Burnout or Misplaced Expectations

Are employees and companies chasing the wrong motivations?

Several times throughout my career I reached the stage of frustration and exhaustion known as burnout. When those times arose, I simply blamed my misery on insensitive owners or managers. They didn’t know how hard I worked and how dedicated I was to make their business successful. Worse than that, those clueless owners piled more wood onto the burning pyre by making demands of me and my time that was unfair and unequitable. Invariably, after some insignificant critique of my work occurred (a straw that broke this camel’s back) I tendered two weeks’ notice and left those heartless SOBs in the rearview mirror. Professionally, these were not brilliant moves on my part because I quit jobs before I found replacements. However, the pain of showing up just one more day in a thankless environment was too much to bear, so with the fervor of Johnny Paycheck, I was out the door.

What amazed me at those times I abruptly tendered my resignations was that the owners were entirely blindsided by my decision. They did not see it coming nor did they have a plan for my replacement. One thing that was true, however, was that I was not indispensable, as those burnout inducing companies are still alive and thriving today.

Burnout rule number one, the show must go on and we are all 100% replaceable!

Until recently, I filed those burnout situations as just bad luck of the draw. I assumed I drew the insensitive micromanage narcissistic card and the only way to live to play another day was to fold and walk away. The problem was not me, I just needed to find a new table with a dealer that wasn’t palming all the aces. With honesty and humility, I can now admit that my burnout was not entirely my boss’s fault, and I played a much larger part in creating my own misery.

First, let’s talk about the reality of owners and sr. managers. The one thing I have observed over my many years of working with successful owners and sr. managers is that they are extremely selfish with their time. The more successful an individual is, the more they manage and protect their time. Since they value their time, they are utterly oblivious to anyone working below them not guarding time with equal ferocity. I am not saying that finding a senior manager or owner that truly cares about your time is like finding a unicorn, however pinpointing the ends of rainbows are involved. Unless one happens to be working for a true friend and mentor, Aristotle’s explanation of friendship and utility applies to these professional manager-employee relationships

Aristotle devoted two books on the meaning of friendship in his “The Nicomachean Ethics,” most notably books Eight and Nine.    

For Aristotle, friendship is defined by three distinct categories:

·       Friendships of Utility

·       Friendships of Pleasure

·       Friendships of Virtue

Utility friendships generally form in the cases of mutual benefit, like associations in the workplace, which can be more long term, but tend to fade once the requirement of association ends. Friendships of utility have value in that it is mutually beneficial to get along to make these relationships more pleasant. Friendships of pleasure tend to center around shared activities like hobbies or on physical attractions. One may think back to relationships of our youth where we tended to guide our lives by emotion and for the most part pursue what is pleasant to ourselves. We all have friendships of utility and pleasure, but as Aristotle explains,

… in friendships based on utility or on pleasure men love their friend for their own good or their own pleasure, and not as being the person loved, but as useful or agreeable. And therefore, these friendships are based on an accident, since the friend is not loved for being what he is, but as affording some benefit or pleasure as the case may be. Consequently, friendships of this kind are easily broken off, in the event of the parties themselves changing, for if no longer pleasant or useful to each other, they cease to love each other. And utility is not a permanent quality: it differs at different times. Hence when the motive of the friendship has passed away, the friendship itself is dissolved, having existed merely as a means to that end.

Aristotle holds no punches in defining what he feels are essential for worthy friendships.  He writes, “(T)o be friends therefore, men must (1) feel goodwill for each other, that, is, wish each other’s good, and (2) be aware of each other’s goodwill, and (3) the cause of their goodwill must be one of lovable qualities…” This brings us to the friendship of virtue or as Aristotle puts it, “(T)he perfect form of friendship is that between the good, and those who resemble each other in virtue. For these friends wish each alike the other’s good in respect of their goodness, and they are good in themselves; but it is those who wish the good of their friends for their friends’ sake who are friends in the fullest sense,…” Essentially, friends of this nature truly wish each other to become more virtuous for the benefit of their friend only.

There are tons of manager training courses where Matt Foley type motivational speakers tell us that employees need to be acknowledged and appreciated at every stage of a project; that companies must create the illusion of friendships of virtue environments because it increases productivity. Companies are building entire HR department initiatives around the notion that they can manufacture higher level manager-employee relationships based on trust and value. But is that goal even possible?

We have all had managers give us compliments that were hollow or felt insincere. This may sound crass, but the only meaningful compliments we ever truly get from our employers is the paycheck at the end of two weeks and the bonus that was realistically conceived and duly paid out. Other notable exceptions could be a gift of a golf outing, concert, or sporting event. The reality is, you cannot take an "at-a-boy" to the bank, nor will it buy your spouse a pretty trinket of affection. Defining compliments and accolades as necessary to a healthy work relationship is a misplaced expectation. To this day, when I am complimented on my work performance, I simply say what my grandmother taught me to say; "thank you" and move on with my day. I dwell not on the complement, its intention nor the lack there of.

Burnout rule number two, the only compliment that has any meaning is one that comes from the reflection in the mirror or a true and trusted friend.  

Another burnout inducer is commitment. Those jobs I abruptly exited were at one time my entire life. I loved the work and had fun learning and applying newfound knowledge and skills to my profession. I am a competitive person, and nothing gives me more pleasure that stacking up wins. I was 100 percent committed to those jobs. Again, companies understand this drive to work towards excellence and work diligently to foster that environment. However, the emphasis is on the company excelling not the individual. Companies celebrate the team aspect of creating the success and assume that group acknowledgement trickles down to the individual. The burnout inducing aspect of this situation comes from seeing owners and upper management reap the rewards of company success while individual worker’s cupboards remain relatively bare.

Burnout rule number three, your commitment to your job should be for self-improvement. If you cannot turn your job into a laboratory to improve your skills and career, walk away because blind commitment to a company is not just a threat to sobriety, it is a recipe for resentment.

The best way to avoid burnout is to understand that your company or your boss cannot create an environment that instills happiness. Nor can they create genuine relationships of virtue. The best a company can do is foster good relationships of utility. To do that, companies must set up structures that are fair and equitable and remove any form of favoritism and bias. Polices must be concise and enforced even handily. Creating relationships of utility required trust in the process and respect for your supervisor.

Friendships of virtue are a rare occurrence in everyday life and finding one in a work environment is lesser so. For as Aristotle wrote, friendships of virtue require your friend to care about your health, happiness and virtue for your benefit and not his own. And finding one of these owners or managers in the business world is like, well refer to my earlier references to rainbows and unicorns…