Amlan Sharma says feeling exhausted, less purposeful, less confident and achieving less at a job he loved became normal in the years after the COVID-19 pandemic.
The 38-year-old occupational therapist says he began to recognise what he was experiencing in some of his patients too.
"That's where I started to realise: 'Hang on, I might be burnt out,'" he says.
According to a new survey, more than one in three Australian workers are experiencing burnout, and for those whose workplaces have "high levels of system friction" it is far more likely.
The State of Workplace Burnout Report, published by think tank Infinite Potential in partnership with Beyond Blue and the University of Technology Sydney Business School, collated the responses of 999 Australian survey respondents.
Study author and managing director of Infinite Potential John Chan says there was a big divide between organisations with very low levels of burnout and those with very high rates and he wanted to "pick out" those differences.
John Chan says a lot of time and effort is lost to "bad process" and "bad technology" at some workplaces. (Supplied: John Chan)
"We're trying to move this conversation away from the individual," he says.
Paula Brough, a professor of organisational psychology and director of the Centre for Work, Organisation and Wellbeing in the Business School at Griffith University, did not contribute to the survey and says it's important to bear in mind the small sample.
Professor Brough says the levels of burnout reported are a little higher than she would expect, but there's "nothing new" in environmental factors being linked to burnout.
"There's key workplace characteristics … which contribute to high levels of mental ill health, which may or may not lead to burnout," she explains.
Professor Brough says the industries people work in are an important consideration, and are not included in the survey findings.
Higher levels of burnout typically occur in public-facing industries and high-risk industries, from bus drivers and customer-service roles to emergency services, she says.
What is burnout?
The survey relied on the World Health Organization (WHO) definition of what it classifies as an "occupational phenomenon" and "not a medical condition".
According to WHO, burnout is characterised by three dimensions:
- Exhaustion
- Increased mental distance or cynicism toward one's job
- Reduced professional efficacy
To have burnout, Dr Chan says, you need to be experiencing all three.
He says burnout has become a buzzword and while that has helped reduce stigma the term is often misunderstood.
"If you're just simply exhausted, that's not burnout," he says.
Professor Brough says stress and burnout are also not interchangeable terms.
"Burnout is the extreme end of the continuum [and] stress is the start of it," she says.
Burnout "red flags", according to Professor Brough, include sleeping changes, anxiety returning to work after the weekend, abandoning usual hobbies and other changes.
'I'm not the problem'
Amlan Sharma says burnout affected his sense of identity as someone who was passionate and took pride in work. (Supplied: Amlan Sharma)
Amlan, who is a father and also has a caring role for a family member, says he became very disillusioned with rigid schedules and limited autonomy at his work.
"It was high job demands, excessive workload, time pressure, constant interruptions," he says.
He says issues that were beyond his control felt like they were wearing him down.
While it presented financial challenges, Amlan moved to self-employment and reduced his work hours, which helped with recovery.
"Over time I started to realise that actually I'm not the problem," Amlan says.
Unnecessary meetings, bad systems and red tape
Senior lecturer at the University Technology Sydney (UTS) Business School and researcher at The Ultimo Institute Anna Stephens, who helped design and conduct the survey, says the organisational factors linked to burnout are things "that create unnecessary difficulties in actually completing your work".
Dr Chan says this is the cognitive load or the "friction" involved in doing the job.
Anna Stephens says some of the "key drivers" of burnout are "inherent to the organisation and the way we design the work". (Supplied: Anna Stephens)
According to the survey results, this kind of work friction means you have 84 per cent higher odds of experiencing burnout in Australia.
Dr Stephens lists poorly designed online systems, lengthy bureaucratic processes, unclear instructions and expectations, and pointless meetings as examples.
Professor Brough says workplace stress can be thought about in two ways.
Firstly, "the big stuff" and then there are the small things that happen frequently, known as "minor stresses", "workplace hassles" or "red tape".
"They are also a key predictor of occupational stress, [which is] not necessarily burnout," Professor Brough says.
"It's often the workplace hassles which just eat away at you because they're daily."
Workload is also an established factor, and this can look like long work hours for an extended period, a lack of resources, not enough support and a lack of control, she says.
"You might not be able to control your shifts that you work, or your colleagues … or the [hospital] ward you work on," Professor Brough says.
But ideally, Professor Brough says, employers would offset that workload with extra support or independence.
"You can have a high workload, but if you also have high levels of support and control, it doesn't necessarily equate to levels of stress or burnout," she says.
Paula Brough says health issues, family stress and money issues can also be compounded by adverse work experiences. (Supplied: Paula Brough)
Job security and 'fragmentation'
Dr Chan says job security and fragmentation are also significant factors.
The survey results found 68 per cent of Australians who don't feel secure in their job are experiencing burnout, compared with a burnout rate of 20 per cent for those who feel very secure in their job.
Job insecurity could be caused by restructures, global politics or AI uncertainty, Dr Chan says.
And fragmentation, he explains, is all the switching you do throughout the day without much control. This might be between meetings, tasks and software.
Dr Stephens describes it as the "constant interruption or multiple competing priorities" that divide our attention.
What individuals can do
Dr Chan wants organisations and employers to really think about the process and systems people work within.
"The leaders and organisation have the responsibility to create the right type of environment, but then people also need to speak up when something isn't right or they need certain support," he says.
Dr Stephens recommends paying attention to your workload, communicating with your manager often and avoiding (where possible) normalising the frictions and fragmentations.
"They are a drain on our cognitive and our emotional resources, and they leave us with less fuel in the tank, not just for work, but for the important things in our life as well," she says.
Professor Brough says a worker and an employer "have a joint responsibility to look after your mental health".
This article contains general information only. You should consider obtaining independent professional advice in relation to your particular circumstances.