Facing Farewell: Resources for End-of-Life Care and Grief

This is a post I wish I never had the knowledge to be able to write…

When my mother went to the Emergency Room in September of 2019, she was diagnosed with Stage IV non-smokers lung cancer and told she had months to live.

I gleaned many lessons and resources over the next two years of her decline, subsequent death, and while navigating the “after” and grieving process.

I’m publishing this on the 2-year anniversary of her death and am called to briefly share about her before getting into the resources.

Patricia Hayes Axtmayer was one of the kindest humans to walk the earth. She was a nurse, Red Cross Volunteer, blood and platelet donor, mom, mentor, grandmother, sister, lover of libraries, dog rescuer, half marathoner, and the woman who dedicated her days to making other people happy. She lived her 70 years in service to making the world better, even donating her body to medical school for research as a final act of selflessness.

I like to think that her legacy of helping others lives on through my words today, in sharing tools to support others through this incredibly challenging and inevitable part of life.

Whether you’re witnessing someone aging, caring for a person with a terminal illness or at the end of their life, or are in the throes of grieving the death of a loved one, there is something for you in the words to come.

No matter what, I hope you know that you are not alone.

Anticipatory Grief

I didn’t really know about this concept before my mom was given a terminal diagnosis. The nutshell definition is: “the distress a person may feel in the days, months or even years before the death of a loved one or other impending loss.”

This article goes more in depth into what anticipatory grief is, how it may feel, and more, as the term transcends the conversation around death and can relate to other potential losses and big changes in life as well.

Recently, it became clear that this feeling hits home for many when a tweet stating “We don’t talk enough about the anticipatory grief of watching your parents age” went viral.

An important note is that there is conflicting data around whether experiencing anticipatory grief can help soften the blow later. I can speak from my own experience to say that it didn’t – and I was surprised and unprepared for that reality.

We were told mom had months to live, but through clinical trials and different chemotherapy regimens, she made it two years. I wrote the bulk of my mother’s eulogy and obituary while she was still alive. We spoke together about death, a future without her in this physical world, and I pre-picked the favors for her memorial mass during what ended up being her final days of life (the favors turned out to be a charming tribute to her love of gardening).

My Type A personality may have subconsciously thought that I could project manage my grief…

While I’m grateful I was able to do these things before (anything that lightens your administrative and cognitive load during those initial weeks of grieving is a huge help), it did nothing to lessen the devastation when she died.

I share this not to be the bearer of doom-and-gloom but because I think it’s important to have realistic expectations - you can prepare all you want but it’s likely you will never be fully ready for what it feels like to experience the loss. That doesn’t mean there is anything wrong with you, it’s just the nature of what comes with something this monumental.

There is a formula that comes from Buddhist tradition that relates well to this:

I was frustrated by the depth of pain I felt because her death was expected. That resistance made my suffering worse. Perhaps with an awareness of this concept, you’ll be less likely to resist your pain even though accepting it is incredibly hard as well.

Palliative Care

This is another term many people aren’t familiar with and/or don’t know of as a potential resource.

Here is a good synopsis provided by Cleveland Clinic:

“Palliative care provides symptom relief, comfort and support to people living with serious illnesses like heart disease, cancer or chronic respiratory disease. Its benefits extend to caretakers, too. If you’re living with a life-altering illness, palliative care may be available to improve your health and overall well-being.”

The article goes on to describe different aspects of palliative care including populations that can benefit (anyone with an incurable medical condition of any age/stage), who provides it, and the breadth of support it’s designed to provide.

The hospital my mom received cancer care from had a palliative care division, but I found we really had to advocate to tap into their resources. I won’t go into the politics than can exist between various providers in the healthcare system, and I’m sure it plays out differently depending on where you are/what the medical situation is, but at some larger institutions the left hand may not know what the right is doing.

So, it’s important to know about and that you can ask for this kind of support!

An example of how this can look: my mom often had many side effects from her chemo treatments and we could only cover so much in a short appointment with the oncologist. Working with the palliative team, we could spend more time talking through all areas of my mom’s life, her goals, and how to best support her both physically and mentally (for example in addition to medications they made a referral to the social work team).

The best time to tap into palliative resources is as soon as you can, as it’s designed to accompany you in navigating everything from the financial to emotional components to symptom management.

In fact, “patients who receive palliative care early in their disease course may live longer than if they did not receive palliative care, or received it later in the disease course.” JAMA.

Also, “Recent clinical trials examining the effects of early integration of specialty palliative care show marked improvement in patient satisfaction, mood, quality of life, health care utilization, and overall survival. For example, patients who received early in-home palliative care services in addition to usual care had fewer emergency department visits, hospital admissions, and lower medical costs.” https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5730447/

My absolute favorite expert on all things palliative medicine is Dr Sunita Puri – her book That Good Night: Life and Medicine in the Eleventh Hour is an exceptional read and really examines the ways the medical system can relieve suffering and become more comfortable with end of life discussions.

I read her book while my mom was alive, and it helped me learn more about how the system should address suffering and whole-person care, which empowered me to advocate for her through the last years of her life.

If you’d like to get a taste of this concept, here is Dr Puri talking about what I hope will be the norm in medicine to help patients and families avoid unnecessary suffering and examine quality of life over quantity of time alive.

My mom had the “gift of the gab” and always asked her providers to share how THEY were doing. Here we’re speaking with her palliative medicine doctor to explore additional symptom support

Hospice: Inpatient vs. Home Care

Some people confuse palliative care and hospice care – these are distinct and if you’re new to end of life conversations, it’s important to clarify what hospice is:

“Like palliative care, hospice provides comprehensive comfort care as well as support for the family, but, in hospice, attempts to cure the person's illness are stopped. Hospice is provided for a person with a terminal illness whose doctor believes he or she has six months or less to live if the illness runs its natural course.”

For example, when my mom was working with the palliative care team, she was still receiving chemotherapy. When it stopped working, she stopped infusions and transitioned fully to hospice care. The oncology team told her she would have 1-2 months left, and she died 29 days later.

Here are some resources that cover the FAQ’s about hospice care, including different types of options for where to receive it, insurance coverage, and more:

• https://www.nia.nih.gov/health/frequently-asked-questions-about-hospice-care

• https://www.cancer.org/cancer/end-of-life-care/hospice-care/who-provides-hospice-care.html

The great debate for many people is whether to receive inpatient care or to do home hospice care.

It’s a huge question with lots to consider, and much easier to talk through when it’s a hypothetical. Most people end up being in a position to choose when it’s time sensitive because who wants to think about dying?! More on that soon…

We did home hospice, and a few things I think are important to share:

• It does NOT include around the clock care – the primary caretaker/family/friends are responsible for the care which can include symptom management, medication management, lifting the person in/out of bed or wheelchair, helping the person to the bathroom / changing diapers, managing procurement of and refilling supplies.

• Typically, a hospice nurse comes to provide home visits at a certain cadence depending on the medical details. Our experience was a once/week visit with lovely, kind, and caring nurses. The provider rotated between 3 or so nurses. There are options to pay for private care to get additional care, and some insurance may have benefits to help with the financial side of that, but it’s another logistic to manage.

• It was incredibly hard, even with the shifts spread across us 4 children and a few dear family friends. It was also a privilege to care for her, and beyond special to know my mom was where she wanted to be for the end of her life - feeling the good energy and surroundings of a place she lived for 40 years. 

Death Doula

This is yet another resource that’s not as well known – perhaps more than all of the others mentioned here so far!

Only a few years ago I had NO idea this was a profession. These beautiful souls focus on helping a dying person and their loved ones before, during and after death.

“An end-of-life doula provides emotional and physical support, education about the dying process, preparation for what’s to come and guidance while you’re grieving.” https://health.clevelandclinic.org/death-doula/

Other terms can be death midwife, end of life doula, end of life coach, or death coach.

I found a local death doula and we met with her once… we thought we had more time, but my mom died only 3 days after our conversation with her.

We sat together on the porch, one of my mom’s favorite places, sipping tea and talking about life. Their conversation went into some philosophical places, and my sister and I saw a reflective side of my mom through witnessing this exchange. My sister even used part of their conversation in her eulogy, and we’re forever grateful that my mom was able to feel supported through this offering.

Here is an example of a well-known death doula, and she has a directory of other providers on her website as well.

Legacy Work

Something that can be done with or without death doulas is legacy work.

This can take many forms and people can either be heavily involved or not much involved depending on the project.

I love this description from Penn Medicine: “A challenging diagnosis often leads people to think about their legacy, what and who they will eventually leave behind. People often think of their financial situation, but almost always, there is the shift to our relationships. We think about what people mean to us, what we want to share with them, what we hope for them.

Unfortunately, all too often, these thoughts stay thoughts and aren’t actually put into motion or shared. “Legacy work” is the process of transforming these thoughts into action. It’s the act of sitting down and taking time to purposefully create something for the people you love and care about. It is a way to capture life stories, lessons, sentiments, memories, and traditions. Legacies can convey what we want remaining and future generations to know and understand about our life experiences. They help us to remember and heal as we carry on important traditions.”

That link goes into many examples of what this can look like – which includes capturing family recipes, stories, photos, and voices. This doesn’t have to be something you wait to do until end of life or a terminal diagnosis, and Storyworth is one example of a platform designed to capture stories in a longitudinal way.

If that quote I shared above about aging parents resonated with you, you can explore this for yourself now! Here are more prompts: https://www.legacyproject.org/activities/lifestory.html

I shared my mom’s original prognosis in a new mom Facebook group and asked for ideas to keep her memory alive for my daughter since she was only 3 months old. I was met with such compassion, kindness, and many actionable ideas (which is impressive since mom Facebook groups have a pretty bad reputation!).

One that stood out: “if there’s any habits she has - try to save those! Example: my mom always called and sang me happy birthday. I would give anything to have that recorded somewhere. My birthday has been the hardest part of losing her for that reason.”

Weirdly enough, I had a voicemail saved from 2017 where my mom sang happy birthday to me and left one of her epic signature long-winded ramble-y messages. I listen to it often and it’s quite the balm on harder days.

Resources:

This is already 4 pages long in MS Word so I better cut myself off soon! Additional resources:

Grief… I could do an entire post on this topic alone, but there are experts out there for that. I’ll share a few things that I found helpful.

A friend, whose sister had died a few years prior, sent me this reddit post. The wave analogy and the reminder that grief is also love was comforting, especially in the initial stage of feeling overcome and weighed down by the intensity of it all.

The ball and box analogy for grief can be a supportive framework for how your feelings may evolve over time. That same friend sent me this podcast episode called “Grateful for Grief” between Anderson Cooper and Stephen Colbert which had me reaching for the tissues.

These are some ways to care for your mind/body through the demands of caretaking and grieving (I personally have used all of these and credit these modalities as being critical to surviving the trauma of it all):

• EMDR Therapy- specific modality for working through trauma. This website has a directory for finding practitioners.

• Acupuncture – game changer! I worked with Heather at Wander Well Acupuncture here in MA when trying to conceive all the way through to today for general support. You name it, acupuncture can help address it.

• Therapy – I was a new mom, partner, friend, sister, daughter, caretaker, business owner, coach, and wellness speaker (and then in the midst of it all, COVID happened!). I needed a place to be able to fall apart. In managing and holding space for others most of each day, this was a sacred place to just be a mess and feel supported by someone else.

• https://endwellproject.org/ - their talks and resources are impressive. I’ve found the recordings of talks especially inspirational. From them: “End Well has become the most widely known and respected organization at the intersection of popular culture and healthcare with a focus on end of life, grief, loss, caregiving, and associated health and welfare challenges.” They have a “fresh perspective and commitment to infusing wonder, joy and hope into these conversations while also tackling the tough stuff.”

• Family Medical Leave Act in the USA (additional info here): There are eligibility requirements and different policies depending on where you live, but it’s important to know about potential options for leave from your employer if you’re a caretaker. I recently did a wellness workshop on burnout and a participant shared that after the session she realized she was fried and needed to get more support as she cared for her father. She was able to use the policy to go part-time in her work, and is markedly less stressed in managing competing demands and able to be more present with her father. Here are 5 things employers get wrong about caregivers at work. The more we share our struggles, ask for resources and policies, and normalize the human experience, the more likely we can ignite greater change.

Books:

• A Beginner's Guide to the End: Practical Advice for Living Life and Facing Death by BJ Miller and Shoshanna Berger. This is a must read for all humans, whether you have a chronic illness, are near end of life, or a regular ol’ 40 year old. It’s a phenomenal resource for ALL parts of preparing for the inevitable end – literally all of the things, from getting affairs in order to what to expect of the mind and the body in its final stages of life.

• Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End by Atul Gawande. Another exceptional read (and dovetails nicely with the book mentioned above by Dr Sunita Puri). My dearest friend has used this as a framework for navigating proactive conversations with her family members to know what everyone’s wishes are in (the hopefully very distant) end.

Grief focused books:

• Healing After Loss: Daily Meditations For Working Through Grief by Martha Whitmore Hickman. This is my absolute favorite for myself and that I’ve purchased it for others. If you cringed at the meditation part, it’s not actually meditation. Each calendar page has a quote and a short note that usually strikes a comforting/validating chord.  

• Full disclaimer- I only partially read these two books that were recommended to me. I tried to read them before my mom died and again in the very initial month or so after, and my grief brain fog didn’t allow much to sink in. It's OK That You're Not OK: Meeting Grief and Loss in a Culture That Doesn't Understand by Megan Devine and also Anxiety: The Missing Stage of Grief: A Revolutionary Approach to Understanding and Healing the Impact of Loss by Claire Bidwell Smith (she also runs grief programs/workshops).

Wrap it up, Aileen!

Death is fascinating in that it’s one of the only things that every human has in common – one of the only guarantees – yet one of the most avoided topics.

I hope that if you’re reading this, you and your loved ones are far away from needing the information… and perhaps this can inspire you to have the hard but important conversations when the stakes aren’t as high.

I know that most likely, you’ve read this far for other reasons. My heart is with yours and I’ll share what Susan David says as a reminder of the duality of life: “Life's beauty is inseparable from its fragility.” 

Wishing you and yours many more days of beauty and comfort ahead.

Thank you, Mom, for continuing to help others breathe easier. Love you more than the world.

Feeling the jet lag together in Ireland, one of her favorite places in the world, in 2010

What do burnout and quiet quitting have to do with one another?

Uncover the impact of "quiet quitting" and stress in this insightful video. Hear powerful stories and expert advice that highlight the toll chronic stress takes on individuals, leading to disengagement and decreased productivity. Gain practical strategies to address stress and create a healthier, more fulfilling work experience.

Auto-generated text below. Please excuse any typos!

Hello we are live the burnout panel on quiet quitting. Welcome everybody to the burnout panel on quiet quitting and we are going to talk to you about this phenomenon that seems to be taking the world by storm right now um there are at least two definitions of quiet quitting one is the person who's saying I'm going to set some boundaries I'm not going on this like ride or die right kind of focus on my work anymore I'm going to say some boundaries around that but then there's another group of people who seem to be really disengaging and are much more likely burning out and moving into that place where they really aren't sure if they want to be in their workplace anymore that's the group we're going to address today sharing with you what we think is going on with that group of people and how you might help them so let's kick it off with our first speaker:

Hi my name is Audrey Holst I am the founder of Fortitude and Flow and the creator of the Perfectionist Archetypes and I help high achieving individuals and teams to rewire from toxic perfectionism into a culture of excellence and we can't talk about quiet quitting without talking about perfectionism these things are are linked together and in order to talk about that we have to talk about the body because we are bringing our bodies to work every single day there are two questions that the body is always scanning for. Am I safe? and do I belong? This combination of perfectionism within an individual and within an organization can create a bit of a survival situation where people are showing up to work their bodies are feeling like they are walking into a tiger's cage every single day. Their body is getting flooded with cortisol and everyday basis and that is bouncing off of co-workers and it's creating a really tough environment which is creating those people who are starting to disengage out of survival this is how they're going to survive this job so some things to talk about is unrealistic expectations that can be again within self and other this is something that is imperfectionism this feeling that it has to be a plus work or not at all it has to be above and beyond and these unspoken cultural rules. So you may not have it in your contract that you you know have to come in early and stay late that may be baked into the culture so that is again trying to follow these very specific rules and maybe they're written or unwritten and having this self-identification with your job as being who you are so not really having anything to identify yourself and your own body outside of your work. Therefore everything having a really really intense impact on you. So in order to deal with this new world we have to figure out okay where is this perfectionism where are these threads how can we come out of this survival situation and become more of our full selves in our work. We have to address those individual and organizational expectations and clarify them. So it's really important to get clear on these things and I think that Aileen is going to be do a really great job talking about the values and how clarifying those can really help us shift what's going on.

Thank you so much Audrey hello everyone my name is Aileen Axtmayer. I'm a career coach and corporate Wellness speaker. One on one I help my clients land work that they love and then I help employers retain that talent through providing customized corporate Wellness workshops all around Stress Management and helping employees restore their energy so they can thrive in their jobs and when I think about quiet quitting and burnout in the intersection here I think you know in my 15 plus years of working with people one-on-one seeing people leave jobs both quietly and loudly there's something really interesting that goes on so a lot of times people end up in their professional roles either in a happenstance way so they couldn't find a job right out of college and then they ended up just doing something temporary and then temporary lends itself to five ten years later or they land work that they love but then as they grow and change as in their personal lives and their professional lives their roles aren't reflecting those changes and values and interests in personality and in the skill sets that they want to want to use not just what they're good at sometimes they're good at something but you don't enjoy using it so I like to encourage people whether it be employers or the employees themselves to zoom out we don't really do these career Wellness checkups we have our annual physical exams we don't do this on the professional level so I I recommend that we do and the framework that I use to examine this is VIPs so what are your values your interests your personality and your skills and when you can create space as an employer or as an employee to really examine these parts of yourself and understand where you're at with each of them you can then use that framework to  understand where your work might not be in alignment anymore and what you can do to really shift and feel like your values interest personality and skills are aligned with the work that you're doing so that's a little bit of my thoughts on how we develop personally and change professionally and how we can Tinker with things to really feel more engaged in our work I think Dr Sharon is going to kick us off into another angle to explore this phenomena.

My name is Dr Sharon Grossman and I am affectionately known as the burnout doc I work with busy Executives and entrepreneurs who feel burned out because their work and their lives feel like too much and they want more time for themselves and their families so what I would like to really shine a light on with regards to quiet quitting is let's take it back for a moment to the brain and when we're doing this quiet quitting thing really we're letting our primitive brain do what it does which is it tries to run away from pain and move towards pleasure but I think it's also important to look at the consequences of just allowing that to happen and not being involved on purpose in that process it's when you are giving up on your goals that you actually are giving up on yourself and why that's important is because you lose Integrity with yourself and we do this and then we justify it because it's uncomfortable because we're tired because we're unsure what I really would like to encourage people to do instead is to use your prefrontal cortex to manage your mind so all of the thoughts that create the stress that make you want to run away that you deal with that stress instead you deal with the overwhelm and make your decisions on purpose because achievement is what will allow you to feel pleasure once you've put in the work so rather than running away from things let's find a way to engage and find out how we can manage the stress rather than just try to take that other route and you know sometimes we do that because we're burned out which is understandable and one of the reasons we might be feeling burned out is because there's just a lot of things that are stewing in our mind and we end up feeling resentful and my good friend Cait Donovan is going to now take that angle and talk to us about quiet quitting and resentment.

Hi everybody my name is Cait Donovan. I work with organizations to reduce burnouts they can keep top talent and I work with people one-on-one to reduce burnout so they can stop hating their lives and I love resentment it's my favorite emotion and resentment and quiet quitting have one major thing in common and that is a feeling or perception of unfairness people quiet quit because things are unfair and they're pulling out they're disengaging right they're not getting out of this what they're put putting into it if we look at Merriam-Webster resentment is defined as bitter indignation at being treated unfairly so resentment and quiet quitting have a common root and I think we have to remember that so if we find a lot of quiet quitting in a corporate setting creating conversations around resentment with support please don't do this if you don't know how call me I'll help with support we can create conversations that allow resentment to be explored in a positive and beneficial way resentments turn into boundaries and boundaries help protect us and one of my favorite people who talks about boundaries energetically is Dr Sandra and she's gonna take over now and talk about boundaries in unresolved chronic stress.

Hello everybody um I am Dr Sandra Lewis and I am a clinical psychologist and personal energy strategist working with women organizations to reconnect them those resources that help them make the journey from burnout to sustainable leadership and an impact that brings them a lot of joy and satisfaction and the threat that I've been hearing us pull on today is This Thread about this nervous system of ours and how when that nervous system gets overwrought it's kind of like we go into survival mode so quiet quitting this this engagement that we see in quiet quitting is really an example of flight or fight right so we we're in this place of just we have disconnected because this thing hurts it's been unfair it's not people aren't recognizing me my talents are being utilized appropriately and now I'm in this situation where I feel like I need to escape so we disengage that's the flight response the flight response might be more of the person who is more cynical right so we're in this space of unresolved stress but when we disengage it's like we move we remove ourselves from the interaction with the stressor itself the lack of recognition or those kinds of things but but we still have the energy going in our body and our bodies stuck in that mode so one of the things that we have to begin to do is to reset our nervous system our nervous system is stuck in that place where we can't get anything we can't even access our mental capacity to make a decision that might bring us to a better place so the first thing is to start with regenerating and rejuvenating a nervous system so that then we can start to hear our creativity again we can start to think about building we can get to our mental energy that energy that allows us to think to what can I do in this situation what are my options we can get back to our emotional energy that ability that we have to actually navigate through stress and see a reasonable solution and to connect with those resources as Cait just mentioned connect with the resources that you need and we've talked a lot about the individuals but we also need the managers to help us so Vanessa's going to talk about how leadership can take apart in ending quiet quitting.

Yes yes yes and thank you lovely the panelists my lovely peers yes for those insights so these three R's that I'm going to share with you right now is from helping my clients reduce their turnover shut down their staff's nonsense and retain their employees while they have been able to lead their teams of employees in their brick and mortar shops and restaurants so these three are to ensure that you no longer have to deal with quiet quitting on your team because yes let's say you are that individual that you know has that require quitting for yourself but you might be watching also as a leader of a team where you're thinking to yourself how do I ensure that this doesn't happen again so three R's one being rewards so you want to ensure that you are acknowledging the great work that your employees are doing this doesn't have to be a five thousand dollar gift card to Best Buy though we would all appreciate that yes right absolutely um but this could even just be a simple thank you some of you love telling your employees what's wrong and you justify it by saying preparing them for a hard not life but really you're preparing them to quietly quit so let's ensure that you are at the very least saying thank you acknowledge them for their great work and doing those rewards number two refreshments and I don't mean appetizers but hey free delicious food let's go uh by Refreshments I mean hosting regular team check-ins they can be monthly they can be quarterly but team meetings where you are realigning with your team about your company's culture mission and vision and last but certainly not least the third are Recreation so Recreation meaning have fun help your employees have fun with each other right with you and the team a holiday party goes a long way but even my client recently hosted an end of summer celebration at the wine bar she didn't think anyone would show up and turned out only one person missed the other 11 employees actually came off the clock they weren't paid for it they came to work essentially to the workspace voluntarily just to have fun and enjoy so whether you're leading an entire business or you're leading a team in a department or you're about to become a leader and you want to do it better than your current boss is remember rewards refreshments and Recreation quiet quitting is preventable now at this time we would love to open the floor to any questions that you may have for us I see we have a question here in the comments that we would love to address at the moment let me pull that question up.

So Olivier asked us is quiet quitting the response of employees to cope to their job rather than to apply the great resignation um so let's go we can go around the room here who already wants to begin and start and we can just go around the room it's quiet quitting the responsive employees coping to their job rather than the great resignation Cait I write about this a lot because I thinkthat quiet quitting is a coping mechanism for Burnout when it is used not as a choice but as a natural reaction so I think we have to separate choosing quiet quitting to protect yourself and quiet quitting because you're so burned out that you have no other choice and you're just trying to make it through your day and not get fired so quiet quitting can be a coping mechanism if you are burnt out and unable to get out of your job at the moment or you think you're unable to get out which is a whole separate conversation we need Carol you know we need to talk about mindset there but yes I think that it can be anyone else on the panel want to address what are your thoughts on quiet quitting versus a great resignation Dr Sandra.

I would say uh yeah it can be and it's probably a more short-term solution it's like what we need right now just to manage to get through right it's just we are here now this situation is really awful and I've determined that in order for me to manage it I have to take a step back I have to do less than I usually do I'm not going to go 187 percent I'm just going to go now 98 to 100 and I'm going to take some time but then we still need to take that next step so what will it look like when my my work life is the one I really want to have and how do I get there yes love it love it look at us look at us yes and we have Audrey yes yeah I think that uh this is one of those things where it's like the all or nothing mindset either you're in it three billion percent or you're completely disengaged in it and there's this this inability or just this lack of skill for a lot of people to figure out how to exist in that middle space like people were talking about engagement versus disengagement or making a choice versus feeling like there is no choice like what's your body's perception of a situation which your mind's perception of a situation so um this is like the conversation of teaching people and giving people the skills in order to exist in that middle ground where you're not completely disengaged and fleeing but you're also not you know it's or not throwing yourself at your work 24 hours a day and feeling like you were identified with that so that's really the conversation we're having right here is how do we get more people exposed to this kind of work that exists in that in between space great question

Love it love it and let's see we have another we actually have two questions from Casey here uh she shares I'm gonna be too long for the screen but here we go I'm reading in some Global surveys that empathy is the number one most value leadership attribute at this time number one what are some actionable concrete steps that leaders can take that show they are empathizing with their team members and then two how can I as a stress team member find my own agency in this crazy world so I can address the first question and feel free peers to also add in and then we can go into number two as well from the individual perspective so in terms of Casey for your first question what are some actionable concrete stuff that leaders can take to show that you're empathizing with your team members and I would say in terms of I'll go back to the rewards perspective and also with the recreation so when it comes to the rewards it's acknowledging helping your team member being the leader that acknowledges your team member for the great work that they did right because it's very easy to say oh my God like you know they give you a piece of paper they finish some you know planning something out and you're like okay they planned that thing but in their mind they're they're saying to themselves I spent weeks on that I spend months on that how could you not give me a thank you how could you not give me a reward how could you not acknowledge me in front of the team for the work that I did right and so it's appreciating and knowledge the work that they put into all the steps that they did to you know get them whatever that they wanted to do that is going to go along with that empathy and the second thing is also you know people have lives so being a leader that understands that your employees have lives right and your employee just as you are perhaps a stress team member for your own leader Your Own Boss right they may be in that same position for themselves too right so how can you ensure that you know we're gonna go into my lovely friends here about to go you know drop some knowledge on how you as a stress team member can find your own agency but just being aware that your employees are people too just as you are and ensuring that you are just showing up and acknowledging and wearing and being aware of the work that they're putting in it goes such long way second question how can I distressed team member find my own agency oh Aileen and then Dr Sandra.

I think uh what a lot of one of us a lot of what we've touched on and talked in depth about today is that stress response and so I think most people especially when you're in that constant state where you're potentially burnt out and you just feel like you're wanting a sense of control you said we have more control over how we feel in our minds and bodies than I think many of us know and recognize so my recommendation is what do you already know that helps you turn that stress response down what helps ground you nourish you get you into that prefrontal cortex like we talked about and out of this survival mode I guarantee you for most people they know these things and that they just aren't doing them as much as they want to or could and it doesn't have to be you know this two-week vacation every month or whatever it might be although that sounds lovely and maybe that is the thing for you but sometimes it's truly just creating some space to be versus to do taking some deep belly breaths so all these simple practices can really be incredibly impactful for helping Center yourself and then the more you do that the more you realize you do have control and you can integrate some of these practice and practices anywhere anytime and then feel like you can see the world from a clearer lens so that's part of my take on that and I just think also the empathizing leader right this kind of empathy it's if that's really about this whole skill that people call emotional intelligence or you know again what our brain does right mirror neurons we see someone having an experience and we're able our brain actually responds as though we're having that experience so when a leader can know and read their own bodies and what how they're responding when they're in the room with someone and they can also notice what's happening with people then they can begin to be more empathetic they can also be more empathetic by just practicing mindful listening making sure that they're saying they're understanding what the person actually said to them because sometimes people answer a question for us and we already have decided what we think the answer is and we're running with that we haven't really listened to them so we want to First slow ourselves down enough to really hear what people are saying and hear those little clues that I'm burned out I really need some support I really need help, Dr Sharon.

So just to continue what everybody has been saying I think it's really important if you are a leader of a team until you work on your own stress it's going to be really hard for you to show up in your best form and the other thing I think is interesting is you know we're talking about empathy and how that's the number one most valued leadership attribute um and I think it's also important to consider the difference between empathy and compassion because sometimes when we're empathetic by definition we're kind of feeling other people's emotions and sometimes if they're stressed and we start to feel stressed and then we're not able to show up and lead them so as an alternative think about how to be more compassionate around what they're feeling once you've taken care of your own stress and that means that you understand that they're having a hard time but you're not necessarily feeling all of their emotions and that allows you to show up as that leader from a place of strength as opposed to now we're all in it together in this mess of stress you know so um it's just a way of kind of stepping back and maybe zooming out and I think a lot of this comes from working on yourself first and foremost and Cait throw in just one last thing Dr Kristen Donnelly who's a multi-time tedx speaker and a fellow speaker friend of ours of the groups did a huge amount of research into empathy into the definitions and the core of the word and what she found out was that underneath the word empathy actually all we're looking for is understanding the word understanding is the only commonality between all of the definitions of empathy so if leaders need to be more empathetic than they need to look to understand wonderful wonderful so we are we have Megan says really nicely said uh we have Kristen who mentioned this is awesome yes we have Casey who says y'all Rock oh well it's been our pleasure definitely to be here on the burnout panel we'll be here every month live on LinkedIn with different topics and I'm gonna pass it off here to Audrey to close us out.

It's it's so great to have to be able to hear everybody in like such a short little segment and basically you can take this as it's we're like a flight of tasters where you got to have a little tiny Taste of everybody's perspective and it was delicious for me just even being on this panel being having like these little tastes and there you can see where the commonalities and where the specific areas of expertise that everybody has and what a huge value that could bring to have all of these voices um be heard by your organization like imagine that your organization gets all of our voices and all of this information in like in a package together that's amazing like that's really an amazing thing like I'm excited just talking about it so we're gonna drop a link in the chat where you can check it out it is just a way to contact us gives your information your name organization need or if you are thinking of an organization you're like oh my gosh they need like they need this work they need this work let us know so we're gonna be doing this like I said every single month and when we can collect information that's also gonna help us like if you've got a topic that you want to hear us talk on to get a little taster whether you want to bring us on ask us about it we'd be happy to talk about it and that was the burnout panel on quiet quitting till next month foreign.

Simple Solutions To Burnout

From establishing healthy boundaries and practicing self-care to seeking support and reevaluating priorities, we provide practical strategies to help you regain balance and find fulfillment.

Auto generated transcript from the panel is below. Please excuse any typos!

Welcome welcome everyone to the burnout panel on Simple Solutions today we're talking about is burnout really simple you're chatting before we went live and a lot of us are thinking this isn't rocket science but sometimes it really does feel that way when you're feeling burnt out or you're just honestly in a life where you're not really zooming out and looking at the forest from the trees So today we're going to talk about acknowledge and insights and actionable practical tips for solving preventing recovering from burnout from each of our experts today.

So very serendipitously I have my own little burnout mitigation happening right now I'm joining super quickly my name is Aileen and I got the call school is closing early for snow so life happens but this is what we're talking about life happens instead of pushing against it and honestly that strategy in and of itself is a way to reduce burnout or to reduce stress that we feel in our bodies right paying times resistance equal suffering so let's reduce our suffering so we took today before I scoot in the snow storm is for Burnout Simple Solutions more executive functioning part of our brains comes back online we can actually start to see what's contributing to our stress what is the biggest source of struggle for us and what can we do and Implement in our lives to take action to start to create more ease so I will pass it on to Cait.

Hey everybody this is real life around here so when snow storms happen and children have to get picked up you know we roll with the punches my go-to solution for Burnout might sound a little bit counterintuitive but I really want you to spend some time tapping into what I call the anger group of emotions anger irritation annoyance and my favorite resentment I want you to tune into resentment because I think that I can be bold enough to say that the past couple of years have left a few people that may be watching a little angry you know we've had a lot of change there's been a lot going on just this past week there was a lot of layoffs from a lot of big tech companies I want you to take note of where the most repetitive resentments are the most common ones in your life and then ask yourself a couple of key questions number one does this thing that I'm resentful about even need to be done sometimes you'll find that you're resentful about doing something that if you dropped wouldn't change anything this is beautiful because the next question is if I have to do it is there someone else that could do it now we're talking about delegation the question after that is is there a way to upgrade the tool do you need better software or do you need different help or do you need a new sharpened knife whatever happens to be that you're using that's causing frustration can you upgrade your tool to make it easier and then the last question is is there an unspoken assumption here and unspoken agreement between myself yes for yourself communication communicating with yourself and communicating with others. Now something happens when life happens for example when maybe you're not able to get done on that project that you told your boss or you told yourself or you told your team that you're going to be able to do and so it's very easy to then say okay who will be impacted all these people were counting on me oh my gosh I can't let them down instead Your solution is to think to yourself how do you communicate how are you going to communicate to yourself and to others that hey life did happen and now it is time for me to do X or do I do see for example and now I'm going to pass it off to Audrey thanks so much I will have to you know we were so excited to get into these tips that none of us introduced ourselves which I think is just really it actually it kind of goes to our passionate about this work like we were talking about strategies before you even got on this call and we were just like let's get it you know we were just ready to dive in so we'll have to do a little circle back on you know intros so without the intro just say really quickly that I the folks that I work with are perfectionist that's my my area of expertise is working with folks who are perfectionists have basically self-identified as having perfectionist Tendencies and one of the things that leads this particular population down the path of burnout is not having an adjustable speed and what I mean by that is that they are either in park or they're going 60 miles an hour and that can look at the speed of which they move physically it's often the way that they describe that their minds are running a million miles an hour and they've got so many things going on and if they have a moment just to sit their brain kicks in super super fast so one of the things that I start to bring to folks is teaching them the concept of having an adjustable speed just like a car you don't just have park or 16 miles an hour you actually transition you can try before you can even make the transition you have to start to be aware that there are different speeds so one of the exercises that he bring people through is having them starting to look around the room and to just notice the speed at which they observe their surroundings because often people who are in 60 miles an hour are scanning the room so fast that they're not actually seeing anything and when you're in that state where you're literally not even seeing the things in the room you're also not seeing anything in your brain either you're not going to see Solutions you're not going to be able to hear communication clearly you're not going to be able to grasp creativity the way that you want to so being able to recognize the speed at which your system is processing information is looking is is looking or not looking is scanning but not actually paying attention but not paying attention is the first step in figuring out oh wow okay I I feel like I'm in this this fast speed is there some adjustability here so just starting to understand that we have different speeds at which we operate and that we do have the ability to shift up and down in between them and it's very common that we only use two speeds Park which is an earliest speed but you know what I'm saying and 60 miles an hour which is going running right by and not even actually seeing any of the scenery so I hope that you know keeping that in mind I'm imagining that Doctor Sandra Lewis is going to have some even more juicy tips.

I am going to have some tips but I'm going to give Dr Sharon her chance to go so that we can so she can share something on how to decode your burnout and then we're going to talk about your bodies thank you so much onthat but something came up today. Because one of the reasons that I find that a lot of people burn out is because of that negative chatter in their mind and you know Audrey just talked to us about perfectionism that's an example of something where if you set those standards for yourself and you don't actually have the kind of results that you want you might end up beating yourself up if I have a client who is very much in this place of wanting things to be amazing you know great intention but then tends to beat himself up when things don't turn out the way that he would like and he said something and I thought this is such a great mindset shift that I have to share it and this is what he said it's redundant to beat myself up because I already felt the pain and I was like that is so good right so think about that when you really care about doing something well and it doesn't work out the way that you would like that's painful right it's like here I am showing up putting an effort putting in time and then we don't have control over everything that happened so it's not necessarily your fault but it didn't work out sometimes it's because we have external circumstances that are beyond our control sometimes it's because we're not quite at the level that we need to be in terms of our skills and sometimes when something doesn't turn out we can learn from that experience and that allows us to do better the next time around so this idea of getting away from beating yourself up is a great way to avoid adding to the stress that you already have in your life and with that I would love to now pass it finally to the lovely Doctor Sandra.

Thank you so much I'm going to tell everyone disconnected from everything including their own bodies so when I'm talking to them and they're describing a work situation or some challenge that causing them to feel even more exhausted and anxious I'm noticing that they're either breathing all the way up here in their chest are there holding their breath but they don't know they're doing it so I call them when we get really exhausted and really anxious at the same time what does that mean now we're just feeling even worse we can't focus we can't be present our whole frontal load right as Aileen mentioned has gone offline so the first thing is to get back in your body just get in your body think of your body here's what I call your body your closest partner all of those signals you're feeling from your body will help you get through the burnout you just got to be able to listen so come back into your body by a simple little task simple thing you can just do is notice where are your feet just notice your feet notice your butt right notice what your eyes are looking at and then notice something that you can see right if you're a visual person if you need to close your eyes notice what you smell notice what you can touch feel your hands on your body even you can squeeze yourself you can massage yourself a little bit to get back on your body and then simply ask from your heart what do I need right now breathe as Aileen mentioned and hear what could you use in that moment to stay in your body it's your frontal load back online and then move to do the next thing but getting in your body is important and I recommend people do this like a few you know if you really burned out person just a few times a day a short little standcan help you reconnect toSo you have what you need to start moving out of the exhaustion and anxiety and in closing what I would like to do is share with you that you can hire us to come and talk to your people you can hire us to come and help your team be absolutely well and brilliant like you want them to be I'm going to pop a link and fill out this form to let us know who you are and what you need and we will reply to you and say hey this is how we can help you and with that I am going to turn this over to Vanessa who's going to lead us through our Q&A awesome people here yes how do you prevent being your worst enemy I'm sure always at some point has been a soulpreneur or maybe right now how do you prevent being your worst enemies who would like to smile I'm just enjoying the facial expressions and everybody this is a great question for us as a panel in general but you know also because we're all about preventing burnout what I would say is at least for my experience the thing that's been really helpful to me and what I encourage my clients to do is to be really intentional about yourself care and how that fits into your day so when you're running your own business and you're at the top of that pyramid you might have people helping you and you might be completely alone right even when you're solopreneur you might hire a virtual assistant and things of that nature but ultimately it's your business with you it's so easy to fall into the Trap of working around the clock to really do this in a sustainable way you have to think about what do I need to keep going without burning out so that I can continue to help my business grow and maybe that means that you plug in days and times that you exercise maybe there's meditation that you like to do that really centers you whatever it is for you figure out exactly when you're going to do that ahead of time and schedule that end so that it's not an afterthought and I'd like to pass it if anybody else has anything they want to add Cait.

B Y O B be your own bestie right if you don't want to be your worst enemy then you have to be first and foremost to yourself and to me being a friend to yourself starts with what I call in my work foundational self-care there's a massive joke with my podcasts being your own best friend means paying attention to your body's basic signals and responding to them in kind this is how you build self trust every time you need something and then you give your body what you need your body says oh cool we're going to be good over here like we're all set every time you ignore your body it says how else do I need to scream so bye and you don't have to do anything massive or drastic you have to drink when you're thirsty and rest when you're tired and pee when you got to pee like right now for example you know that the snow storm and I'm no pretty cool but yeah so love that bestie without add to that is what I usually say during my workshop is be selfish and owning the word selfish right that's ultimately what it's about it's really understanding what is that you need to best succeed so not even in a moment by moment for everyone else around you because it starts with you it starts with like there's a post I saw actually right before we got here You know she was looking at the snow and she just felt like cuddling on her couch and watching Netflix but then she told herself no I got to do these photos I got to put in all this work and my comment was and sometimes you just have to rest and watch Netflix yeah I had a thought about this is that the whole idea that sometimes it we get into this place where it feels like the business is running us instead of us running the business right so the business is actually literally directing how we feel is directing how we see ourselves more importantly so we now if the business isn't going exactly as we wanted then we say oh there's something wrong with us we start the internalize it because the business is not working so that means I'm broken right but in actuality you had a reason for creating this thing you fell in love with this for a reason so this relationship you have with your business it really is a relationship why did I fall in love with doing it with me and being with you oh okay so let's work this partnership out a little bit more let's think about how you can give me a little bit more how I can recognize what you're giving me and what I'm giving you right do some give and take thinking about but staying grounded in why you are running the business why is it important to you what is the gift you're giving to the world what is it that impact you want to have that thing will help you keep saying in love with that you're doing and you'll have to love yourself because you know you won't be able to do it if you don't love yourself oh man I'm living everybody's I was like I was like I need to hear everybody's answer to question I need to hear like the entire panels and I and I think that that is that is my input to this is that you need to surround yourself with people that are doing business in a way that you want to do business that are exhibiting Exquisite self-care that are using business models that are that that are working for them and that they are sticking to you mind and their clients and themselves that is a you know a mutually nourishing and supported model because I think that for many of us who step into these things.

Just as Dr Sandra was saying we do it because there is a calling in us and we may not be natural business people right I'll say for myself I'm not a natural I'm not a natural business person right this is not the thing and the business had to be right so my models for what a boss was was not all was not maybe necessarily who I need to be for myself so for me how I work is I need to see the examples to understand the concept I need to be with the examples to understand the concept so starting to surround myself with people that were displaying and modeling and being in the world the way that I want to be in the world is the way that I started to get my you know get my feels around how to do this myself I need to get I need to see the examples in order to understand what that looks like for myself.

I'd say keep showing up to these discussions and surround yourself with more people like us who maybe are you know modeling away that helps you do that for yourself I love that I love that so if anyone's watching whether you're watching a replay or watching the slide continue to type your questions in the comments because we are here every month and so we'll take your questions and answer them on the next panel happening in February okay such a great such a great event yesterday.

Righty well in that case you don't control other people's feelings and you have to learn how to disappoint people sometimes absolutely and the point about you know listening life happens right and understanding how to deal with life and what you're hearing whether you are maybe you work for a company or you know a company or you know someone who can benefit from the burnout panel and hearing what is we have to say to you.

Increasing Employee Productivity

In this video, you will discover the delicate balance between increasing employee productivity while mitigating the risks of burnout. Listen to our experts and their real life examples. Prioritizing a supportive work environment is key.

Transcript automatically generated from the video. Please excuse any typos!

All right hello everybody Welcome Back to the burnout panel today we're talking about increasing employee productivity but I think this discussion may go in some directions that you may not be expecting because productivity is a symptom but it may not be the problem so we're going to be digging into that today.

My name is Audrey Holst and the founder of Fortitude and Flow and I work with companies and there are a couple of things that are going to be important to Anchor to during this conversation in order to really understand how we are talking about productivity number one employees cannot run on adrenaline long term and they have been running on adrenaline for the last few years especially High performers especially folks who want to get the work done especially High performers all of these people working and there is absolutely no reason for productivity things that we do in 2023 have to be made in 2023 we cannot be thinking about the stuff that worked back in 2019 and try to get back to there because we are at a different location in time we are at different place in our workplace we are different place with our mind and bodies so whatever works standards existed back then is not going to be relevant to the solutions that the workplace needs now so we have to be honest and present about employees needs right now and thank you for that intro Audrey.

I'm Dr Sandra clinical psychologist and personal energy strategist who is absolutely focused on how do we have the resources we need to actually to sustain this productivity that we want to have right how do we actually create that for our people in our workspaces and how do we help them recognize how things to what matters to them so when you think about productivity you want to actually think about this kind of intersection between the demands are challenges of what you're doing and the skills that someone in the resources that someone brings to it as or as you started alluded including to it people are overloaded that's what they can give to that place and they start to feel like it is taking me twice as long to do half as much twice as long to do half as much so you can imagine that that actually at some point you have people who are high performance and when you're in that space and you're not having resource you don't have the resources you need you actually just start to say I'm not sure I'm me anymore there's a sense of self-doubt that comes and a loss of confidence so in order to help people find this place that some writers are here too and I've got I got this right nowthis organizational Mission also matches something in my own internal Mission so as employers one of the things that's important for helping people to have this sense of flow toYou want to look at how you're setting up the environment for that I wanted to a real estate office last year sometime and they actually had it on the wall their mission and their philosophy I was like so every time you walk in here somebody sees this so whatever their minds are that you can put in place that would support people knowing this is the mission this is what we're going for in this project is a part of making right now involved with this Mission so having people get clear about how their own personal values natural this organization like I mean I know many of us no matter what we do it's like we're at a point in our careers where we don't want to be in places where that don't match our values and this is something we're seeing about younger Generations as well is that people are looking for work that's fulfilling so when you do that you can actually help them make the most of that relationship between the demands and the challenge that they have being flexible some people need flexible work schedules that's another way to help them like stay there stay with it right but the why behind there there is is really important because when you stay in touch with that why that is like a resource inside of you that matches the resource outside of you this goal that the organization has that can sustain you over time so those two things for me I think are the most important things and employers can do are one is to make sure there's flexibility in the environment and then the other is to make sure that there's a clear connection between employee purpose and values and organizational purpose values Mission I think the last thing I would add is something or drink into it to normalize taking breaks and to put in place buddy systems even more people help each other and so those are my thoughts on this productivity.

hello everybody my name is Cait Donovan and I work with organizations to reduce burnout so they can keep top talent which is currently a massive issue when I think about productivity one of the first things that pops into my mind is the study that was released I want to say 2017 or 2018 about the fact that when we are distracted it takes us 23 minutes 23 minutes so slack emails text messages on and on and on when we moved to a hybrid and or remote situation we expected people to be answering our dings all day every day and the problem with that is we're not giving people any Focus long-term not a great thing but on a short-term helps people focus however you can't get the benefit from it if you're aiming to create a focus if you're starting something and then you are continuously distracted so as an employer as a leader if you can create space within your teams that people are allowed to be on do not disturb for period yes exactly I see Rebecca virgin it can take even longer exactly so let's really pay attention to the fact that if we want people to stop and focus and be productive we have to create an environment in which within which that is acceptable that is my spiel for today and I'm going to pass it on to Aileen to give you more.

Thank you Cait. Experience workshops all around reducing stress and improving the employee experience beneath there's this balance rate of being availableHybrid environment and you can't just pop over to someone's cubicle and say hey can I ask you a quick question about this there is the need for those last teams emails Etc we have to find that balance of that deep focus time so what can this look like and what's the sign say around it Doctor Andrew Huberman podcast to the whole Siri behind this is that we can try to work with our systems with work with the way our brains work to maximize that efficiency and productivity so if you batch out 90 minutes to really have your head down and get things done and then take breaks you're more likely to be more efficient with the task that hand and the study show we can then tap into more of that critical things notifications of your employees who can you take that 90 minute Max window and start to think about the workflow and create ways for your employees to have that focused activity time and also maybe maxing out people can't have more than 90 minutes of meetings in a row and then of course you can move things around but there has to be that schedule do things that do not require the cognitive faculties to be online so it's washing dishes if you think about sleep that's the ultimate defocused time if you imagine this akin to doing weight training or weightlifting you wouldn't do 50 sets all at once you would do I don't know I don't like trying but a couple sets you take a break if you're saying yeah yeah you can have that head down time but then you are responding to emails during vacation your sending emails or asking people to be in touch nights weekend you're not walking the talk so specially for managers and leaders this is challenging cuz it trickles down if you say that deep focus time is approved and encouraged but then you're doing things so I am going to pass it on to Vanessa.

So they call me the business the fibrillator because I essentially helped ignite that spark amongst business owners and helping them to empower their own team members and employees also continue that spark and my lovely panelist members here essentially we went into a lot around the low productivity due to burnout right so your employees have low productivity due to burn out from doing so many things but there's also low productivity due to doing so many things that don't give you Joy right in summary your employees abroadokay so going back to the idea of flow right the doctor Sandra had brought up your employee support and I'm going to share a little bit about my experience as an employee when I was in the corporate space in corporate Consulting and working with Fortune 500 the multi-billion dollar companies with you know wanted to make more billions of dollars okay and then I'm going to a solution so the fact is that I like very things when you know you may find this as well too even as a team leader yesI like my work 75% of it but that's 25%, yesterday I was connecting with a software engineer and he had a bit of field for 15 plus years now the senior manager level you know and he was looking to definitely you know move up the ladder as well too to the principal level as well and he had shared that you know 75% of the role he does enjoy but there's 25% he does not and you can see that 25% is what is taking over because that he talks about his job you can see that there's the level of dissatisfaction you know but it's like yes he loves 75% of it and that he doesn't like that he doesn't enjoy now of course with all these layoffs happening whether someone is over performing underperforming he's very much like you know what let me know Rock the bull I'm just going to keep my head down management team hit the goals but you know he's still bored I remember those times when I was born to right maybe you're listening here as a team leaderboard now well guess what your employees your other team members are probably feeling similar things as well productivity your own team the main idea here is that you want to make them come to work you want to make them want to come to work you want to make them want to enjoy what they're doing and that looks different you can do that different ways right if you have a virtual team versus if you have you know everyone comes to the office or everyone comes to the business type of team it's going to look a little different but here are some ideas that some of my you know when I was a employee so for example but for example right one of the former employers that I used to work for today very popular when I was in the Consulting space as well where it's like happy hour right you leave the client office and it's time for happy hour let's all go out for for time for drinks or whatever I mostly drink the water but still it was so fun time activities hey Google as you know that yoga class that many golf in the middle of the day or at the end of the you know end of the work day those are also things that help to shift the mind and provide that break as well too right for your employees and sometimes it's just as simple as for me not simple this may not be as simple depending on your particle structure in your company but even putting a structure in place your company where people can move around or they can take on additional unnecessarily different projects strategy and at some point I was you know working on the US team and essentially so ultimately what happened is that myself and so that didn't mean I didn't do my usual us work but I also then did the US work and then also was able to take on the Canada team but you as a team leader think about like you're connecting with your peers at the VP levels the director level you know what else is happening in the organization do you see that one ofI hope your employees navigate how else can they you know bring that to Joy back into their work maybe you can't promote them but they can still be you know get some joy in and what is that they're doing so I'm going to pass it off.

Thank you so much Vanessa. I'm Dr Sharon Grossman I work with organizations that want to create a workplace environment where employees are engaged productive and fulfilled by addressing and preventing burnout now as you've heard here today there is more than one solution to Bringing productivity up but what I really want to talk about and I think some of our panelists have already kind of planted the sea but I want to take it I want to talk about leadership and culture so I just had a session this morning with a client who tends to be a perfectionist and he really leads with his heart so never would he expect his employees to have the same standards that he has on himself and what we talked about is that it's important for you as a leader to be a role model because even if you don't have those same standards and you're not getting your employees up for making mistakes or not having the kind of productivity that you expect they're watching you and if you have a different set of rules for yourself they're going to often emulate what you're doing and that perfectionism in those standards and there's unrealistic expectations may end up burning them out and affecting their productivity so it's not enough to say everybody has to follow these rules which takes care of them but I'm Different it's really important to remember that you are leaving this entire company and that even if you're just a manager and you're not leaving the whole company those employees that you're leading are looking up to you so you have to take that very seriously and not make yourself the exception to the rule it's important for you to as somebody here mentioned really walk the talk and so what that means is if you have perfectionistic standard you need to start with you right what is it that you believe that creates that standard is it a fear of failure is it I need to prove yourself is there something about if I'm not number one or if I don't do everything perfectly then you catastrophize what that means right think about what it's like for one of your employees and what you would do or say if they made a mistake or they didn't have the best performance ever you probably have a lot of compassion for them and are able to lead them with that compassion but if you're really hard on yourself and you're beating yourself up then that's going to be problematic so we really want to think about the kind of culture that you create through your example and we talked about the idea of not just getting to the goals that you have in terms of your productivity but also think about the Journey of getting there because you can get there in more than one way you can get there by really pounding the pavement and working super hard and working nights and weekends and never taking a break because you've got so much to do on your list or you can incorporate more of that wellness and getting away from the perfectionistic black and white thinking of things where we're really extreme thinking about how to incorporate and introduce a little bit more flexibility and validity so that you have that space to breathe one of the things I talk to my clients about is how let's see make a mistake yes you want to incorporate whatever you learn from that situation so that you grow from that experience but in between the mistake and the fixing of it or the problem solvingyou want to take that moment to just get in touch with your emotions because oftentimes we feel disappointed if you've worked really hard and you experience failure you're going to experience something emotionally so take that time out for yourself to really breathe some Humanity into the experience before you jump into the solution again the idea here is we're not robots and if we are going to be doing this in a sustainableHave to take into consideration the human element which includes our emotions so you've heard so many really great tips here today and I really hope that you take some of these ideas and you run with them and we'd love to hear in the comments also whether you're watching this on replay or live what you're going to do and to just close this out I know we're going to have some q&a's and I'm going to pass it over to Vanessa and then Audrey.

Yes so essentially a question that we got and is do we think that burnout has gotten worse right and I think this is coming from the space of there are you know layoffs happening and such that nature as well too in this world or at least in some industry not all industry but some Industries and there are people you know I think there was an article recently about how a lot of CEOs have you know quit ultimately thoughts here right now I think burnout is first of all we've gotten language around it so May 28th 2019 the World Health Organization decided burnout was a thing so first of all we're going to hear more about it because if you're looking for yellow cards you're going to find yellow cars we're looking for Burnout we're going to find more burnout is also more common to talk about it so we're going to have more people talking about it that being said what I see happening is you know when you are stressed for an extended period of time you go on vacation you end up sick or with a headache we talked about this on our last panel the same thing is happening on a grander scale everybody's stress hormones went through the roof during the pandemic we maintained we maintained now things are normal going to get again things are starting to come back down now if that makes sense any other thoughts yeah I had a similar thought which is that because the pandemic pushed us to change the way he worked so so rapidly traumatic in some sense like a shop that happened so we're at the place now where we're trying to heal it so even though I don't even know probably 20 30 years ago people who work in professional development we're talking about the personal images you do work in a way that sustainable and that fulfills us and that allows us to grow and evolve that's where I think we are so we can't get there without looking at the problem burnout exhaustion you know this sort of perfectionism all these things that we talk about are the pieces that have to be solved in order for us to get to this place where we're working in a different way that is sustainable that allows people to grow and that makes an impact in the world love it love it thank you so much for sharing I see you on music awesome awesome so if you have any other questions if you are watching us and you have any other questions feel free to type in the comments or chat if you are watching the replay because you signed up to watch replay yes then also type in your questions as well we love seeing them in the comments and we'll definitely keep an eye out as well too and oh and said this is a great panel I've gotten a lot thank you Anne appreciate you thanksbut yes yes love love andShared some people think it was just 20/20 but we forgot there a whole lot of other things pre-2020 absolutely right yes absolutely mentioned as well it's like the the topic got a lot more you know steam but I know that I was talking about growing a business without burnout is it before 20 okay you wrote a book on it you know and I'm not okay yeah exactly what Vanessa said we've been we do this every single month so last month we talked about we talked about high turnover rates and that's a big topic and we got a lot of interactivity on that so please head on back and take a look at that our next topic.

Next month we're going to talk about decreased morale and engagement we've got a lot of topics we're going to continue us we're not talking about computers all the solutions that we talk about are human Centric Solutions and these are things that are going to be number one on the list for for people going forward this is not going away this is only going to continue so this is work that the earlier you implemented the earlier you start to get folks like us on board in your organization the faster the better the results are going to be because these problems are not going away anytime soon so make sure that you are following us at the burnout panel make sure that you are registering for these events every single expert in this group is constantly posting really high quality high value and I keep those questions coming we look forward to seeing you again next month.

How to Give Positive Feedback to Your Employees

Embark on a journey to boost employee morale and create a lower stress work environment. Through inspiring stories and expert advice, discover the power of positive leadership, effective communication, and fostering a sense of belonging among team members.

Transcript from video- please excuse any typos!

59%.

59% of workers globally will say yes they were stressed at work yesterday. Only 21% of employees worldwide and 33% or 30% in the US will fall in the engaged category… meaning that they are provided with their optimal productivity for them. So we are here today. Turnover is not a cost if you really need to have new business okay they say you don't have to worry about paying for somebody else so with that being said I would love to introduce my lovely lovely is seemed appears we're going to start with Dr Sandra Lewis.

Let's just think of this whole lack of morale as a signal right something that says things are going quite well in the organization because our employees are disengaging they actually don't feel like they trust you anymore because morale means I'm I'm not really feeling good about this place anymore this is not a great place for me to be there are many things that contribute to that as we know burnout is multi-layer and I just want to touch on a couple of things that that is getting us to pay attention to what's going on right so in the environment we can think of this in a couple of ways the kind of culture that you create but also you can think about what is the structure of the relationships between people and the environment one of the most poignant things that happened noticing how some employees particularly if you have an environment where you have people who are the only right they may be few people of color they may be few women noticing whether or not they feel like they're fitting into this puzzle that you put together of this Talent right and noticing noticing that there are certain social issues that might impact them differently that was a challenge that I hope some employees work through 3 years ago when they felt that their managers were just ignoring the fact that they couldn't even participate the way they usually do so when you notice that as a manager you want to pay attention to that that disengagement that is telling you okay on the employee side it's also important for us to begin to think about how we navigate the challenges in the world and how they impact us because they can combine with the demands of our job to leave us in a sense of loan morale when something in the environment happens at least those feeling hopeless and we're in a workplace that also seems not to notice us then there's much greater chance morale and dealing with these kind of environmental issues microaggressions things where people feel invisible or not cared for not noticed is that you have to get comfortable having uncomfortable conversations get comfortable being uncomfortable you heard many people say it before but we will not end these challenges these environmental challenges that impact people's well-being if we are willing to talk about them it's sort of like you know that that closet until now repeat many organizations it's about nurturing so in this environment we're trying to create a space where everybody flourishes so be comfortable being uncomfortable so that you can actually grow and I'm going to turn it over to Kate with thaton you but we are looking forward to hearing what you have to say so yes all right hey everybodyWhen we want to engage those parts of the brain so that people even on a biological level feel more engaged with their work we have to give people feedback that is really specific so that they actually feel seen so this is building up a one more layer on.

Dr Sandra was just talking about making sure you're seeing people noticing their needs Etc this is making sure you're seeing people and noticing their contributions so you're looking at somebody and you're saying hey I saw you showed up that day Hanging On The Edge and because of that simple thing that you did that was hard for everybody else but you made it happen you really save the day that day really specific feedback is what is going to get this moving this is most important top down so from leadership levels from management levels however there are also here recognition mechanisms that are critical so if you build in this type of peer recognition remember to notice each other and accept praise when it comes in because it will feel more natural there's a lot of software now that you can use for this so you can just Implement a top-down solution manager start doing this people will probably start doing it naturally but there are also a bunch of different options like 6q Kudos that is used on slack High Thrive bonus Lee they're all built on engaging with each other through positive feedback Cycles if we all knew a little bit more of that what we're doing is worthy and valuable and seen and recognized and appreciated everything would be a little better the next person up on my list today is Miss Aileen who does exactly that.

It helps employees feel like their valued by their colleagues by their organization and it's much harder to disengage when you when you see that impact so my recommendation today for increasing morale is to actually go a step further and see how people feel valued by checking in with them and asking them was creating disengagement what is impacting your morale organizations is something you need to to pay attention to we want to kind of note what really matters to people so it could be serving your colleagues your employees but also I just ran a session for a big tech company this week had over 500 people at the session and just noticing what people are sharing in the chat in a 60 Minute session I got a good sense of people feeling like they can't step away from their work to take a lunch break things like that and then we can start to think about reverse engineering that when people share with you permission. Thanks so much Aileen.

Hi my name is Audrey Holst this is a big topic and you know something that came up recently as I'm having calls with different HR folks and managers is that sometimes we think as a company that we are doing a lot for our workers because we've provided them with all these benefits and here's what sometimes happens is the benefits that we provide are not aligned with the needs of the workers so I was just having a call yesterday with someone who said yes and they said we pay their tuition so if they want to go get an education will totally reimburse their tuition and I'm like that's great except they're just trying to like not sync right now so they're just paddling in place they cannot think about how they're going to swim longer swim faster like that's just not what they need right now so it's not enough to throw stuff at people right now what are you doing to incentivize them and they said the resources are the incentive and here's the truth that about 25% of workers never utilize the resources and we know that because people aren't taking their vacation days off right we give them all kinds of benefits they're not using them so a smart thing to do is to also glamify it and to reward them for getting through a number of different resources are supposed to help them prevent burnout be more engagement amazing amazing yesterday.

So we are now at Q&A time so you are listening to chat on anything that you would like to know about how to increase employee around engagement with a lot today Company's not about this colleges around the world to talk about to train team members and your team and your leaders and your management on various things related to ensuring that you are reducing turnover rates and increasing retention within your team and part of that comes with increase in the productivity of each employee each leader and while employment question as well as fill out the form in our chat that we're going to put in right now and with that being said any other thoughts from the panel that any of you want to share here today awesome with that being said imagine some horns blowing right now how to decrease acetism okay how to ensure that your employees are showing up for work and being present and being most engaged when they do.

Chat with you June 26th

Finding Balance in the Chaos: How to Embrace Positive Stress

Plot twist: not all stress is bad.

A consistent theme in my practice, whether it’s in my 1-1 career coaching sessions or workplace wellness workshops, is stress management. 

I often ask my clients if they know what eustress is, and many times the answer is no.

I ask this to participants in my wellness workshops, and recently I delivered a customized wellness workshop to over 500 people and only about 10 said yes… so, this seems like an important topic to discuss!

Here is the American Psychological Association (APA) definition:

“n. the positive stress response, involving optimal levels of stimulation: a type of stress that results from challenging but attainable and enjoyable or worthwhile tasks (e.g., participating in an athletic event, giving a speech). It has a beneficial effect by generating a sense of fulfillment or achievement and facilitating growth, development, mastery, and high levels of performance.”

Sometimes just knowing this exists can help us shift our mindset and feel less stressed.

Instead of demonizing it all, in a moment of challenge we can use this awareness to reframe and remind our brains that we’re safe.

A fantastic deeper dive into this can be done through listening to this excellent TED Talk about how to make stress your friend, by Kelly McGonigal.

She also has a book “The Upside of Stress: Why Stress is Good for You and How to Get Good at It” if you’d like to dig even deeper again.

I’ll leave you with this invitation: can you take a look at all that is on your proverbial plate that is stressing you out, and explore which thing you may be able to reframe and label as a source of good stress, helping you develop and grow personally and/or professionally?

Feel free to let me know in the comments – it can be quite the powerful practice.

Deconstructing the 12 Stages of Burnout

Understanding the stages of burnout is crucial in order to take proactive steps toward prevention and recovery. Join us on this enlightening journey as we dive into the 12 stages of burnout and empower ourselves to prioritize self-care and wellness.

Auto-generated transcript below. Please excuse any typos!

Which stage are you in and how do you ensure you get out of the cycle, the cycle of burnout? Yes, there are 12 stages it's not just that flat-out passed out in the hospital bed or the subway that is burnout there are 11 stages beforehand.

On this episode will be decoding all of the 12 stages for you giving you the science to avoid the later stages and tips on what to do next.

Stages 1 and 2: Excessive Ambition and Working Harder

Starting with the incomparable and amazing Audrey, thank you Vanessa, and thank you for hosting us as always, Vanessa is incredible at this. So we're going to cover, I'm going to cover stages one and two, my name is Audrey Holst I am the founder of Fortitude and Flow and the perfectionist archetypes which is something I'm going to reference in this first stage which is excessive ambition or the compulsion or need to prove yourself I tend to put this under the hero perfectionist archetype so you may find this in people that are willing to work harder than everybody else they don't complain they make it look easy they tend to take on things that are more than what is realistically reasonable and they don't even think about saying no, they just add stuff to their plate and, I know a lot of folks especially those who are really in caring and ambitious perfect professions just like the laws the lawyers that I work with are in this category.

So we start here and what happens is these folks tend to keep pushing themselves and essentially it ends up just amplifying. So, pushing themselves to work harder this becomes the inability to just turn it off right, work mode becomes the default mode so it can be difficult to prioritize in this place everything. Everything feels urgent it's like everything takes on this umbrella of feeling of urgency. Focus in general goes straight to work head down gets it done and there's a little space for other pursuits so this becomes a situation where people have more on their plate than what their plate actually allows for. Just from that description, we're only in stages one and two you can imagine that this is not a sustainable way to work in the long term.

Stages 3 and 4: Neglecting Personal Needs and Displacing Problems

Aileen take it away with the next stages - thank you so much, Audrey, hello my name is Aileen Axtmayer the founder of Aspire with Aileen, I'm a career coach and a corporate Wellness speaker helping people reduce stress and hopefully recover from burnout or prevent burnout in the first place, so I'm going to be talking about stages three and four which are neglecting personal care and needs as well as displacement of conflict. The displacement of personal or neglecting personal care and needs is sounds pretty self-explanatory but it's an important one to highlight because I think this is where we often will see more of the external signs and symptoms in our colleagues and our employees and potentially ourselves so when we take that prioritization of work like Audrey spoke about and it's that heads-down focus one of those common starting points is oh let me just stay up a little later or let me just grab that take out and then when we start to move towards more of that burnout mode, this becomes a significant and decrease in quality and quantity of sleep maybe not feeding ourselves nutrient-dense food, not moving our bodies so all these basic needs that in isolation we might say oh I didn't really work out that time but when we zoom out we can see a lot of them start to take a toll. 

When I work with my clients in this, I kind of draw a Venn diagram, it's like unaddressed work stress then you have less energy right when you're not managing stress and it's more of the distress and chronic physiological stress versus good stress or eustress when that's not addressed we start to have less energy to give and we have less energy, of course, we don't want to cook, no one goes for kale when they're feeling stressed out and then we get more of you know the comfort foods. That lends to the couch being extra comfortable, and then when we are sucked into that couch we don't want to move our bodies we also impact our sleep with those food and movement choices and then the whole thing perpetuates itself. We'll go to Kate to learn what happens when that cycle begins and or continues and what happens next.  

Stages 5 and 6: Revision of Values and the Growth in Shame

Hi, everybody, I'm Cait Donovan, and I work with organizations to do to reduce systemic burnout so they can keep top talent. I do this through keynotes and workshops.

Number five in the 12 stages of burnout is changing in values and we sort of alluded to this Audrey, alluded to this earlier when she was talking about this inability to turn off. Work is the priority, and work is always the priority nothing else is a priority even if those are not your internal values. This is really tricky so you have to start thinking that those are your values until you stop and really look at it. So by the time you come around to facing burnout, it feels as if it just happened without your permission as if you were not in the driver's seat this whole time and sometimes you're not for a moment. Right?

The red flags to look for here within your organization are inordinate amounts of late or early emails, people emailing all the time at 2 A.M and 10 p.m. This persona where the only thing this person can talk about is work. So they stop talking about their hobbies, they stop talking about their families there's nothing else going on in there. Also a frustration with other people who are not prioritizing work in the same way that they are, so this can create some toxicity between your teammates and between people. This is important to look out for that continues and we move on to stage six. Stage six is the denial of problems and the growth of shame. This is where my good friend, Negative Nancy comes in. I want to apologize to any super nice Nancies that might be out there this one in particular is negative in this stage there is cynicism, sarcasm, explosive reactions, and a sense of disconnect.

This is one of the stages that relates directly to the World Health Organization's definition of burnout. The red flags that I want you to look for here are interpersonal problems, toxic communication patterns, and overall changes in behavior to a more negative focus than was typical for this particular person.Moving on to cycle numbers seven and eight. I would love to leave you with Vanessa Zamy.

Stages 7 and 8: Social Withdrawal and Behavior Changes

Thank you, Cait, so hi there, I'm Vanessa Zamy known as the Business Defibrillator, I help business owners grow their businesses without burnout and I'm going to be connecting with you about stage seven and stage eight of burnout. So perhaps you're you know you're not taking care of your basic needs, your values are misaligned, you're attributing to that Negative Nancy that we just heard about and you're saying to yourself all right there's more, yes, there's more. So, number seven is the social withdrawal that sounds very obvious right, what is social withdrawal? When you withdraw from society, now the thing about it is, that there are subtle differences to this, right, because let's talk about introversion versus extroversion, you may say oh but that person's just an introvert they just prefer to be inward and like I'm just an introvert so that's why I'm not connecting with society. When it comes to burnout, how do you tell the difference? This is where you may either hear yourself or your colleague saying well you know I'm not able to go to that event because I have to work on that project or I can't make it I have this family thing very vague or I can't make it my dog needs help just all vague things but that's not necessarily the issue. The issue happens when you're repeatedly hearing these responses every weekend, every Saturday, every Sunday, every Friday, every Wednesday. It's you, they used to say yes, but now they just always seem to be something in the way.

As a business owner entrepreneur, an example of this would be when you're telling yourself or you're telling your friends oh I have this thing I gotta do for business every single weekend. Every group gathering you have something else you have to do right because here's the thing even introverts interact with people and so if you find yourself without any societal interactions then you are on stage seven.

Now stage eight is the obvious behavior changes. Now what this means is that you just act differently, I mean you literally just act differently not even just in society like a social going to events not going to events but other behavioral changes that were alluded to a little bit earlier as well when Aileen mentioned neglecting personal care and needs. That's one type of behavioral change, right? An example is one of my clients where, you know when we had to take a step back to say okay what is it that makes you feel good about yourself she noted that oh I used to swim when's the last time you swim I asked her oh about a year ago, you see how that, you know, works out there? 

And then today I was actually connected with somebody who has a non-profit right, non-profits are amazing she's had a non-profit for 11 years when I was speaking with her this is a potential client we'll see she becomes a client but essentially when I was connecting with her right I can tell the passion was gone. I can tell that she was no longer feeling passionate about the non-profit and she wasn't able to tell that for herself. And you may be in the stages where you're listening to us here today and you're saying to yourself oh I have been a little bit, oh yeah, yeah there's that thing I haven't been doing in a while hmm right? And so sometimes thinking about what is that passion that you need to reignite within yourself so that you can ensure that you're moving forward with the things that you need to with your values as Kate had mentioned or even with you know personal care or needs that you need to have to happen so that you continue back to the behavior change that actually suits you, not the behavior change that is actually harming you.

Stages 9 and 10: Depersonalization and Emptiness

Moving on to the 12 stages of burnout, next up we have Dr. Sandra. Hi everybody, I'm Dr. Sandra, a clinical psychologist, and personal energy strategist connecting you with those resources you need to make this journey from burnout to sustainable leadership and success whether that is an individual or a group, or an organization. So I'm going to pick up where Vanessa left off and talk a little bit more about what happens when you're now not doing what you need to do for yourself, no longer taking part in things that matter to you so much so that you get to the point that's called depersonalization. When you get to depersonalization I can tell you right now you're pretty deep into burnout, you're way down, you're sliding down that slippery slope. In depersonalization, you're not noticing your body anymore, you're failing to pay attention to your body signals at all. This is the person who goes to get a pair of pants from the closet and thinks they can still wear them but then they put them on and it's like, oh so like I really can't fasten these pants anymore. So they've spent months now eating too much not attending to themselves and now they're and they haven't even noticed that their body's gaining weight. Sometimes they also start to do things because they're sort of beginning to stay move towards numbing, they do things that actually will harm their bodies more than help their body. So this might be a little bit extra drinking, a little bit taking part in things that actually make the situation worse, and eventually end up in stage 10 which is called emptiness. This emptiness is actually a stage where it feels frightening because you now don't feel like you're quite alive anymore. You feel very drained and depleted and it's so scary that sometimes people will actually do things to try to make themselves feel alive. So sometimes that's a lot more sweet food, a lot more sex, a lot more drinking. So when you get to these stages, you can see that you're at the point where you actually really need some professional support. In the depersonalization stage, you're probably seeing some physical symptoms like you might have rashes, you might have pains that aren't going away. And by the time you get to this emptiness, you probably do have some significant physical symptoms. You're going to need a physician and you're going to need somebody who's a burnout expert to help you move through this.

Stages 11 and 12: Depression and Total Burnout Syndrome

And then we're going to switch over now and Dr. Sharon is going to tell you about these last two stages of the system that Freudenberger and North created. Thank you so much. Yes, I am Dr. Sharon Grossman, I am the Burnout Doc and I, as a keynote speaker and coach, work with really, really fried exhausted executives and their companies who want to stop freaking out or checking out and I help them rock out. So what we're going to talk about right now are these last two stages because you want to know how far this can go. Stage 11 is where you get to a point where you're just feeling depressed, and I get this question a lot sometimes people are wondering about the difference between depression and burnout so this is a really important stage for us to understand and to be able to pull apart.

Now I am a trained psychologist and so I've worked with people who have suffered from depression for many years and so if you just look at depression outside of burnout what we see is there's a change in appetite, there's a change in sleep that we tend to isolate ourselves more, we experience more of a sense of worthlessness, more inappropriate guilt over things. You might just have that feeling like you're walking through molasses, everything just takes so much more energy and it's really hard to motivate and get moving. And while that is depression in and of itself, it is actually in the later stages of burnout something that we can see.

So we see sometimes that you have both things happening at the same time. What does this mean for you if you are depressed but you're also having certain symptoms of burnout? Then you might be at this stage 11. The way that we can tell if they're both happening or if it's just depression or just burnout is that with burnout when we step away from the situation, it's easier for us to bounce back. But with depression, that doesn't happen. You can be completely removed from the situation and still feel depressed. So this is a big differentiator. 

Stage 12, this is our final stage. This is what is referred to as total burnout. So this is the end of the spectrum and unfortunately, it is very, very serious. So we need to think about it as such. This is where you no longer care about yourself or others. So in the same way that depression is a stage where you get to a point of hopelessness and oftentimes people who are severely depressed will say, "What's the point?" This is what we see often in that stage 12 of burnout. This is where you've just reached mental and physical collapse. You view your life as meaningless, and it really does require medical attention because oftentimes what we see is people become suicidal, they're at risk for suicide. So this is where if you are thinking about hurting yourself or someone else, then we really do encourage you to call 9-1-1, go to your nearest emergency room, and make sure that you get the help that you need so that you don't do something that is going to hurt yourself.

Um, and you know, I don't want to just leave us on this note because this is a very kind of depressing, speaking of depression, place to end. But really, the reason that we're here today to talk about all these stages is to alert you to how really significant and severe this can be. And now I think we're gonna also share with you what you can do if you are experiencing burnout. So I'm going to hand it back to our host Vanessa. So thank you, Sharon, for that, and thank you to our panelists here.

Questions for the Panel

A few questions have come up, right? So we had, we started out with, as you can, and hopefully everyone listening, right, you can see that yes, there are 12 stages, right? There are different pieces and components where burnout is not just you flat out. It's things little things here and there that happen to your psyche, to your physical way of being, to how you relate to yourself internally and externally, that really add up to eventually getting to that point where you are asking yourself, "What is the point?" And if you know someone who seems like they might be approaching that or if you yourself are approaching that, I hope you can see that there's a way out of it, right? There's not, you don't have to continue on the path towards all the 12 stages, and even if you end up at the 12th stage, you can still find your way out.

A question that I have here is, so Audrey, I mentioned something about, you know, excessive ambition and compulsion, and you know, people said they're pushing themselves to work harder and not being able to turn off. What are some tips that you may have or anyone on the panel may have for how people can effectively say no?

Yeah, it's an excellent question, and I think also folks should reference the panel that we did last month because there are some really good tips and tricks. And I mean tips and tricks, to put it lightly, right? This is something that you can't just take one trick and all of a sudden you're like, "Yeah, cured!" You know, like this is something that is an embodiment in the nervous system. I think that maybe as you can listen to each of the stages going deeper, you're realizing that it's not just like a mental thing, it's also a body thing. Once the body starts getting deeper and deeper into this, it becomes harder and harder to pull it out on the other side.

So, creating awareness is the biggest thing here. If you have no idea that you even have the option to say no or that you are pushing past a limit, you have to start recognizing limits, you have to start recognizing needs, you have to start recognizing the fact that, "Oh, what does it mean to be taking on too much?" or "What does it mean to be having compulsive ambition?" These are things that require some awareness before you can actually address them. So, just starting to create some noticing. When I use the framework, the forward student flow framework, it's noticed that is number one because you can't create change until you've actually paid attention. I'm sure other people have plenty of things to say about this topic.

Yes, love it. Anyone else on the panel would like to add on tips on how to, on that person who's facing that perfectionism, in a sense, right? I think that's the perfectionist archetype is what Audrey had alluded to. Right ways that they can, you know, embrace because perfectionism is not necessarily bad. It's not horrible, you know, it's just more so, you know, it can be harmful in this scenario, but it's not terrible, no. If there's a neurosurgeon that's operating on my brain, like please be a perfectionist. So, there are places where perfectionism is highly necessary. The question becomes, is the place where you're applying it right now highly necessary? Is it really that highly necessary?

But for me, before we get to saying no effectively, we have to break down why we avoid saying no in the first place. If, for instance, really commonly with clients, I hear that they're not saying no to people because they don't want to disappoint anyone. If you have a major fear of disappointing people, I can give you all sorts of scripts for how to say no to things, but you're not going to use them. So, I think what we need to do before we start saying no, before we give people the words to say, is to pull apart where is this striving coming from, where is this really happening in your body and in your persona, what's going on here? So that we can unwind it and create space for you to be able to not even then get to having to say no because you're not saying yes in the first place, right?

So, I like this idea of internal boundaries, where we're looking at, especially in my work, we're looking at resentment, seeing where it's built up, and then pulling ourselves out of those situations that aren't even requiring or asking for our help. That's not stating a no boundary, it's just not over participating in things that aren't asking for you. Foreign good point.

Yes, so next question for the crowd here while we wrap up. So, we talked about a few things that we came up with when, you know, Aileen or even when I was mentioning just the idea that you then reach a stage where you're not doing things as you used to do. So, whether that be neglecting personal care overall or maybe not eating well or at all, or neglecting things that you like to do, whether it is swimming or even just things that you're passionate about. So, any advice here from the panel on how does one bring those things back? Right, let's say someone is listening and they're at that place where they have stopped doing stuff and now they're in this kind of new routine that is, you know, it is a routine, right? It's not a helpful routine, but it is a routine. Any tips from anyone here on the panel on how can they bring that back?

Yes, Sharon. Well, I think these two questions actually have something in common. We are thinking about, you know, even in the way that we're asking these questions, we're thinking about our behaviors. How do we do something different from how we're doing it? And I think that we often get into trouble when we're just focused on the behavior because the reason that we've been doing it this old way all along is because there's some underlying belief that we hold. And that may be something completely out of our awareness. It might be a subconscious belief that says you don't deserve to feel good or you aren't a good person or if you don't say yes to other people, they won't like you. So, we have all these reasons for doing things the way that we do them. And so, yes, we can talk about how to change our behaviors. But ultimately, I think if we don't really focus on changing the beliefs that are underlying, these are the things that drive our behaviors. So, we kind of are going against the stream. That would be my first stage, is to just hope you change the way that you think about things, the way that you believe about yourself and other people. That's leading you to do things the way that you're doing them. Once we clean that up, then changing the behavior gets a lot easier because we all know what we really need to do. We're just not doing it. That mindset, that mindset indeed.

Right, and I know we each have our own different fields. Some of us do corporate leadership, others…

I do the business side. Some of us do the early life transition side and all these different pieces. But the common thread is the mindset, right? Getting into the mind and beliefs. Did anyone else have anything they want to add? Oh, yes, Dr. Sandra. So yeah, and I was, um, I had the same thought as Sharon that there's a connection between this difficulty turning yourself off, always being focused on work and self-care. And part of that is sometimes we're in an environment, again with the beliefs, where it is suggested that as a woman, as a person of color, as this or that, you're not really allowed to thrive in this environment. Like you're gonna have to go the extra mile, you have to do more, you have to do twice as much to get half as far. So there's a belief there, and there's also a legacy, and they are also often realities in your environment that do hold you back because the beliefs are not always in you, they're in somebody else's head about you, and that person makes decisions. So you may be fighting something that you don't really have control over. So beginning to help you sift that out and see whether or not you're fighting you and shifting beliefs you can shift or you're fighting some other belief that outside of you is an important distinction as well.

And I think very simply we can all end our day by saying where that I take care of me during this day. Just at the end of your day, where did I take care of me during this day? And if there is no place that you took care of you, then we definitely want to begin to help you do at least one thing every day where you say you can end that day and say, "I took care of me today." I was going to add to that too for organizations, people who are trying to help their employees not burn out. Now, listening for some of the signs and symptoms that we've shared can be really helpful to assess the culture. But really being intentional about the way you're connecting to and learning from your employees about how you're creating opportunities for them to take care of themselves or not, how you're managing expectations of being on all the time and responding to things in a timely manner so that, like Dr. Saunders shared, the other side of the coin for those listening who are trying to create healthier cultures at organizations, what can you do to contribute to a healthier environment that helps get rid of that dialogue that you have to, that the only way to succeed and to be a good team player is to sacrifice yourself?

Yeah, and on that piece of team, I'm curious Vanessa, since teams like it's your specialty, um, what like what would you suggest in terms of that teamwork aspect when it comes to burnout? Because it's a huge piece. Like a lot of this is we're talking about that environment, the individual, but that team piece is like a whole other element. That is such a great point, and it starts with the leader. It starts with the leader of that team because at the end of the day, the team members are following what the leader is doing. They're following what they see or they think can be is approved by the leader, what they see or think the leader is doing. And let's say you are the leader, what you're saying to yourself, you know what? Perhaps I work the weekend, but I don't expect my team to work the weekend. Then you've got to say that because guess what? They're going to do, they don't work the weekend. Oh well, this person, the most weekends. I'm worth the weekend too. And like that way

I can get promoted, right? And being acknowledging that as the leader, you do have the power, you have the influence to guide your team in direction so that they can understand that you know what, one of the values that we have is that you're able to work on your own time or one of the values we have is that you only work nine to five or that if you need to put in extra hours, you put in extra hours. If that's your team culture, do you live your life, but having those boundaries, having those expectations, and making them known and communicating those effectively is what will help your team to align with each other even stronger.

Yes, yes indeed. Great question, Audrey. Um, yes, so we are running a few minutes left, so we're gonna wrap up here and I'll pass it off to Audrey as well to close us out. And for those who have any questions, if you're listening to the replay or watching us during the replay, then I encourage you to react and also, you can also comment with your questions. We will be keeping an eye on the comments as well too the next couple of days, so you're welcome to comment if you have any questions come up or reach out to us individually.

Audrey: Yeah, so this is something else that you can if you're watching the replay, you can click on right away is you've had us, you've heard us talk a little bit about, you know, what is the sort of existing paradigm around burnout, but you can also hear that there have been some updates to this model in a lot of ways and that the work culture has changed and work culture is changing. It's like a living breathing entity. And so everybody in here has been working within this living breathing entity of Team space, individual space, organizational space, working with folks to prevent burnout, to talk about burnout, to educate about burnout, and to help people recover from burnout. So this is a group you can bring us into your organization, we can talk about this, we can educate on this, and you can hear how everybody has their own synergy here, but everybody has individual expertise. So there is a link that's going to be dropped in the chat where you can click on it and you can ask us specifically to come talk to your crew or that you can even ask us questions that you want to have us answer in future panels, discussions like this on LinkedIn or maybe there's somebody that you know whose team might really need us. Well, keep it anonymous, but you know, this is something that you can start to recommend, let people know that this is happening, right? That this is available because this is certainly, as you can see, burnout doesn't just magically go away by itself. It's something that needs some sort of outside intervention or education or awareness in order to create a shift. So you can check out the form, fill it out, and even if you're watching the replay, this is going to be available for you at any point, so save that bookmark, that link. So when you're sitting around starting to remember some of the stuff we talked about today, okay, there is, there are people and there are resources available.

Fantastic. Well, this was the burnout panel on decoding the 12 stages of burnout, and the link is in your comments. Join us in 2023 in the new year as we tackle another topic to get you through and on the other side of burnout. Ciao.

The Greatest Lessons I’ve Learned as an Entrepreneur

I’ve officially been a woman-owned small business owner for 7 years!

Here are 7 lessons from 7 years of my entrepreneurship journey to help YOU in your work and wellbeing.

1) Celebrate your wins… and save proof!

Life is too short and there is always more to achieve. If you don’t acknowledge what you’ve done to get where you are, you’re never going to feel fulfilled.

Save those happy emails and any data of those wins… and take pictures when possible. The photo below is from February 2016 commemorating the first time I received payment for my own business. 😊

One way to integrate this into your regular workday? Start your weekly team meeting by asking everyone to share one win. It builds connection, community, and helps retrain your brain to start to look for the positive.

2) It’s okay, and beneficial, to cringe.

There are MANY things I did when I started that I cringe at now. It reminds me of when I found the resume that I submitted when I first applied be a career coach in 2007 … I had an interests section that listed “the internet” #eldermillenial

We all started somewhere and were novices at some point. If you look back and cringe, it’s a good sign of all the skill development and expertise you’ve gained along the way.

3) Be kind to yourself

Most of us have a feed running in our minds filled with negative self-talk. In a world that pretends perfection is attainable, let’s dispel that myth and honor that we’re human and to be human is to make mistakes.

There are over 2000 studies on the power of self-compassion for improved wellbeing and professional development.

Life is hard enough - have your own back.

4) Ask for help

Oooooo… growth edge anyone? <<raising my own hand>>

My thanks to my best friends and family for being my unofficial board members at the start of my business. This isn’t new advice for most, but my invitation is to explore how much you’re implementing this on a regular basis in your personal and/or professional life.

5) Zoom out

You've likely heard me preach about doing career wellness check-ins. I said I never wanted to have my own business. My interests and values shifted, and I've changed my professional life to align with those shifts.
 
You're not the same person at 43 that you were at 23. Give yourself space to see what you want your work to mean and how it is or isn't aligned.

6) You can have too much of a good thing

It’s less talked about, but you can absolutely burn out from doing what you love.

How can you create boundaries to not let work take over?

7) Live your life

We’re human beings not human doings. You can work hard AND have hard boundaries about when it’s time to rest. When you learn how much happens when we sleep, it becomes clear how productive rest is and how critical a component it is to achieving.

Often, we don't take this to heart until life puts it in perspective for us...
 
Take the vacation. Close the laptop when you’re fried and just mouse-moving. There will always be more unread emails.

Be okay leaving things on the to-do-list and reconnecting to things on your who I want to-be list.

Cheers to 7 years, and to you celebrating yourself more!

What Happens When Companies Lose Top Talent?

Discover the secret to reducing high turnover rates in this empowering video.

Uncover effective strategies and heartwarming stories that emphasize the importance of creating a supportive work environment, fostering growth opportunities, and prioritizing work-life harmony.

Transcript from the LinkedIn Live is generated automatically. Please excuse any typos!

Hello world of LinkedIn - we are the burnout panel, a group of six women with six perspectives that gather together to bring you the best of the best on burnout prevention and recovery practices for your organizations and your lives.

Today we're talking about burnout related turnover and what happens when companies lose top talent. A conservative estimate cost of replacing an individual employee salary this issue and provide solutions that support employee wellbeing. Now as an expert in Stress Management mindset training and burnout prevention, I believe that there are three critical talking points to consider when addressing this issue so firstly it's essential to understand what is stressing your workers out stress and manifest and a whole bunch of different ways like workload work there's different things you can focus can be encouraged to do like take regular breaks you can offer them flexible schedules Etc

Finally it's essential to create recovery strategies that help your employees recover from burnout and of course prevent it from recurring again and those include offering a police time off providing access to coaching Services counseling services and with that I'd like to turn it over to Aileen.

To build on what Sharon said, there can be a special place where we can do this kind of assessment and exploration reviews alignment that comes up in that conversation maybe they just outgrown a skill that used to be you know more engaging and challenging but once they've gotten that under their belts it's not scratching the edge the same way so there's some space to change things around you can be intentional and do some job crafting and maybe explore other projects that this employee job get absorbed by other employees now talk about a reason for people leaving if we're intentional about these chickens we can say okay well yeah you're doing half of that other person's jobs let's look at this and get you back to a place of more equilibrium and it's so much better to be proactive with these conversations helping individuals and organization sustainable success so as I think about turnover, I see it as a signal as a symptom of a bigger problem it could be that there's a loss of interest in the world for some reason their people are being motivated they're not being challenged by the work there's boredom or there's a misalignment between the person in the organization in some way around the values that could be another symptom physical energy you know that's that Vitality that we feel in our bodies like there's any connection to our bodies mental energy that ability to focus to be creative and I know every organization energy that ability to actually feel confident in what you're doing to connect with others to build stronger energy we see all of these kinds of energy go down right very quickly so if you are not being if you're being overworked your physical energy and your emotional energy clearly you're going to be trying so one of the things that we can do as individuals is to really be able to return to our awareness of our own energy another challenge that we might see is this kind of inability to grow up if we can't grow and we don't feel like there's a way for us to advance we also will start to disengage and burn out so as as people in an organization one of the things you want to pay attention to is how our work is giving us a sense of our own growth is it helping us to go to that next place that we need to go in terms of our personal development in our career organization emotional and mental energy.

Lastly I would say one of the key reasons people burn out is that their values are somehow being violated in an organization or they don't have a sense of purposeful about connecting those two things as as team leaders doing evaluations so with energy management we can start to say oh we're going to cultivate our resources in such a way that when we hit these bumps will actually be able to get past them and continue to grow and try to move a mission for right thank you I'm going to pass it now to Dr. Sandra.

I'm talking about support for management thank you so much in your organizationa lot of leadership has been leading by default but the leaders that are needed now need to be better listeners they need to be better coaches and they have to be collaborators so this is going to require a leadership in the work to the workplace to be in charge of their own nervous system right this is something that this panel has a lot of experience about is people beingPretty stress in the workplace which is normal stress is not necessarily a bad thing but when this is basically spreading from person to person and you don't have a leader in charge everybody in a calm and centered and grounded way that's a big deal leaders stress trickles down through the team and having the skills to navigate their own stress is going to be a huge boom to the whole company something that's really important to understand about this burnout panel specifically is everybody here has worked in organizations in some capacity founder of fortitude and flow and this is work that I love to do with companies and individuals so I'm going to pass this off to Vanessa.

Hello hello everyone so the thing about these pressures the individual contributors they are the ones when we say employees they're the ones we're talking about and that is not true this is everyone is you know I thought you prone to this whole burnout issue within your organization right so that's that that my peer audio just shared around 50% of employees are worried about worrying about worry that's not just individuals that's everyone and right now what I do today right is as a professor to that though my corporate experience was in Corpus strategy billion dollar companies in various Industries opportunity questions that you can use to help you as a leader both managed up and also manage down is number one ask yourself and also ask the person who gives you the command what is the specific outcome they are expecting right so what happens that there's so many things to get done in a company specially when you're growing and scaling whether you're at the early stage where you've been around you know 50%why is this information needed that then allows you to understand and even to Define for yourself what could be the best possible outcomeBe done on Monday or do they have to happen tomorrow probably not tomorrow and so with that being said understanding these three things about every time when would allow you to better understand the path that you were given so that you can then better communicate that to your team and your employees so that they can then not worry as much not as much not the same time

hello everybody I work with organizations every day to help them reduce burnout specifically in order so that they can keep the top performers so this is what I talk about all day everyday and the reason that I focus on top performers is because we give a stat right in the very beginning they are the least likely group to ask for help and the most likely group do not I beg you do not leave your top performers behind their Healthcarecame up I was quick and simple today do we have any questions to well question for you today Hello testingOpening door practice is one that allows for reciprocation on the level that you're trying to get at when you go to your top performers and you say to them hey last week I really messed up so and so and either this is how I figured it out or do you know anybody that could help me figure it out you also open the door at least to either ask them or for them to say hey Google whatever you know what how do you what are some signs right that people can look out for that leaders can look out for organization can look out for that they may be at risk of a massive just High turnover rate what is something that people can look out for specifically you're looking for a lack of productivity you know there's always the danger of believing that everything is good because you've been successful and not really checking in and making sure that you you don't need to tweak anything and that's kind of what we saw about those classic example was Blockbuster how they're like yeah we got it under control and then next thing you know they're overtaken by a new industry Giants right so it's really important not to fall into this self-efficacy trap cuz you get into this negative spiral where you think that everything is working just because if you have these top performers you're not asking the right questions and you're not paying attention you might find out later that you're in a lot of hot water.

So I I suggest that companies do take the seriously and explore even if you think that things are okay right now I had a thought about that too there's a book called Power by field where they actually interviewed people who are with cell and they're in their disciplines where they Resurgence or artists or athletes or whatever and one of the things they talked about was this idea that people will do whatever they have to do regardless of how they feel they actually called it a symptom and that when you notice people just continually doing and doing and doing and not even ever talking about how they feel we're in trouble it's like they call it a formula for mediocrity that literally if you keep pushing yourself what happens is everything's train there's nothing left to give but you keep going and then as Cape mentions then your body starts to fail right something's got to give at some point so this ability this ability that we can have to sort of check in with people and say everybody says I'm fine but what does that really mean fine how are you feeling literally you might have to take these conversations I want you to pay attention to those because I know that that's what really drives what's in you that makes this work upI love that one of the biggest things with my hundreds of hours of interviews the perfectionist is that they get really good at putting their heads down and working harder when things are not working they work harder and it to your point it makes it more difficult sometimes to even tellI often I might want to go into a company's and I'm doing coaching I will be talking with people and their perception of their stress is not necessarily accurate to like the reality of what's going on so having those regular check-ins with your folks and and having a collective support system looks like we've got a question here in the comments how to help manage burnout when you're in a downturning organization facing the prospect of having less people when folks are already suffering from the big question actually I'm wondering if Vanessa if you have something to say about that since you're often in me and not space question what I was feeling Etc and it was only I know people were talking about you know checking with your leaders checking with your employees but sometimes in my case it was my leader who was an impetus for me not feeling welcome heard or even that I belonged in that organization right and so it was only when I was able to speak to other people outside of my team and I was able to get so the other mentors you can say or other advisors and other people other leaders and organizations no one actually knows who they are except for you that means they're not talking to people in the company and organization that's a problem like that means that they like they just don't feel like they're like long there or there's so much inside of them that they just don't feel comfortable sharing it all that inside will then build up and it will explode in some form or fashion okay and it may not be a buddy which means that that is a flag send them to Executive code send them to send them somewhere but he was sending the HR even if you're afraid to say about you but send them anyways because it's better to for them to be heard and for them to not be heard and then you end up in a whole situation question on a regular basis because at the end of the day everyone in that sense when everything is kind of going into a downturn it was on the same boat everyone's on everyone should be on the same page cuz everyone on the same boat and so it's just a leader to be transparent and honest it's one of my crisis management is being transparent is being honest is being humble and it's been having to understand what's talking about having to understanding that hey employee he's not looking too great they're just on paper that I'm looking too great however I believe that it can change because XYZ ABC right so don't leave people in the dark keep them in line with what it is that you think it's going to happen and a lot of people during the pandemic they were still able to get their employees back even after they fired them or they put them on hold for them because there was that level of transparency of just okay here's what's happening every week right system regulation so different kind of stressful but still stressful.

It all comes back to how much no matter what's going on can we feel grounded literally turn off flashlight can we assess with really necessary and other tasks projects deliverables that can be punted instead of just saying oh this is what we've always done now we have less people do all the same things let's get realistic here and say let's mitigate us all burning out and what are the things we might be able to put a temporary hold on or punt if you need to be in touch with us you have more questions you can throw them down in the comments below we will do our best to answer them even after this is finished management.

How to Prioritize Yourself at Work

Join the burnout panel and discover practical techniques for effective communication and achieving a healthy work-life balance. Learn to say no effectively and with no regrets.

Auto-generated text below. Please excuse any typos!

All right welcome everybody to the burnout panel discussion for February. So we are so excited about this topic this was something that was brought up to us during our last uh monthly discussion and this is about saying no effectively. Uh this is a sexy topic saying no and boundaries are very sexy topics people like to say the words a lot they like to talk about it a lot but what about actually doing it that's when it gets a little bit complicated. So the reason we wanted to talk about this is it's something that comes up in a lot of levels of organizations this is something that you may be struggling with as a manager as a team leader in the corporate setting in general. If you're an entrepreneur you're going to be running into this all the time if you are on a team you may be running into this. So this is something we want to make sure we cover on multiple levels and there's going to be so much juicy stuff from everybody on the panel today. So as a general reason why say no is important because without it this is where things start to go south this is where you start to court burnout and as we were talking about earlier nobody wants to date burnout. Nobody wants it you know what nobody wants that relationship so people think about about boundaries as building these brick walls and it's going to create this distance between me and other people it's going to create instant conflict. Um it comes right into our hardwired sense of belonging if I say no I'm going to create a distance it's going to get me kicked out of the village or it's going to make somebody else feel bad it puts us in this either or either I win or they win there can be a power struggle feeling here. Um this is something that is going to make you have to admit that you're a human being with limitations you don't have endless amounts of energy to just give away to whatever you want you actually have to prioritize and be able to communicate those prior those priorities. 

So let's jump into the actual solutions of the no and I think that will develop as we go along more reasons as to why saying no and then creating these boundaries is super important to get us as a far away from burnout as possible. Go ahead jump in.

So um I don't know if we want to intro ourselves we've done a lot of these so I think everyone can just pop over to our LinkedIn pages but my name's Aileen and I'm going to kind of start from a place of before we talk about the strategies for saying no which my colleagues have excellent resources and tips and tools to do how do we kind of look at that prevention like we talk about being proactive about this. So my strategy is turning inward to create more awareness of your limits so you're not setting yourself up to only start saying no when you're already taking on or have taken on more than you can handle. So like Audrey said I think there's some shame and stigma around like we expect we're super super human superheroes and that we can just take on  everything but we all are human we all have a maximum capacity so creating a little more space for stillness for silence for just checking in with yourself to even know am I starting to feel overwhelmed. We were chatting before I went live about like oh starting to get a little of that texture of overwhelm so when we can notice that and create the space to really be sniffing it out in advance before we're completely over tired overburdened overworked exhausted burnt out. Then we can integrate some more of the strategies we'll talk about today effectively because if we're already in that place we're going to have less bandwidth less cognitive faculties and then what can be a hard conversation will feel that much harder. So I think Dr. Sharon wanted to piggyback on that and we'll keep chatting from there.

Awesome thank you Aileen and I'm Dr Sharon on the Burnout Dock and I think of this like any other thing. I think there's always two things that you want to look at one is the Tactical of like how do I say no right like maybe there's some script that will allow you to have just like more ease with this idea of like okay now I have something to follow but I think the other piece which is huge is mindset. So if you're a manager and you really need to say no to other people it can be challenging because you want to be seen as helpful you want to accommodate your team members but it's also crucial to establish some boundaries and make decisions that align with your team's goals and priorities. So to do so what I'd like to share is that it's important to actively listen to the request and take into consideration factors such as what are the resources that I have available to me. Um and resources can be your time your energy but it can also be like other factors. Um the impact on other team members the potential consequences of saying yes or no because either one of those there's always consequences to be really thoughtful of and be sure to communicate clearly and honestly with the person who's putting the request out there. Then explain your decision and provide any sort of alternative options if you are going to say no or maybe suggestions that may be helpful. So sometimes it's um well I'm not available to do this but you might ask so and so or I can't do this right now but I'll be available this afternoon or next week. You know so kind of having the those kinds of alternatives is really helpful and so with that I'd like to pass the Baton to one of our other experts because we have so much that we would like to share. So who would like to go next?

I'll jump in my name is Cait Donovan. I am the host of Fried the Burnout Podcast and one of the things that I like to teach people is to build boundaries Say no by being a brat b-r-a-t. Now b stands for beliefs or believe. R stands for resources a stands for abilities and T stands for trust and by using one of or a combination of these words you can formulate boundaries that Empower other people so you end up getting a win-win at the end of the day so say there's somebody at your office who's constantly writing to you to ask you for numbers from a spreadsheet that you have access to and it's not really your job to give them those numbers they could get those numbers another way but they keep asking you and you keep answering so you've created this unspoken agreement with this person that they're going to ask you for the numbers and you're going to provide the numbers but you notice every time their email comes in you start rolling your eyes and huffing because you're feeling resentful that you have to provide them with these numbers and so it's time to create some space there you can say to this person hey I know that I've done this in the past here is the resource that you'll need to do this in the future I trust that you have the ability to use this well and move on right so if you use these words beliefs resources abilities and Trust in some way shape or form in your boundary statements you'll find that they help to give the person who's asking you for something their power back to use their own resources you'll be increasing the level of Trust on your team because you're telling people I believe in you I trust you I know your abilities so this is a nice way to sort of hand things back over without being like no ER ah you know.

Yeah I I love that Cait and I also love that when you set that boundary where you said no I'm not going to give this information and the way you responded to it you said yes I'm gonna give you an opportunity to be self-sufficient right yes so the one of the things I think is really important for us to hold on to particularly when these nose make us feel like stressed and like we're gonna be kicked off the team or the team's not gonna like us that every time we say no to something we're also saying yes to something else and we want to get real intentional about what we're saying yes to and what we're saying no to so the yes you know we can take this on means no we can't do this other thing over here and you can also involve people right in that discussion around if we say yes to this what does this mean about this if you're a team leader you want to have that big picture how am I always how am I how am I keeping this in the flow of the big picture so that as we're saying no right or yes what is what is the opposite what is the thing that's complementing the yes or the no right they they happen simultaneously so you don't actually have to ever be in a poll you can actually recognize right that there's there's a no and a yes happening and what are they and just be present with them and figure out what's the best way to prioritize I think Vanessa has some thoughts about this too.

I would like to say you know at the end of the day folks you just gotta be selfish and it sounds bad but ultimately here's the thing you can't show up for people if you're in the hospital dehydrated on the floor can't move you just can't show up for other people and if that is the if you are heading in that direction then what good are you to anybody else what good are you to yourself so it starts with you you gotta show up for you so you can show up for other people because guess what an empty cup of water cannot share water with another cup if you run out of water in the cup what are you gonna give you don't give any more water so you just gotta be selfish folks and it's okay to be selfish it's okay to look out for number one because that person who asked you for that request guess what they were looking out for number one I know sad to say but they were gonna they were looking out for themselves they said to themselves you know what I want that request done so they asked you because they knew you weren't going to say no because they know you better than yourself they knew you were gonna say no so what they said was well I know such and such is going to say yes so let me just ask them I dare you to surprise them this week I dare you to surprise them and say no period there's no explanation there's no my sister needs me to do this there's no my cousins in the hospital there's no oh my car broke down just say no period and then return your face to your screen and continue writing that email I dare you and you know I think this really goes back to that mindset piece where we have to get around this idea that saying no is bad or that people are going to judge us or that we're not good managers and our job is always to take care of everybody else I think we have to really embrace the idea that it's okay for us to as you said to put ourselves in that number one spot and what I actually see with a lot of my clients is that they're often doing amazing things in the world in order to make the world a better place and to make sure that everybody's happy and taken care of I just I just had a session with a client who was like yeah I started this business because when I was project manager I was miserable and I wanted to create an environment where people are really happy at work and then they can provide for their families and go home and have a nice life and I'm like and what about you because he's the long working seven days a week trying to make this happen right and and he's like oh yeah yeah look that doesn't apply to me so it starts with you it has to start with you right and it's always about like looking at that mindset piece what are you telling yourself that's getting in the way of being able to say no and often there's some sort of I should be doing more I'm not doing enough and I feel guilty and I don't deserve to look for those kinds of statements because those are going to be blocking you and when you can eliminate those it's a lot easier to then follow whatever formulas like the brat method to be able to stand your ground um and I do just want to let people know that I have to bounce off but you've got five other amazing women that are going to continue this so I will see you all next time thank you so much.

Just to jump on on that I think that came back to the creating some space she mentioned looking at those statements but there has to be kind of an ability to zoom out and do some self-reflection to start to notice any of those trends that language the deprioritization of self so uh some strategies on creating some space one would be just for anyone listening I'll invite you to take a little inventory of your day-to-day even look at your calendar how much white space is there if it's just all the color coding can't relate at all uh you know back to back to back I'm gonna guess just to educate a guest you don't have a little space for that zooming out that forest from the tree so it doesn't have to be an hour a day you don't have to be meditating you know for forever you don't have to really change your life around drastically to create that space so it can really fit in with whatever the realities of your life are it might be if you're a parent and you're a business owner and you're whatever and the only time you have space for yourself is when you get to take a shower take a long shower and that's not the most environmentally friendly recommendation but if that's what time you get take that time and without the phone without other people hopefully you get you know beat to yourself there you might be able to start to check in and just see like scan from the crown of your head to your toes how am I feeling in my physical body I think Dr Sandra shows that there's a lot of Clues and data there and then check in on that emotional mental front too so see at your calendar is there any white space and where might you even have two minutes a day to start to turn inward because that's going to influence all your outward actions foreign and I would just like to say all these emotions that you're feeling they are your friend please do not kick them to the curb and act like they do not exist they are here to help you do the right thing for you and everybody else it's just like Vanessa said you go and they're broken falling down nobody you're not helping anybody you're not helping you so if you feel a real no to this thing you got to tune into that because that's telling you there's a problem here there's something that needs to be solved now the problem could be that you're questioning yourself as a leader that just means you're gonna get some coaching somebody's gonna help you you're going to feel better as a leader the problem could be you're also recognizing you don't have enough resources to do this thing well we can do this later when we have resources but do not kick your emotions to the curb they are there to help you make friends with everyone they are a superpower they are a thousand superpowers do not leave them behind wear your cape emotions on it and you know me I love resentment it's your superpower because that's my best-selling keynote and the thing I love to talk about most but Gabor mate says something in a few of his books that he said he didn't even make up he got from a therapist that said when you are stuck in a boundary situation and the decision that you have to make is either going to leave you feeling guilty or feeling resentful so either you're going to say yes and you're going to feel resentful toward that person or you're going to say no and you're going to feel guilty about saying no sometimes this is the double bind we find ourselves in right so it's not so easy just to because either way we're going to feel terrible but every time these two emotions come up if you're left with a choice between guilt and resentment go guilt every time because resentment will continue to eat at you and eat at you and eat at you and eat at you and what happens with when you choose guilt is that most frequently you'll see that people made it through without you so another reason that we don't say no and back to Sharon's ideas about mindset is that we don't we have a hard time sometimes thinking that people are going to be okay without our help and if they don't need our help then we have this sort of internal or maybe I won't say we I'll say I when they don't need our help I have this sort of internal monster that says if they don't need you you're not worthy you're not valuable so we've attached our value to being able to jump in and help people when we can so saying no first of all feels guilty second of all feels like we could be excluded from everything if we're not necessary then we don't matter right so this this game between guilt and resentment the guilt first of all choose guilt because you can handle that better and also the more you practice doing that the easier it will be for you to believe that other people are doing it too one of the like so-and-so is always going to say yes so I have to say yes but when when we start treating each other like adults and saying this person will say no if they want to it means you'll be more apt and more open to asking people for help when you need it because sometimes boundaries are about putting up fences but sometimes boundaries are about opening Gates and letting people in and asking for help so you'll feel less guilty asking for help if you say no when you when other people ask for help sometimes because you'll trust that people will be able to say no to you if they can't do it does that make sense I know that was kind of a lot of ideas in a short period of time but they all kept running through my head as we were talking and I needed to get them all out there.

Yeah I love that Cait and I will introduce myself also my name is Audrey Holst I'm the founder of fortitude and flow and guilt is a huge one that comes up a lot and I love that perspective if we look at the Neuroscience around a lot of these things why we behave the way we do and even the feelings that we have about certain stuff right it's normal our bodies are doing what they think is the right thing for us it's following the pathways that we're found to be most efficient for us at some point and that's the thing to understand is sometimes we we start to have these opinions about ourselves for feeling a certain way just like Dr Sounder is saying right like we have all of these different feelings that come through and when we fight them we actually start draining our own energy because this is information right this is really important for us to understand so our body does what we what it thinks is most efficient and when we start to create change just like when we're starting to say no or we're starting to create a boundary the natural reaction from our bodies and our nervous system is to have some resistance to it because it takes more energy if you have a pathway of guilt then guilt is the easiest thing for your body to go through it's the easiest feeling it's wired that way so when you start to create changes in that your body is going to say whoa whoa whoa hey this is this is asking more resources than what we're used to expending here that's normal so you'll go through this discomfort uncomfortable feeling which is normal it's going to feel uncomfortable and if you can get on board with that discomfort and realize oh the discomfort is actually just my body rewiring a new pathway that can make going through all of these different strategies that folks are talking about way easier and the discomfort.

I love that Audrey the discomfort is also a signal that I'm learning something new I'm growing I got you know I'm stretching a little bit I'm expanding my comfort zone you don't have to step out of your Zone you just can add things to it and as you add things to it you start to feel like okay something new here I gotta work with it so giving yourself permission to be all right with the discomfort is incredibly important fantastic oh don't I know some amazing people here with these tips the burnout panel on saying no effectively right so we talked about first tuning inward are you feeling guilt are you feeling resentment are you feeling doubt what are the emotions that you have within you and really sit down with them and explore the why behind them and then look at look outwardly look at what's happening outside in terms of your leadership preference look at what's happening in terms of do you feel empowered do you feel like your team is respecting you do you feel as though you're respecting you right because then step number three is Take the Lead rotate the lead and respect thyself whether you're using the brat framework that Cait mentioned earlier in the video in this episode if you didn't hear it rewind hear it again and or right whether you're using other tools to ensure that you have that sense of agency for yourself where you are taking care of number one which is you so you can show up for other people okay and then set number four ensure doesn't happen again what are things you can put in place to uh make sure and ensure that you are saying no effectively always and forever and that you are not continuing to knows what what was it that um that Aileen said earlier where she said that texture of overwhelm to ensure that you're not feeling that texture of overwhelm yes yes indeed love will love it.

so if you have any questions for us type it in the chat absolutely and in terms of the burnout panel right so we are here not only on LinkedIn to provide you with tips every month but we are also here a panel of six amazing experts who are here to deliver and help your team and your company grow by ensuring that you are eradicating burnout you are preventing the burnout or you are solving for the burnout that is currently existing in your team to ensure that you are more productive as a leader you are more productive as a manager you are more productive as an employee because when you your individuals are more productive the collective is more productive and the growth can occur and the abundance is what awaits each and every one and each and every Collective that happens and that is why we are here doing what we are doing showing up every month for you.

Oh my name is Vanessa Zammy by the way and I ignite had to find the evolution I never enter myself yes I know M5 evolution by emboldening women Nationwide to leave prosperous Community Enterprises and I'm here as part of the burnout panel because we are here on a mission to ensure that everyone is thriving everyone is thriving okay everyone is thriving and we are going to be back here next month as well too to share with you more insights and actionable tips on how you can combat the biggest issues on burnout.

Chat with you all later.

3 Lessons from Ted Lasso to Help Your Job Search

I’ve already confessed my love for Ted Lasso in my 5 Lasso Lessons to use to create a healthier work culture article.

With Season 3 (finally!!!) being officially teased as “coming soon” – what better way to celebrate than to discuss how this show can bring lightness to an often-heavy thing – the job search process.

Okay… one better way to celebrate would be to rewatch Seasons 1 and 2… this will be here when you’re done 😊

With significant layoffs happening lately, this topic is even more important to discuss.

Here are 3 Lessons from Ted Lasso for Job Seekers

1. Be curious

Photo credit https://tenor.com/view/ted-lasso-tedlassogifs-be-curious-jason-sudeikis-dont-judge-gif-21044956

If you watched the show, you’ll remember one of the best scenes from the series (in my opinion!) being when Ted beat Rupert in darts in front of the entire pub. Here’s a refresher, or a little sneak peek if you’ve never watched.

Random fun fact: I played a LOT of darts when I went to college at Villanova University and was actually fairly decent. RIP Maloney’s Pub!

This mindset can be very helpful when you’re interviewing for a new job. It’s easy to get distracted by the excitement of moving forward after applying and to forget that you’re interviewing the organization too!  

One way to stand out from fellow interviewees is to think strategically about what to say when asked “What questions do you have for us?”

Here’s where being curious comes in.

If you’re interested in and excited about the role, then you’re likely starting to envision and think about the realities of what it might be like to actually:

…do that job

…be a part of that organization

…work with the people interviewing you.

Asking questions about the details of those things will absolutely make you stand out from your competition and show that you’re invested in this opportunity. An example of what this could look like:

“I noticed in the news recently the announcement of a future partnership with XYZ Company. I’m curious to know how that partnership might impact this team, and the scope of work for this role in particular?”

A related note: If you’re genuinely interested in the organization and the job, this is much easier to do.   😊

2. Culture clues are all around

Pulling on this curiosity thread, if you keep your eyes open, there are often clues on company culture all around.

Ted Lasso treats every member of the AFC Richmond organization the same – from executives to the MVPs to kit man Nate. While that’s the norm for a person of his character, it’s clear that when he takes over as head coach that this way of treating others is not the norm. In Season 1 Nate is absolutely shocked when Ted is talking to him, remembering his name, and including him in any decision-making.

Photo credit https://www.getyarn.io/yarn-clip/e5d9a5d2-cdbd-414e-b64e-d27365c88e52/gif

That was a clue for Ted to see what the former leadership was like. For anyone at AFC Richmond wondering how this new coach would influence the team culture, it was clear from the start that outdated hierarchical dynamics would not be a part of the new system and that everyone had value and something to contribute.  

Many clients come to me looking to leave a toxic work environment – but a common theme? They know they want to make a change, but they’re terrified that they may end up somewhere just as bad or worse.

While we can never be 100% sure about what it will be like at a particular employer until we’re employees, there are a number of ways we can try to collect culture clues.

Here are some strategies:

• Look at feedback and company reviews on Glassdoor: I do think of this as being analogous to Yelp reviews for restaurants – you need to have these be only one piece of the puzzle I’ve looked up my favorite restaurants on Yelp and been shocked to see some of the poor reviews – everyone has their own unique experience 😊 That being said, if there are tons of reviews saying there is a toxic work culture, that’s important data to consider.

• Ask questions in your interviews – other than the basic “can you tell me about the company culture” – to keep collecting clues. I approve of the sample questions included in this article with 6 ways to figure out a company’s culture, and the other tips they share are great as well.

• You can also use the interview process, particularly the types of questions you get asked, to reverse engineer and see if they’re pointing to any red flags. If every interview round has multiple questions about how well you handle challenges, lack of information and clear direction, and conflict… take note! Write down the questions you’re asked right after finishing each interview so you can zoom out and look for these themes before accepting an offer. Also, if you arrive early for any in-person interviews, use that time to be a fly on the wall and see what you might observe about employee dynamics.

• Is there high turnover? You can ask how long the person who held the role you’re interviewing for was in it, but you can also do an advanced search on LinkedIn and see if the organization is churning out people. Lastly, I love these 9 “sneaky” ways to keep assessing culture.

One last point on this Lasso lesson: you can also use this idea to your benefit when onboarding at a new organization. Look to learn from everyone, not just those in leadership or roles more senior to yours!

For example, if someone technically “below” you in an organizational chart has been there for 10 years already, they have a lot of institutional knowledge. This is one of the hardest things to learn when starting somewhere new, and something that can contribute to your ability to hit the ground running.

Everyone has something valuable to contribute.  

3. Be a goldfish*

When Sam is beating himself up after a play, Ted shares that the happiest animal in the world is a goldfish because they have a 10 second memory. He then encourages Sam to be a goldfish and it’s perfectly awkwardly received.

Photo from https://tenor.com/view/ted-lasso-tedlassogifs-jason-sudeikis-goldfish-be-a-goldfish-gif-20788379

I put an * on this lesson because there is some nuance to it.

If you’re applying to jobs with a thoughtful job search strategy and aren’t hearing back or never making it to final rounds of interviews, channeling your inner goldfish can help you not take any radio silence or rejection from employers personally.

However, it’s important to not completely goldfish this scenario: if you’re never moving forward in your process, look for the message that might be under the surface.

• Is there room to articulate your background better to connect the dots for employers?

• Can you make your resume stronger?

• How do you deal with answering negative interview questions?

Once you’ve assessed whether there is anything to learn, let goldfish mentality come in to avoid past “losses” impacting your future performance.

It’s much easier said than done, especially if you were a part of layoffs as that can take a toll on your confidence, but fostering job search resilience is key to being able to employ this strategy. 

Surrounding yourself with a community of people that treat you with kindness and cheer you on, when you’re winning or losing, is always a sound strategy in life. If you don’t have your own Lasso-like coach to be a part of that community, feel free to book a complimentary consultation with this coach instead 😊

Happy job hunting, and don’t forget to BELIEVE!

Photo from https://tenor.com/view/ted-lasso-believe-gif-18590055

How to Job Search When You’re Feeling Burned Out

The calendar starts fresh.

There is a lot of that “New Year, New You” vernacular out there and a wiry energy abounds… but we all know that the holiday season is not exactly recharging for most adults (I’m especially looking at you, parents of young kids!).

With all the talk of creating new habits and setting goals, you may wonder how anyone manages when you’re just trying to stay afloat.

If that sentiment resonates for you, you may be burnt out.

Some other traditional warning signs of burnout, as per the OG psychologist on the matter, Herbert Freudenberger, are:

• Depersonalization

• Decreased sense of accomplishment

• Emotional exhaustion

Whether you’re burned out or “simply” experiencing the stress that comes with being in a job you don’t want to be in anymore, energy is a finite resource either way.

So, what do you do with this Catch-22:

You need energy to look for a new job, but your current job is taking your energy?

Four tips for job searching when you’re feeling burnt out:

1. commit to calming your nervous system

   It may sound counterintuitive, but I recommend starting by NOT going all in on job boards and applications. This is how approximately 99% of my clients begin their search before we work together 😊 This approach can easily become a time suck – here’s how it often plays out:

   You sit down in front of your computer thinking, “Okay here we go, job search time!” and then three hours and 30 open browser tabs later you are left questioning what you’ve accomplished. Maybe you started with clicking a link for an open position, which led you to look up the company on LinkedIn, which led you to click on an employee profile to learn more, which brought you to another company page, which…. you get the point. Long story short: before you know it, lots of time and energy have been expended... both of which you typically don’t have an excess of if you’re burnt out.  

   Start, instead, by becoming militant about your stress management.

   This doesn’t mean you need to spend all day everyday meditating. What I mean is, take the step of discovering (or simply recognizing) which activities help you feel like your best self. I’m talking your tried-and-true go-to stress reducing strategies – the things you either already do (or could integrate more), and commit to prioritizing them even when adding a job search to your plate.

   Are you feeling so far down the burnout cycle that you don’t even know what helps you feel better?

   I’m obsessed with the book Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle by Emily and Amelia Nagoski. These are their 6 evidence-based strategies to turn OFF your stress cycle and turn ON your rest and repair mode. The good news? They’re all simple, free, and doable (and they work!).

   A related note for business owners or if you have to plan a lot of content in your work: Tracy Stanger has a Planning Your Year program that I did for 2023. One thing I love is that she has you input your down-time and personal commitments FIRST. We all know those can easily get kicked to the curb, so prioritizing them first then making the rest of your life fit around it is the kind of anti-hustle counter-culture messaging the world needs.

2. Believe in Boundaries

   We’ve all heard about the power of saying no by now, and if you’re burned out you have FULL permission to scale back your committments and expectations of yourself.

   When you feel like you’re treading water, tell yourself that staying afloat is enough.

   No need for any fancy swim strokes.

   In addition to saying no and taking pressure off of yourself, explore creating boundaries at your current job to mitigate additional stress (if possible!).

   I love this breakdown of 10 traits of an anti-burnout employee.

   If you work from home and feel like work just bleeds into all of your time, these simple strategies can help create both literal and metaphorical space between you and your work.

3. control what you can control

   Along those lines, what are the additional sources of stress in your life? There are plennnnty of stressors we have zero control over (hence my strong nudge to double down on the stress reducing coping strategies). But, which might you have some control over reducing?

   For example:

   A. Are you surrounded by negative people – otherwise known as energy vampires – and is there room to distance yourself from them? Here are 6 strategies to protect your energy.

   B. Do you feel exhausted every time the alarm goes off in the morning and if so, is there any wiggle room in your control to go to bed earlier? Create a wind down routine to help “land the plane” of your brain before bed? Here are other reasons why you may be so tired (and what to do about it).

   C.  Are you stress-scrolling and spending time (the same time you feel like you don’t have enough of!) getting sucked into a comparison trap on social media? Here are some free resources to create more screen life balance.

4. know, and keep coming back to, your why

   What is driving you to make a change?

   What kind of impact would it have to stay where you are and not put energy towards this new role?

   If you land what you’re looking for - how will life look differently for you / your family / your friends?

   Being clear about these answwers and having these bigger picture drivers in mind can help you keep perspective and stay resilient through the process.

I hope these strategies serve you in restoring and protecting your energy, so you can land work you love!

Simple but Powerful Practices to Create Boundaries Between Work and Home

Does the term quiet quitting make you want to roll your eyes at this point?

I get it – but it’s amazing to see the narrative shifting and employees pushing back on previous paces of work that are not sustainable.

The best thing I’ve seen about quiet quitting was the following tweet:

The last few years have created opportunities for many people to reevaluate their values. What matters to them. What they want their work to mean – or not mean – to them in their lives.

You can love what you do and work in a healthy culture and still prioritize creating healthy boundaries to not let work interfere with doing the other things that matter to you.

What has been particularly refreshing for me is that companies are reaching out to me to teach their employees how to prevent, or recover from, employee burnout.

My most popular corporate wellness workshop has been my “Power Down, Level Up: How to Create a Healthier Relationship with Your Phone to Improve Your Life.” In this corporate wellness program, in addition to all the tech tips and tricks for disconnecting from our phones, I also share strategies for separating work from home.

These are not mutually exclusive, as often we check work email on our phone, but zooming out on how we think about our workday and delineating between being “on the clock” and off is also important… especially since the lines have become much more blurred with the increase in working from home.

Here are more ideas for creating those sparkling boundaries:

• Set an automated “out of office” email for the weekends to counter the culture of always being available. Still in the habit of checking emails on nights/weekends? If you’re the kind of person that feels you need to respond right away or you’ll forget, you can reply to the email at night/the weekend but schedule it to only send during normal business hours.

• Bookend your day with a calming ritual. Work tends to bleed into times in our schedule that used to be protected as we WFH more. If possible, block off your calendar first thing in the morning (just like when you used to commute to the office and not be available for a call!). Do something grounding to set the tone for your nervous system for the day. Similarly, end your day with a clear signal of “leaving” work – even if it’s just a walk around the block. It does wonders for making the transition in your mind.

• Establish a designated workspace in your home (aka no laptop in bed or wherever you relax). This helps your brain stop associating every corner of your home with work. If you have trouble sleeping but work in your bedroom/bed, this is for you! If you want bonus points, set a cut-off time for work, and shut down (gasp!) your computer and put it out of sight.

• If you tend to set a boundary, but then not hold it, get an accountability buddy and/or set alarms with yourself to check in on how you’re doing with implementing the strategies you’ve picked.

• Eat lunch away from your desk/phone/computer. No more sad desk salads. Food is one of the greatest joys we can experience in this life (no? just my foodie opinion?) but apart from that, we’re not meant to be tethered to our desks for 8 hours/day. I listened to a fascinating podcast by Dr Huberman and he speaks to ultradian cycles when prepping a new workshop “Retraining Our Brains and Attention Spans” for a Boston corporate wellness client. The takeaway is this: our brains actually max out at 90 minute work cycles - and even that length is a stretch for our focus at first. Whether you want to nerd out on the science or not, it’s there, and it says you’re more productive if you walk away and take that break.  

• If you need boundaries between yourself and people, here’s a post I wrote on 6 Strategies to protect your energy around negative people

There are plenty of other strategies I recommend in my 1-1 coaching and workshops, but sometimes less is more so I’ll leave you with these.

If you want to try one and/or you already have something that you know helps but you’ve fallen out of the habit, I can’t recommend the book Atomic Habits by James Clear enough!

What’s your favorite way to separate work and home? What boundaries have you created that have created more harmony in your life?

5 Ted Lasso Lessons To Use To Create A Healthier Work Culture

The Apple TV+ show, Ted Lasso, will forever hold a most special place in my heart.

I first started watching thanks to the encouragement of my mother. At the time, she was enduring treatment for stage IV non-smokers lung cancer during a global pandemic… so basically, she was trapped at home feeling like garbage and was a prime candidate for both entertainment and some cheer. 😊

She and my brother swiftly ripped through the first season, and every time I would travel to the home I grew up in in Connecticut to take care of and visit her, she’d rewatch episodes she had seen at least twice already so that I could catch up.

Before the second season dropped, our entire family counted down to it with incredible anticipation. When we found out they were only going to release one new episode per week, we were frustrated with the news at first (who doesn’t love to binge their favorite show?!).

It ended up being the most precious gift for us all.

Each week we faced medical complications, side effects, treatments, and often bad news. This show gave us something to look forward to – some light in the darkness that made up those days – and for that I will be eternally grateful.

It’s a great reminder of one of the many lessons the show imparts on its viewers – we all have much more power to create a positive change on the lives of each other than we realize.

Whew! Now that you know the depths of my love for this show, let’s get into some of the other lessons and how they can inspire us to create a healthier workplace.

Lesson 1: We don’t always have to change everything - sometimes listening can be just as impactful

When the legendary Roy Kent finally gives in and seeks out the “Diamond Dogs,” he’s surprised that they don’t offer advice and/or fix his problems. The conversation goes a little like this (after removing his signature expletives!):

Roy: Wait. So sometimes the Diamond Dogs is just chatting about stuff, and no one has to solve anything and nothing changes?

Ted: Sometimes. Yeah.

Roy: That's cool.

It all comes down to the power of connection and mindful listening. Sometimes, your employees and colleagues just want to be heard.

If you’re trying to make changes – big or small – in your organization to create a healthier culture, start from a place of being attuned to employee needs. This makes it much more likely that the changes will not only land well, but will also be impactful.

When it comes to 1-1 conversations, the question “How can I support you?” provides an avenue for this kind of discernment and getting to the root of what people want and need.

Image via GIPHY

Lesson 2: PLAY is powerful

In season 2, Isaac becomes Captain of the team and starts to lose his competitive edge. Roy tricks him into playing a nighttime pick-up football (soccer) match with young players, and there, Isaac remembers that having fun is why he started playing in the first place. When he taps into that innate joy, his performance elevates as well.

This demonstrates how playfulness and joy can impact many areas of our lives. My “The Power of Play” corporate wellness workshop covers how to infuse more joy and perspective into our lives. There is some interesting research on how play helps adults with resiliency, productivity, creativity, problem-solving and more.

When it comes to the workplace, there are two ways to explore integrating this concept:

1. Can you create more moments for this amongst teams? Some companies try by having foosball tables and axe-throwing events, but referring back to Lesson 1 here, it’s good practice to see what fun means to your employees first

2. Can you encourage this by creating more room for employees to do it on their own time? Especially if you’ve educated them on the power of play, perhaps creating a yearly “Friday Fun-day” where they have one full or ½ day off. This gift of time could demonstrate how serious a company is about facilitating more joy for their employees    

Image via GIPHY

Lesson 3: Mental health is physical health

That same season, Ted’s panic attacks are made public. He leans in and takes the opportunity to speak with the press about the importance of mental health and reducing the stigma around when people struggle.

This is another big lesson many organizations have learned over the last few years.

With rates of anxiety and depression rising 25% globally over the last 2 years, facilitating a culture where employees feel safe, supported, and able to access the resources they need to restore their mental health is critical.

What support tools does your organization have and how are those communicated to employees? In terms of prevention, what programming and tools are provided to employees to support their physical, mental, and emotional health, as we know they are all connected?

Lesson 4: We can’t control how others act, but we can control how we respond and model the behavior we’d like to see

This lesson is a core tenant in meditation and mindfulness practices, and it plays out on the Ted Lasso screen time and time again.

Ted appears, at times, impervious to the harsh words from AFC Richmond fans and the press. He repeatedly responds to criticism and negative energy with his trademark optimism and one-liners. 

If you’re in a workplace where you’re dealing with a difficult colleague/culture, one way to keep yourself grounded is to embody this mindset.

But what about applying this same notion to create a healthier workplace?

We know by now that company culture is contagious – which is great when it’s a healthy and positive one, and not so beneficial when it’s a culture of burnout and toxicity. Given this, we want to be mindful of what we’re “spreading” and how our behaviors contribute to these cultures.

For leaders, it is even more important, as tone trickles down. For example, let’s take this scenario:

Leaders encourage employees to take their vacation days and really disconnect (to reduce stress, prevent burnout, and aim for more work life harmony), BUT when they themselves are out of the office, they’re still attending meetings and responding to emails.

That mixed message has a powerful impact on an employees' ability to trust that it’s okay to truly disconnect.

If trying to create a healthier workplace, leadership needs to “walk the talk” and be offline, otherwise the status quo will remain. And while we can’t make an employee really disconnect when they’re on vacation, we can model that it’s not only acceptable but encouraged behavior… and that may make all the difference.

Lesson 5: No matter our job title, there is always more to learn and more ways to grow

In Season 1, Ted relied on “kit man” Nate (a colleague typically ignored by many, and in an organizational chart, a “lower-ranked” employee) for an important idea that impacted the whole team. Ted’s ability to not only be open to feedback and ideas from others, but also his active solicitation of it is a great example to follow.

A healthy workplace is one where we recognize that all people can add value, not just the highest ranked employees.

Whether formally, through things like 360 reviews, or informally, through the way we treat one another in everyday interactions, how does your organization embody this simple yet powerful principle?

I hope these Lasso Lessons inspire you to explore ways you can integrate more wellness into your workday to create a culture where employees feel valued.

Want to learn more about how I support companies in creating wellness programming with this mission in mind?

Reach out for a complimentary consultation and let’s talk more.

Image via GIPHY

Finally, as a parting bonus, if you like to listen to music while you’re working, here’s a playlist I made from the soundtracks of both seasons. The songs are mostly instrumental, and the overall energy of the playlist is relaxed. Cheers!

Texting and Typing a lot? Simple Stretches to Show Your Wrists Some Love

International Day of Yoga was in June, and what better way to celebrate than with moving our bodies.

We know the importance and benefits of keeping active and maintaining joint mobility, but most of us don’t pay attention to how tiny repetitive movements impact our physical health.

Most of us spend hours every day texting and typing, but how often do we take care of our wrists which bear the brunt of those movements?

Practicing small exercises daily can improve your wrist mobility, ease tension, and prevent future injuries. This short but effective video shows you some simple stretches you can do anywhere, any time.

I often teach micro-movement breaks like this at companies (it’s especially a welcome pause during a long all-hands or off-site meeting!). It’s a joy to show employees how accessible taking care of our bodies can be, even in a full workday.

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Let me know if you have any questions!

If you’d like more simple ways of counteracting the aches and pains that come with sitting and stress, you can grab my complimentary guide here.

3 Ways to Support Your Employees' Mental Health

Mental Health.

This phrase has been in the headlines more in the last 2 years than ever before.

But what is it really, and how can we continue the conversation to ensure we create cultures at companies that foster a more open dialogue about something that has been stigmatized for so long?

In this article we’ll…

• define the difference between mental and emotional health

• discuss how to normalize the fact that life is not always easy and that we all need different kinds of help at different times

• explore 3 specific ways to support mental health in the workplace

What is mental health?

The American Psychological Association (APA) defines mental health as “a state of mind characterized by emotional well-being, good behavioral adjustment, relative freedom from anxiety and disabling symptoms, and a capacity to establish constructive relationships and cope with the ordinary demands and stresses of life.”

When I talk about this topic in my corporate wellness workshops, I like to point out the word “relative” in that definition. This is a small but strong word choice!

The goal is not to live a life free from anxiety, and wellness does not mean never having hard experiences interfere with the rest of your life. That’s impossible, as to be human is to suffer.

This may not be the cheeriest thing you’ve read all day, but it’s true. 🙃

The APA even somewhat acknowledges this by saying there are “ordinary demands and stresses of life” as to set the stage that it’s not about never being stressed, it’s about how you cope with inevitable stress.

The World Health Organization (WHO) and others are doing their part of expand upon the definition of mental health and emphasize this point: that mental health is more than just the absence of mental illness.  

What is the difference between mental health and emotional health?

I adore the work of Psychologist Dr Guy Winch, and he makes the delineation clear by stating “Mental health is about diagnosable conditions like depression and anxiety. Emotional health is about common experiences like loneliness, failure, and heartbreak, the non-diagnosable stuff.”

I highly recommend checking out his TED Talks, especially “Why we all need to practice emotional first aid.”

In this talk he describes how there is no health without mental health, and notes “…how much we favor our physical health over our emotional health. For example, if we get a cut on our arm we can tell just by looking at it whether we need a bandage, a stitch, or an ambulance. But when we sustain an emotional wound like rejection or failure, we have no idea how to gauge whether the wound is deep or whether it requires emotional first aid and few of us would know how to ‘treat’ it ourselves if it did.

As a psychologist I find that unacceptable. Our physical health and our emotional health are the twins of our general wellbeing, and as such, we should treat them equally.”

This analogy is powerful – emotional/mental pain and dis-ease can interfere with out lives just as much, sometimes more, than the physical. It’s time we not only acknowledge that but also create better ways of caring for and promoting healing in this space.

Why does this conversation matter?

Both mental and emotional health have taken an incredible toll while people have navigated the turmoil of the last few years. The APA definition above refers to “ordinary demands and stresses of life” – we all know that the circumstances we have all faced recently have been far from ordinary. It’s no wonder the data shows people are struggling to cope.

Rates of depression and anxiety climbed globally by more than 25% in 2020. Recent events aside, in the US there has been a steady increase in rates of mental illness and a lack of people seeking treatment for some time now.

This mental wellness quote sums this up well:

Source: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/the-squeaky-wheel/201602/if-emotional-first-aid-were-dress-it-would-look

We spend 1/3 of our lives at work. Given this, creating space to take care of our mental and emotional wellbeing at work is a must to create meaningful change.

With the economy shifting, many are worried that as budgets tighten, the progress that has been made in this space will regress. Ariana Huffington is one of those people, and she is encouraging employers to continue to take mental health and wellness seriously as the world continues to change.

With all of this in mind, and a better understanding of what mental health is and why this conversation matters…

Here are 3 ways to support your employees' mental health 

1) Communication

One way to encourage employees and colleagues to take care of their mental and emotional wellness is to create a safe space for them where they feel supported and seen. Honoring that we’re all humans and not simply work-horses can go a long way in this regard.

In one of her podcast episodes, the inimitable Brené Brown shared that she does the following at her company:

“We start every meeting with a two-word check-in. We take turns sharing two words that describe how we're feeling that day. We all have the human need to see others and to be seen. The realness connects us.”

Source: https://twitter.com/BreneBrown/status/1336363448507260928/photo/1

I love this practice because it’s a way of seamlessly integrating mindfulness and self-compassion into the workday (two tools that have a plethora of evidence supporting their ability to improve mental health.)

Being asked to name our feelings (…which is easier said than done!) and being given the time and space to turn inward to find the answers is such a caring gesture. Sometimes, it can be all you need to notice that you may not be doing that well. With that awareness, you’re much more likely to take action to feel better. A simple practice, with potentially powerful results for one’s mental wellness.

Another easy way to facilitate an open, accepting culture is through keeping these conversations going (not just once month/year!). Some people are apprehensive about doing so, and that’s understandable especially since most societies haven’t equipped us with much practice to approach these kinds of exchanges.

Two strategies?

The first is to practice mindful listening. It’s really about listening and giving people the chance to have someone hold space for them to show up as they are, and less about what you say. In fact, sometimes saying nothing beyond the sentiment of “I’m here to listen if you want to talk” can be more than enough. Listening doesn’t mean you’re taking over the responsibility of solving any issues, and you can (and should!) refer people to connect with their Employee Assistance Program and any other internal resources equipped to support employee wellness.

The second strategy is to check out the Harvard Business Review article on how to be a mental health ally.

2) Offering and modeling behaviors that facilitate mental wellness

There can only be so much change without buy-in from leadership. If leaders model behaviors that can help prevent burnout and create more work-life harmony, employees will believe that it’s okay for them to take time to take care of themselves. What does this look like in practice?

• Offering mental health days

• Encouraging people to use their sick time when they’re sick (sounds simple, but think of how many people you know who “work through it” and explore why that’s the case).

• Creating a policy where employees must take a minimum amount of vacation days

More than that, having leaders demonstrate how to disconnect by not sending emails or being in meetings when they’re out of the office can show that time away is meant to be AWAY!

Apart from vacation, leaders can demonstrate boundaries between work and home life by not emailing or sending Slack messages at all hours. This can foster a more balanced and less stressful culture, which influences the mental and emotional health of employees.

I know this is easier said than done, but that’s why I talk all about how to implement these practices in my Power Down, Level Up: How to Create a Healthier Relationship with Technology to Improve Your Life workshop!

Speaking of which, the third example of how to support your employees’ mental health is through

3) Customized corporate wellness programs

One of the reasons I love offering corporate wellness workshops in Boston and beyond is because I get to help organizations support all areas of their employees’ health and wellness.

Want to help employees take care of their minds and bodies? Let’s do some yoga and/or meditation.

Want to teach employees how to manage their stress and connect with their colleagues (reminding them that they’re not alone, and showing them that their employer cares since they’re offering these sessions)? Let’s run some customized corporate wellness workshops on the topics you’ve seen employees struggling with, including sleep, nutrition, and more.

The above HBR article shares that:

“Group self-care activities in the workplace promote peer-to-peer engagement. Popular activities include exercise and fitness classes, healthy meals, meditation, and mindfulness programs. These experiences also foster more in-person conversations, which can facilitate discussions about mental health. Sometimes people with mental health challenges find it comforting to do things with colleagues that aren’t directly focused on mental health; many fear the loss of such social connections due to their issues. Extracurricular activities organized around a shared interest or affinity can create a space in which to create connections with other employees that facilitate engagement.”

If you’re interested in learning more, you can reach out to consult about the corporate wellness workshop needs at your organization.

These sessions not only provide people with the tools they need to feel better; they also can be a means of preventing employee burnout from the start – which is a topic we could spend an entire article on 😊

For the sake of brevity, instead, here is the Australian Government’s National Workplace Initiative (NWI) from their National Mental Health Commission. “The NWI provides a nationally consistent approach to workplace mental health” and the blueprint they share is an incredible resource to use when thinking about both the management of and prevention for mental health challenges.

If you want to dig deeper into this topic, feel free to reach out as I’m happy to point you to additional resources and providers based on your interests.

Here’s to greater wellness, in all of its forms, for all!

Job Search Stress... and How to Effectively Manage It!

April was Stress Awareness Month, but around here we talk about managing stress on a regular basis!

I hope you enjoy this conversation and get what you need to reduce stress and land work you love!

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One major contributor to stress for many people is their jobs (where we spend about 1/3 of our lives).

For some, the job search process itself is one of the most challenging experiences they have in their professional world.

The stress can arise from any number of parts of the process, and manifests in several ways. I’m guessing that if you’ve ever been on a job search, at any time in your life, you know the stress that it can bring!

These are some of the most common questions I have seen stress out job seekers:

• What do I want to do in my career / what kind of job do I want?

• What type of organization will have a culture that aligns with my interests and needs?

• What am I qualified for?

• What do I even write on my resume?

• Do I need a cover letter?

• How do I actually spend my time in my job search and what do I need to do to hear back from employers?

• How do I connect my experiences and relay it clearly in an interview?

• When and how can I follow up with someone after interviewing?

• How do I negotiate the salary in an offer?

…and more!

When I work with clients, I not only help them with these tactical topics, but I make sure we address their overall stress management in life.

We explore how they can take care of themselves to have the energy and ability to execute on all of the components that make up a successful job search strategy.

I sat down (virtually!) with my wonderful colleague Becca Carnahan to talk about some of the ways to manage job search stress. It’s always such a joy to connect with my career coaching colleagues and see all of the ways that job seekers can get the support they need.

Practicing Yoga at Home? Try these Simple Neck Streches

April was Stress Awareness month, and May is Mental Health Awareness month. They're beyond connected, of course, and being in a chronically stressed state has a negative impact on our mental health.

The first step to addressing both of these is awareness- when we understand how we're feeling (mind and body) and what our stressors are, we can then take action.

One element we can become more aware of is where we hold stress in our physical bodies. For many, it's often in our jaw, neck, and upper back.

My invitation for you is to
1) take a few breaths and a moment for yourself today... where do you notice stress manifesting in your body?
2) Try this release and see how you feel!

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If you’re curious about learning more of the science behind how our bodies hold onto our emotions, there is a fascinating book called The Body Keeps the Score. It’s certainly not a light read, but can help illuminate how these two things are connected and what we can do with our bodies to help move our emotions.

In the book Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle, the Nagoski sisters walk through this concept in detail as well. It’s a favorite book of mine and I adore their voices and the very simple yet evidence-based and practical strategies they share to release phsyiological stress from our bodies, freeing our minds in the process. The strategies are summarized in the link above.

They highlight movement as one of the most efficient and effective ways to do just this - so that’s my final nudge for you to explore this stretch and any other form of movement that feels good to you!

Feeling Some Burnout? Try this Breathwork as a Morning Meditation

This breathing exercise has been a favorite of mine ever since Boston yoga instructor David Magone first introduced me to it back in 2012… a casual 10 years ago 😊

There are variations for the flow and hand positions, but the gist is the same: alternating breathing out of one nostril at a time.

I have found that even when I’m teaching it, I feel calmer after only a few cycles, so I’m not surprised that there is research to support the benefits this has on our nervous systems (check out PubMed to see some).

I find when I’m teaching corporate wellness workshops to help address employee burnout, breathing exercises seem to be the most popular and can sometimes be less intimidating when people are coming to the session without an existing mindfulness practice.

Breathwork IS a form of meditation!

When people experience the physiological benefits that come with the specific breathing practice at hand, those positive feelings and impact can motivate them to come back and do more.

As with any habit, feeling that reward makes it much more likely to be something you repeat!

If you’d like to pair this with music, here’s a link to a meditation music playlist I created.

Anyone else a Nadi Shodhana fan?

Or if you’ve never done it, let me know how it feels if you try it out!

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3 Benefits of Working with a Career Coach

You might think this post is going to be very biased since I’ve been a career coach for well over a decade now.

While of course I can’t remove that lens, I know what it’s like to be on the other side of the table, too!

It was through working with a career coach myself back in 2005 that I discovered this path.

I was at a crossroads. I realized I didn’t want to be a teacher – something I worked towards for almost 4 years of college already, and my go-to reply whenever anyone asked, “What do you want to be when you grow up?”.

Feeling completely overwhelmed and stuck, and then finding my way after working with this coach, was an incredibly formative experience. What I learned from being a career coaching client myself is influencing what I’m sharing here as well.

This post is aiming to answer a lot of the common questions I see when prospective clients originally reach out to me for a complimentary consultation. There is often a period of a lot of stress, nerves, or anxiety before people end up reaching out, so my goal is to provide tons of information so no matter which coach you explore working with, you have a good sense of things and feel more excited than nervous 😊

With all of that in mind, let’s get into 3 of the benefits of working with a career coach!

1) You get to talk about yourself with an un-biased person who has your best interests in mind

When you’re working with a coach, you’ll notice a difference in the way they listen to you compared to how it feels when your friends and family listen (no offense, friends and fam!).

Not only will they be fully engaged, attentive, and attuned to what you’re saying, they’ll ask lots of follow up questions to dig deeper and learn more. In addition to this open and mindful listening, a coach has no ulterior motives steering them to encourage you to make a particular decision.

In fact, most coaches won’t even tell you what decision to even make! They’ll reflect back what you’ve shared, what they have heard you articulate as your values, interests, and drivers, and help you to connect the dots you may be too close to the situation to see.

Their true goal is to help you feel empowered, informed, confident, and supported enough to make a decision that feels right to you based on what matters in your life. A coach can help you see the forest from the trees when you’ve potentially gotten caught up in the opinions of others, which are usually well-intentioned but clouded by the values of those people.

Here is how a former client of mine shared how this felt for her:

“While Aileen is amazing in so many ways, I think one of her most outstanding qualities is her ability to listen. Aileen never told me the job she thought I should want - she always made sure that my career decisions reflected my passions and aspirations.” – Megan Quill

I’ve had previous clients joke with me that they feel like I’m their therapist, which is (definitely not what career coaching is!) so flattering as it illustrates just how heard and supported clients can feel when working with a coach.

2) They hold you accountable

This may be the most valuable benefit of working with a career coach!

For some people, having an external source of accountability as they work towards a goal in their lives can make or break their progress.

You may know this about yourself already, but if you’re wondering whether or not you’re one of those people – or if you just want to learn more about the kind of structure that enables you to maintain momentum when working on something – I highly recommend taking the four tendencies quiz by Gretchen Rubin.

If you’re curious about diving into the four tendencies more, you can read this article about how understanding your tendency can help you improve your life. Gretchen has also been on countless podcasts and written many other articles in addition to her books.

Image is from https://gretchenrubin.com/podcast-episode/podcast-120-happier-four-tendencies/

I’m an “obliger,” which is the most common tendency, and Gretchen states that “Obligers meet outer expectations, but struggle to meet inner expectations. They’re motivated by external accountability; they wake up and think, “What must I do today?”

I can know that I need and want to move my body, but if I don’t sign up for a yoga or barre class, I’m much less likely to do it. I can know that I need to take time to focus on marketing my business, but not do it until I work with a marketing consultant who is checking in on my deadlines and progress.

(Yes, I’m a coach who basically loves having coaches herself!)

This is part of why we see group fitness classes, personal trainers, business coaches and more being so popular – for most areas of life there is likely a solution that involves creating external accountability for it.

When you work with a career coach, you have a dedicated person invested in your professional success who is there to give you the tools and create the structure needed for you to succeed. That accountability stops the cycle that is common for countless people - wanting to prioritize your career development but often having it fall at the bottom of your to-do list because life gets in the way.

When I work with my career coaching clients, I ask them what kind of accountability feels good for them. Questions I ask most often include:

• Do you want to set a deadline to do these action items by and if I haven’t heard from you by then I’ll check in?

• Would you prefer to schedule our next session, so you force yourself to have to have updates by then and see a goal on the calendar?

Every person, their style, and their life circumstances look different, so I meet each person wherever they are based on the kind of support that makes them feel good.

If you know you thrive when there is external accountability, what areas of your life have you implemented this and how has it helped you move forward?

3) They offer reliable resources and bring structure to a structureless process

Another benefit of working with a career coach is having a reliable, knowledgeable go-to source to answer all the million questions that come up throughout your job search. Questions such as:

• What should be on my resume vs my cover letter? Do I really need to write a cover letter? How long should a cover letter be? And Who do I address my cover letter to?

• I haven’t updated my resume in forever… what do you even put on them anymore?

• How do I follow up with an employer after an interview if I haven’t heard anything?

• What’s the best way to prepare for an interview?

• How do I answer the “what’s a weakness” or “tell me about yourself” questions?

• I have a LinkedIn profile but I haven’t updated it in years and I’m not really sure what I’m supposed to do on there anyway… help?

• Is it okay to negotiate the salary offer?

• I got an offer from one company but I’m waiting to hear back from another that I like more... what do I do?

Instead of spending hours googling the answers, and getting lots of conflicting advice, you have an expert in your back pocket. Moreso, someone who understands you, your background, and your personality so they’ll tell you the best practices but also help create some workarounds if a typical approach doesn’t align with your comfort zone.

Additionally, many people feel overwhelmed when job searching. They’re not sure where to start to create a job search strategy, what to focus on, and how to spend their energy efficiently to get the best momentum and results. They may come out of the gate strong but then if they’re hearing crickets after applying they aren’t sure what to do next.

Working with a career coach will help you create structure and efficiency in an often structureless process, so you can get results, and, get back to the rest of your life.

Now that we’ve exhaustively covered the top 3 benefits of working with a career coach, let’s delve into what it actually looks like to work with someone.

What to expect when working with a career coach

One of the most common questions I get from people is “So… what… does... it actually look like?! What do we really do if we were to work together?”

Which always makes me think of this scene from Office Space:

The answer depends on two things:

1. you and your unique situation and

2. the coach

In my practice, if you’re in a good groove and just want an extra pair of eyes on some application documents, a refresh on job search strategy or interviewing, and a sounding board, I typically recommend we focus on 1-1 appointments. These are done via zoom, phone, or in person as you feel necessary.

This means I’m here when you need or want to connect, cheering you on and checking in in the ways you’ve said feel good for you, but we don’t have a regular standing meeting filling your calendar.

If, on the other hand, you’re feeling rusty on all things job search, overwhelmed with how to proceed, and/or know you thrive with more support and accountability, I supplement those 1-1 sessions with “on demand coaching.”

I created five comprehensive learning modules with an arsenal of resources (videos of me teaching you what you need to know, workbooks, templates, guides) for each step in the road – figuring out your path, updating resumes and cover letters, LinkedIn, interviewing, taking care of yourself while doing this work, and more.

With instant access to this kind of coaching, you can chip away at your job search on your own time (no schedules to coordinate!) and then we end up being able to dig deeper in our 1-1 coaching time together. To make it manageable, based on where you’re at, I’ll get specific with your “homework” and point you to the resource/module to start with and then we plug away together from there.

Clients have access to this for life, and my whole ethos is that I’d rather teach you how to write an effective resume vs do it for you so you don’t need me again! Most people change jobs a good number of times in their life, so I believe it’s powerful to equip each person with the tools they need to feel supported in future job transitions as well.

The nitty gritty of what coaching looks like can be very different, so I always encourage people to shop around and ensure they find a coach that feels like the best fit for them, their personality, and their needs.

This brings me to my final point – how to find coaches, and what to do if you want to dip your toe into more self-guided work in this space before/instead of reaching out to someone.

How to find a coach + ways to explore working on this yourself

I always do a complimentary phone consultation with anyone interested in working together. I do this to not only make sure they feel like I’m the right person for them, but I also want to make sure I feel like I have the right skills, approach, and background for what kind of support they need.

If I don’t think I’m the best coach for the job, I typically refer prospective clients to my trusted colleagues and friends in the field, helping me feel confident that they’re in good hands.

I also always recommend that people explore free coaching options, especially if budgets are tight. Most people are surprised when I tell them that if they studied somewhere for an undergraduate degree, there are often a number of free resources (including coaching sessions at times!) available to them through the Career Services office. This typically is not heavily advertised, so I recommend people reach out via phone/email to the center directly to ask. Often there are 1-3 sessions for free for graduates, and/or access to internal job search resources.

Lastly, one of the most frequent recommendations I give to people exploring making a change in their professional lives is the book “Designing Your Life: How to Build a Well-Lived, Joyful Life.” This is an incredible resource filled with hands-on activities for building self-awareness and deepening your understanding of what work means to you and what might be exciting to integrate into your next opportunity.

I hope that this comprehensive post not only helps you understand some benefits of working with a career coach, but also gives you tools to find someone that is right for you to work together towards achieving your professional goals.

Here’s to feeling supported in the process of doing more of what you love, no matter what that is!