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Half of Workers Around the World Are Struggling with Burnout

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Re: Half of Workers Around the World Are Struggling with Burnout

#71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In either case, the purpose of what you are doing is earning a salary to pay your bills. Workers would do well to always keep it in mind.

If the only purpose of your life truly is to pay bills, that would cause anyone to burn out.

Nah. You cab find happiness and purpose elsewhere. From family to hobbies.

Work is merely a means to an end.

Re: Half of Workers Around the World Are Struggling with Burnout

#72
"11,000 desk-based and frontline workers"

Software? Devs? Sales? Accountants?

This seems like pretty broad category.

But also, if such a broad category is having burnout, across countries and cultures, then maybe that is indicating some larger problems?

Re: Half of Workers Around the World Are Struggling with Burnout

#73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In either case, the purpose of what you are doing is earning a salary to pay your bills. Workers would do well to always keep it in mind.

That sounds a lot like "The peasants should know their place".

Much to the opposite. The ruling class always want excuses to pay workers less. "Purpose" is one such bullshit.

Re: Half of Workers Around the World Are Struggling with Burnout

#74
post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ac actual academic career is the WORST in terms of burn-out. I was writing paper reviews at 4am. People I know who are professors board planes with a pile of papers to read or review. Midnight meetings to discuss conference organization. Add in the pressure of publish or perish.

I second that academia can be terrible for burnout. In an experimental subject, experiments that can take months to prepare can fail for reasons that you can't do much about, and all you can do is start over. I used to describe this feeling to my wife as if sometimes someone would come along from time to time and wipe your hard drive. Even though my current job can be a grind, at least we rarely have to just throw aw…

I sometimes tell my team that writing software is about learning what to write and how to write it, not the actual artifacts. So throwing code out is not bad, it is just part of the process of learning.

Re: Half of Workers Around the World Are Struggling with Burnout

#75

Most people don't have "fulfilling" jobs. They have a paycheck. A very small percentage of Americans, let alone those around the world, have the privilege of analyzing how their job makes them feel. I get paid great money to play with computers. My father was an elementary school janitor.

I think Office Space summed up the problem nicely: "Peter Gibbons: The thing is, Bob, it's not that I'm lazy, it's that I just don't care. Bob Porter: Don't... don't care? Peter Gibbons: It's a problem of motivation, all right? Now if I work my ass off and Initech ships a few extra units, I don't see another dime; so where's the motivation? And here's something else, Bob: I have eight different bosses right now. Bob…

> Peter Gibbons: Eight, Bob. So that means that when I make a mistake, I have eight different people coming by to tell me about it. That's my only real motivation is not to be hassled; that, and the fear of losing my job. But you know, Bob, that will only make someone work just hard enough not to get fired."

This is literally my company. 8 bosses - all of who spending their entire existence in monitoring and PIPing engineers instead of using their authority to deliver constructive outcomes for the business.

There is zero growth mentality among them (except headcount growth for their empires). Can't even imagine how to steer their org to produce value.

Why the f will a IC care more about the success of the business than the 8 destructive bosses above them?

Re: Half of Workers Around the World Are Struggling with Burnout

#76
Something that I've noticed is that as a programmer what I make either works or it doesn't. Either my code compiles and passes the tests or it doesn't. However, I don't have control over the factors that facilitate working code (tech debt, reasonable deadlines, good architecture, etc.).

So it's the worst of both worlds. I have a lot of responsibility but very little power.

Compare this to someone in a soft skill role who may have to deal with kafkaesque bureaucracy but at least it is difficult to objectively measure their results. Or a blue collar worker who is just expected to put in their hours and effort.

Re: Half of Workers Around the World Are Struggling with Burnout

#77

Most people don't have "fulfilling" jobs. They have a paycheck. A very small percentage of Americans, let alone those around the world, have the privilege of analyzing how their job makes them feel. I get paid great money to play with computers. My father was an elementary school janitor.

I think Office Space summed up the problem nicely: "Peter Gibbons: The thing is, Bob, it's not that I'm lazy, it's that I just don't care. Bob Porter: Don't... don't care? Peter Gibbons: It's a problem of motivation, all right? Now if I work my ass off and Initech ships a few extra units, I don't see another dime; so where's the motivation? And here's something else, Bob: I have eight different bosses right now. Bob…

The lack of "another dime" when you work extra is also something that prevents most people from going above and beyond. If there's nothing else out there, why would you care?

Working with my wife now to get her to start a business so we can keep my salary to pay the bills but focus on the business so our effort can have a meaningful impact on the bottom line.

Re: Half of Workers Around the World Are Struggling with Burnout

#78

I have no doubt that BCG will be more than happy to help anyone troubled by the implications of this "research" with an "engagement" to study and reduce burnout in their organization. For a nominal fee of course. I have even less doubt that said engagement would not lead to more fulfilled employees given that the MBB consulting cargo cult has arguably given us the modern corporate culture that leads to such prevalent…

What does MBB mean in this context?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Three_(management_consul...

Re: Half of Workers Around the World Are Struggling with Burnout

#79

Most people don't have "fulfilling" jobs. They have a paycheck. A very small percentage of Americans, let alone those around the world, have the privilege of analyzing how their job makes them feel. I get paid great money to play with computers. My father was an elementary school janitor.

I would say even most computer jobs aren’t fulfilling. It’s always funny when companies want to almost bully employees into caring about their “mission”. Maybe if you’re flying to Mars, the mission is genuinely exciting. But it’s hard to care about some database tech or payments or ads or whatever in the same way. And yet people pretend because if they don’t it may negatively affect their job.

Re: Half of Workers Around the World Are Struggling with Burnout

#80

I have no doubt that BCG will be more than happy to help anyone troubled by the implications of this "research" with an "engagement" to study and reduce burnout in their organization. For a nominal fee of course. I have even less doubt that said engagement would not lead to more fulfilled employees given that the MBB consulting cargo cult has arguably given us the modern corporate culture that leads to such prevalent…

What does MBB mean in this context?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Three_(management_consulta...
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