Surviving Burnout (2015)
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Surviving Burnout (2015)
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Re: Surviving Burnout (2015)
#2A harrowing tale and I'm thankful the author made it through alright, but I have to fundamentally disagree with one possible takeaway from this:
Her solution to burnout was to _start her own business_?? I'm glad this worked out for her in the end, but holy shit this would be the literal last possible thing I (or I hope many others) would consider as a solution to burnout. That's a _fast track_ to burnout.
Re: Surviving Burnout (2015)
#3A harrowing tale and I'm thankful the author made it through alright, but I have to fundamentally disagree with one possible takeaway from this: Her solution to burnout was to _start her own business_?? I'm glad this worked out for her in the end, but holy shit this would be the literal last possible thing I (or I hope many others) would consider as a solution to burnout. That's a _fast track_ to burnout.
Maybe. Starting a business does involve the classic “now you have all of your customers as bosses instead of just one boss” but it also unlocks much more autonomy and frees you from the loss of agency that the author felt in their corporate role.
Re: Surviving Burnout (2015)
#4[deleted]
Re: Surviving Burnout (2015)
#5A harrowing tale and I'm thankful the author made it through alright, but I have to fundamentally disagree with one possible takeaway from this: Her solution to burnout was to _start her own business_?? I'm glad this worked out for her in the end, but holy shit this would be the literal last possible thing I (or I hope many others) would consider as a solution to burnout. That's a _fast track_ to burnout.
Maybe. Starting a business does involve the classic “now you have all of your customers as bosses instead of just one boss” but it also unlocks much more autonomy and frees you from the loss of agency that the author felt in their corporate role.
Cool, I have zero bosses at my business!
Re: Surviving Burnout (2015)
#6A harrowing tale and I'm thankful the author made it through alright, but I have to fundamentally disagree with one possible takeaway from this: Her solution to burnout was to _start her own business_?? I'm glad this worked out for her in the end, but holy shit this would be the literal last possible thing I (or I hope many others) would consider as a solution to burnout. That's a _fast track_ to burnout.
Yeah, I’d say it depends on why you burn out. Some folks burn out from caring too much with too little input over the outcome. Maslow’s hierarchy and all that jazz would indicate starting a business might be a reasonable alternative.
I know for myself I’ve been in business for a couple of years with a full-time job and I love my business infinitely more than I could ever care about someone else’s. Once it grows to the point of sustaining my family, I’ll have “made it” by my own estimate.
But I do agree. It’s certainly not a cure-all, and largely depends on your personality and the unique reason you burned out.
Re: Surviving Burnout (2015)
#7A harrowing tale and I'm thankful the author made it through alright, but I have to fundamentally disagree with one possible takeaway from this: Her solution to burnout was to _start her own business_?? I'm glad this worked out for her in the end, but holy shit this would be the literal last possible thing I (or I hope many others) would consider as a solution to burnout. That's a _fast track_ to burnout.
Depends on the business. Some are definitely an extreme version of “caring about the results of our actions but having no meaningful control over those outcomes” but some are very different.
Re: Surviving Burnout (2015)
#8>> caring about the results of our actions but having no meaningful control over those outcomes
This really dies sum it up in a useful generic way. Ultimately the balance of this sentence will differ from context to context, but the equation ultimately has to balance.
Put another way, if you care a lot, but have no agency, then ultimately you will be frustrated.
If you care a lot, but have no resources, then again, you get frustrated.
Burnout is just the moment whe you stop fruitlessly caring. But you -want- to care (about something) so not-caring leads to depression.
Matching your care to resources available is a good start. Make sure you care about something that can be materially affected by your resources. Feeling under-resourced is a sign that those allocating the resources have different goals to you.
If your care exceeds your agency in resources product direction, code quality, then you can choose to care less, (find something else to care about), align your caring to match those who do have agency, or move on.
Starting your own business gives you agency, so you're free to allocate resources as you choose. However you still need to aquire those resources (which in turn can change what you care about.)
Starting and running your own business is enormously freeing - it gives you complete agency. But its also HARD. People don't pay you for what -you- care about, they pay you for what -they- care about. Its very hard to find customers who appreciate your priorities, and it's also hard to adjust your priorities (aka what you care -about-) to match theirs.
But if you get it right, it's amazing.
Re: Surviving Burnout (2015)
#9A harrowing tale and I'm thankful the author made it through alright, but I have to fundamentally disagree with one possible takeaway from this: Her solution to burnout was to _start her own business_?? I'm glad this worked out for her in the end, but holy shit this would be the literal last possible thing I (or I hope many others) would consider as a solution to burnout. That's a _fast track_ to burnout.
[deleted]
Re: Surviving Burnout (2015)
#10Does anyone have an advice for those who stay employed by a megacorp? I’m on a vacation this week and have just realized that I was effectively in isolation outside of my work.