A recent survey showed that employees would quit their job to go to a company that had enough policies to prevent burnout. On its face, that isn't too shocking. No one wants to feel burnout, so of course they would leave!
Looking at the data deeper, a few things struck me.
First, extra vacation isn't enough. It is a typical problem of trying a short-term fix when something deeper and longer term is needed. The vacation helps, but then they get put back into the burnout pace. Companies need better policies that address the real issue - too much work, not enough resources, etc.
Second, and more troublesome, is that a large percentage of the workers felt like they couldn't talk to their manager about the issue. This is a clear-cut damnation of managers. If you have a team that is afraid of talking to you about an issue that impacts their physical and mental health and is putting them on the road to leaving you - you have failed as a manager.
One of the 2 jobs of a manager is to build a great team. You can't do that if they don't feel like you are protecting them. Challenging them once in a while to do more is fine. When it is a constantly thing, it is downright evil.
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