More than just a source of income to earn a living, work can cause physical and mental exhaustion which has detrimental consequences.
A local production recently staged a play on a topic familiar to every worker.
Titled The Working Dead, it was about an overworked employee whose untimely death from exhaustion prompts his boss to hire a bomoh to bring him back to life.
Unfazed that the employee is now a zombie, the boss demands that he continue working because he must meet his Key Performance Indicator.
While the play, presented by KuLT Productions, was a musical comedy, the subject is anything but.
Many years ago, one boss told my colleagues and I that we needed to complete all reports or die standing. Our job demands and pressure had turned us into zombies, and we often felt tired, hated coming to work, were emotionally drained and not motivated.
Typically, we either lamented to friends about it or we would take short breaks, thinking that these steps would work to resolve the heaviness we felt.
Unknown to us, we were experiencing symptoms of burnout, and every employee, at one point in his or her working life, will suffer from it.
However, although we hear and know about burnout as one of the common issues at the workplace, we don’t realise that if left unaddressed, it can lead to a wide range of mental health issues.
PSYCHOLOGICAL CHANGES
The term “burnout” was coined in 1974 by psychologist Herbert Freudenberger when he noticed the physical and psychological changes in volunteers working at a free clinic in New York City.
The volunteers, who were once enthusiastic and eager to work, began to suffer from loss of motivation, cynicism and emotional depletion.
Freudenberger defined burnout as a "state of mental and physical exhaustion caused by one's professional life". Since then, burnout has been included in every talking point about workplace stress but never acknowledged as an occupational hazard-- until recently.
The World Health Organisation has included burnout in the11th Revision of the International Classification of Diseases.
In the new classification, burnout is defined as a “syndrome conceptualised as resulting from chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully managed”.
WHO characterises burnout by feelings of energy depletion or exhaustion; increased mental distance from one’s job, or feelings of negativism or cynicism related to one's job and reduced professional efficacy. In this context, burnout only refers to phenomena in the occupational context and should not be applied to describe experiences in other areas of life.
Although burnout is not classified as an illness, WHO states that it is a factor influencing health status or contact with health services. This means people should seek medical help when they display the symptoms.
Sunway University’s head of department of psychology Associate Professor Dr Alvin Ng Lai Oon says burnout is workplace stress that is not managed because either people don’t realise there are symptoms or they don’t talk about them.
“People don’t think of burnout as a risk to mental health condition because they think it is a normal job-related feeling. They think the lack of energy and disillusioned view about their job are nothing to be concerned about and can be easily rectified.”
With increasing cases of burnout, there is the likelihood that mental health problems happen even more. Burnout is not usually diagnosed because a lot of the symptoms are transdiagnostic, which means they can be found in many disorders.
Burnout is having symptoms of depression solely related to work and not in general. Depressive disorder has a wide effect on the person’s functioning, and goes beyond just work-related events.
Ng says the best way is to listen to your body and be aware of warning signs.
“Talk to a counsellor before the symptoms get worse. You should not feel ashamed if you want to seek help from a counsellor or a psychologist. This does not mean you are crazy. It means you are taking care of yourself.
“You can’t just tell yourself to think positive. It is impossible to always be positive. You should think adaptive because it is more realistic and helpful. Think adaptive means you activate your behaviour to do something about the problem.
“It is also important that companies provide in-house counsellors for employees. A healthy work environment brings a much bigger return of investment compared to the cost of ignoring mental health at the workplace, such as high turnover, absenteeism, behavioural problems, legal costs and lowered productivity.”
The trouble in dealing with burnout is that sometimes role overload is seen as something to be expected and accepted. So those who suffer from burnout are worried of being seen as lazy, incompetent or weak, therefore leading to self-doubt. They will either quit without seeking help, or they may work even harder and ignore the symptoms. This will increase the risk of further burnout and co-morbid disorders such as depression and anxiety.
Individuals who are burnout can also become quarrelsome, edgy and impatient, with the likelihood of frequent anger outbursts. This kind of reactivity and aggression can be coping mechanism, as a way out of not getting what they want. It may also cause workplace bullying which would lead to systemic problems within an organisation, and affect quality of relationships at the workplace.
It is also important to improve mental health literacy because part of it is understanding what burnout means and what should be done. Below are five symptoms of burnout that employees may dangerously assume as normal work-related feelings.
1. PHYSICAL AND MENTAL EXHAUSTION
Burnout leads to physical and mental exhaustion. Physical exhaustion is characterised by muscle fatigue, shortness of breath and lack of energy to carry out daily tasks, doing even simple chores or work, and increasing the likelihood of becoming ill due to reduced immunity stemming from prolonged stress.
Mental exhaustion is characterised by being emotionally drained where there’s a higher likelihood of apathy, self-blaming and feeling of helplessness or hopelessness.
Cognitive dysfunction happens when information processing abilities take a toll, affecting attention, focus, memory, decision-making skills, problem-solving skills and creativity.
It also includes behavioural or habitual outcome such as slower movements – reduced productivity, social withdrawal, avoidance of work, procrastinating and even abusing substances to cope with unwanted emotions.
“Exhaustion brings about a change in attitude, behaviour and emotions towards dysfunction, compounding physical tiredness that naturally happens when one has worked hard on a particular challenge.
“One way to prevent exhaustion is improving physical fitness as it has been found by research to be a good buffer against stress and burnout. But we all have limits to managing demands,” says Ng.
2. SLEEP PROBLEMS
Changes in sleeping pattern are the common signs that something is wrong with your body. One can either be sleeping more or sleeping less, or have disturbed sleep. There are times you feel too tired to sleep and it becomes a worry, which also perpetuates difficulty in getting to sleep.
Ng says changes in sleeping pattern affects overall functioning as the individual is not well-rested to function optimally. Cognitive ability will not be as sharp, therefore mental functioning will be affected to the point that problem solving becomes limited and mistakes become more likely. This leads to a cycle of problems and further burnout if not addressed early.
“There is also a likelihood of significant change of eating patterns - either eating more or eating less than usual – which can also affect functioning where nutrition is concerned. There can be a likelihood of self-medication or abuse of substance such as alcohol or certain types of drugs to cope with these changes,” he says
3. NUMB ABOUT WORK
When you are mentally exhausted, you are likely to be apathetic. You could also become very spiteful towards problems and attribute them to the workplace or workplace management.
“This increases the likelihood of being cynical about work and numb to the stress. You are likely to be helpless and hopeless about even thinking of taking steps to solve problems.
“Apathy is reflected in attitude, behaviour and emotional expression such as taking to social media to complain or express feelings that are not constructive or negative. A behavioural example of apathy is a move towards self-destructive behaviours such as social withdrawal, substance abuse, absenteeism and even resigning from work without first seeking help to address the issue.
4.REDUCED PRODUCTIVITY AND PERFORMANCE
When you are physically and mentally exhausted because of burnout, there is reduced capacity. Psychologically, you are slower in processing information, problem-solving, finding resources and making decisions.
Therefore even asking for help may not be part of your automatic response when you are tired.
Ng says when your cognitive abilities are less functional, anything to do with information processing such as thinking, focusing and memorising leads to poorer performance even if you are physically fit. As such, if you’re physically tired, it makes things worse.
“Your burnout causes physical and mental fatigue which can affect both your body and attitude. It is only natural that you start making more mistakes and being less accurate in your work, and so your productivity and performance take a nose dive.”
5. EXCESSIVE WORRY
“Worrying leads to mental fatigue. It becomes a cycle of worries that makes a person who is burnt out feel as though they’re just going downhill, with no hope of recovery.
“This pattern of negativity has a high risk of depression. Even if you’re not burnt out, excessive worrying can also lead to it due to the same reason.”
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