Why is everyone so burned out by work? A personal investigation

At the urging of my boss (the CEO of Private Media), HR department, and GP, I had last week off work, sick.

The doctor’s medical certificate said I had a medical condition and would be “unfit for work”. I definitely felt that way. For more than a month I had been struggling with my sleep.

Chatting to me in the weeks before my absence my boss had spotted the signs of what is described in catch-all terms as “burnout”. 

According to the World Health Organization, burnout is chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully managed: more than 60% of Australian employees reported feelings of burnout according to the latest data.

Mental health and wellbeing support network Beyond Blue says burnout can result from too much stress at work: “burnout is a combination of feeling exhausted. Feeling negative about (or less connected to) the work you’re doing. And a feeling of reduced performance”.

I have been editing SmartCompany since October 2022. Like any job, it’s a journey, but I mostly love it!

Aussie workers are in poorer physical and mental health since the pandemic across all ages and stages. And prime-aged workers between 25 and 55 – so my editorial team at SmartCompany and I — are reporting the greatest burnout.

Our publication’s mission is to “fight for, champion and scrutinise SMEs and startups”. 

As part of an ongoing series addressing the future of work, today we are devoting an entire issue to burnout: what it is, how it is affecting employees, and what companies can do to support workers hitting the wall.

What does work-related burnout look like?

For a month or so before my enforced break last week, I had been battling insomnia – averaging significantly less than five hours of sleep a night – a condition I had no experience with historically.

I had no problem falling asleep – I was typically absolutely knackered – but woke up after two or three sleep cycles with my head spinning about the challenges of the day. Last week, in my first session with a psychologist to help address my sleep (and the stress causing it), I described this sensation as “spinning plates”.   

My plates are mostly – but not solely – work-related. Cost of living pressures and the wonderful challenges of relocating to rural Tasmania are also factors. But work is the major contributor. When you have a never-ending to-do list, and have spent your professional life seeking to achieve inbox zero, 2am isn’t a great time to be awake with adrenaline and cortisol levels spiking. 

According to Dr Marny Lishman, psychologist and author of Burnout to Brilliant, “burnout is a psychological syndrome emerging from a prolonged response to chronic stressors in the context of a person’s life”. 

“It’s a state of mental, emotional and physical exhaustion that has emerged because of an individual’s stress response in their nervous system being continually on alert as though they are constantly under threat.” 

Private Media’s employee value proposition (EVP) says our business strives to support “a healthy work-life balance”. And while no company is perfect, the actions of my colleagues in recent weeks, both in the leadership team and my editorial and commercial colleagues on SmartCompany, show this to be true. 

Every industry is doing it tough right now, and the media is no exception. According to media analyst Tim Burrowes from Unmade, “the last week of June was the most brutal week since the end of the 2012 financial year, with the biggest cuts ever seen at Seven and Nine”. There were big cuts at News Corp too, and last week Nine axed youth-focused Pedestrian’s CEO and closed a suite of sites, with major job losses.

Macroeconomic and structural forces are swirling, with media catching a perfect storm of shrinking advertising revenue, declining traffic – as Google moves away from referrals to “zero-click search” and Meta exits news entirely – and the looming existential crisis of generative AI eating everyone’s breakfast, lunch and dinner. 

It’s enough to keep anyone in publishing awake at night. I know I’m not alone.

How should SME and startup owners and operators cope with burnout?

As a co-owner and former operator of local news startup *PS Media, I have recently experienced the pressures of running my own business, and while I am not a co-owner or shareholder of Private Media, publisher of SmartCompany, I have an owner’s mindset.

Running a business at any time is tough, but doing so during a cost-of-living crisis, at the most challenging (non-Covid related) time for the Australian economy in three decades is uniquely so, with businesses in most sectors under immense pressure.

“Many small business owners who reach out to us for support are overwhelmed and their business can be really struggling,” says Dr Luke Martin, clinical psychologist and Beyond Blue spokesperson.

“Many small business owners can find it difficult to separate their work from their personal lives, running the risk of their work overtaking their life, which can easily lead to burnout. They run the risk of becoming exhausted, putting strain on their personal relationships as well as increasing the likelihood of mental health issues.” 

“This can be compounded by the current economic climate and rising costs of running a business, making it especially challenging times for small business owners. When you give so much of yourself to your business, it can be exhausting, and left unchecked, your mental health can really suffer.”

Beyond Blue says it is important to recognise the early signs of stress and feeling overwhelmed and to put a plan in place to address it. 

Beyond Blue’s excellent NewAccess for Small Business Owners program is a guided self-help mental health coaching program that is free, confidential and convenient.

“It’s a tailored program that provides practical guidance and support to small business owners to better manage day-to-day stresses” says Dr Martin. 

“It also links them in with other support services that are available, like financial counselling.”

How should employers navigate a world where as many as six in 10 Australian workers are feeling burnt out? 

According to Gallup polling, record stress levels recorded during the pandemic are yet to decline, with hybrid and remote workers in particular battling seemingly insurmountable workloads and disconnection, which is contributing to spiking burnout. 

“We are getting used to a new way of working,” says small business wellbeing advocate Leanne Faulkner from Fortitude at Work.

“Work from home has sparked a need to re-educate ourselves. In the corporate sector employees have access to well-defined procedures to manage wellbeing. We need to redefine what solo working/home working actually means. People who work from home rely on informal networks for support. We need to think about how we support the supporters.”

At Private Media, our efforts to support our staff are led by our wonderful chief operating officer Ai Mawdsley, who last week published a blog about burnout on our internal staff site, which is republished today on SmartCompany. 

She shares five key insights that should inform any employer’s approach to assisting staff facing burnout, summarised below:

1 Burnout can be caused by overwork, stress, moral injury or psychological factors.

2 Time off is usually not enough. Burnout requires a collection of interventions. 

3 A health professional is required to get better. 

4 Individuals need to recognise their burnout warning signs.

5 Regular exercise is a key preventative for burnout.

You can read the full article here.

How am I (Simon Crerar, editor-in-chief of SmartCompany) addressing my own burnout?

If you’re still reading, thank you. This article is now 1,700 words, and industry data analytics show that few people make it this far down any article.

I’m breaking all my own rules: I extol the benefits of Axios co-founders Mike Allen and Jim VandeHei’s Smart Brevity approach to communication, and this report is anything but brief. 

So, how have I been addressing my burnout? 

Well, firstly, I had a week off work, a necessary firebreak where I broke – but didn’t yet entirely reverse – my cycle of very little sleep, with one glorious night of nine hours of restorative sleep, and another where I slept seven. 

As importantly, I got a mental health care plan from my GP and had an initial appointment with a wonderful cognitive behavioural therapy psychologist. 

Knowing time in nature is good for me, I went for some gentle trail runs and long walks. I turned off all my devices, and read for three hours entirely uninterrupted, finishing two books that have been sitting unfinished for months. 

I played golf with a small-business owner mate, spending much of the round talking about mental health, and had a heavenly hour at the Elsewhere Sauna, alternating 90-degree centigrade heat with Southern Ocean cold water dips. And – most importantly – I spent quality, stress-free time out in nature, and then enjoying pagan rituals at Willie Smith’s WinterFest, with my wife and kids.

Secondly, back at work this week, I had an extended session with Private Media’s wonderful COO Ai, auditing SmartCompany’s output and processes and attempting to make them more efficient for my colleagues and I. A vital exercise all leaders should do regularly. 

And finally, this week and for the next few weeks I will be having a four-day work week with Friday off (on doctor’s orders) to ensure batteries are fully recharged by Monday. 

As Dr Marny Lishman, psychologist and author of Burnout to Brilliant says, burnout can be the wake-up call we never thought we needed. Working to get “better” can help us create a personal and professional life better than it ever was before. 

“The cure is often in the cause – so taking the time to reflect on how we operate in the world now, tweak it a little if required, and then steer ourselves in a direction that better aligns with who we are will help us design a life that’s better than we ever thought possible.” 

That’s what I’m aiming for anyway!

PS: The latest data shows 64% of employees working regular four-day work weeks experienced reductions in burnout – but that’s a discussion for another day!

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