sick and tired of feeling sick and tired'

#78

Post by gdubs »

epicgiga wrote: post #14

A lot of companies are actively factoring this into their HR model. Their model is to hire fresh people and burn them out. Increasingly this is the direction western corporations are moving. Their ideal model is: place performance quotas above long term sustainability, people then burn themselves out, you then fire them for performance reasons, and you have them on an aggressive noncompete and threaten them with it w…

Yikes, have we come so far from slavery that people have completely forgotten how atrocious it is?

To your other points, one could simply say that as a society we need to move away from short-termism and the dogma of maximizing shareholder value.

Re: Burnout: 'Sick and tired of feeling sick and tired'

#79

Post by leftyted »

epicgiga wrote: post #14

A lot of companies are actively factoring this into their HR model. Their model is to hire fresh people and burn them out. Increasingly this is the direction western corporations are moving. Their ideal model is: place performance quotas above long term sustainability, people then burn themselves out, you then fire them for performance reasons, and you have them on an aggressive noncompete and threaten them with it w…

There is a difference between being a slave i.e. being owned and being a "wage slave" i.e. operating under significant coercion. We are all coerced to some degree; that's part of being an organism (coerced by nature) and living in a society (coerced by the crushing weight of social interactions). But we aren't owned.

Though it's not your intention, this blurring of categories justifies real slavery. If everyone is a slave then no one is a slave. If "bourgeois freedom" is an illusion then every kind of repression can be justified by the claim that it will bring about "real freedom".

Actually, the freedoms that we have are real and they matter.

Re: Burnout: 'Sick and tired of feeling sick and tired'

#80

Post by jamisteven »

One's career isnt always the sole reason for burnout, many times one's workload is totally fine, but combined with their work commute, family and other outside influences, they become burned out. We need to take a holistic look at burnout and not just attribute it to career.
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