Disrupting Burnout
Disrupting Burnout with Dr. Patrice Buckner Jackson is dedicated to overworked, undervalued high-achieving servant leaders who give all to serve others and leave very little for yourself. You are an accomplished woman with many responsibilities and you often find yourself overwhelmed, exhausted, and burned out. I’ve been there. As a matter of fact, burnout almost cost me everything. Compassionate work can carry a high price tag: your mind, body, spirit and relationships may be in distress as you serve the needs of others. I am here to equip your hands and refresh your heart so you can serve in purpose and fulfillment and permanently break cycles of burnout.
Disrupting Burnout
117. Harnessing Data to Combat Burnout: A Strategic Approach
Hey Friend,
Ever wondered how powerful data can be when tackling burnout head-on? In this week’s episode of the Disrupting Burnout Podcast, I take you through an enlightening journey of how I led an exhausted staff to recovery using a strategic, data-driven approach.
Join me as I share the compelling story of adapting my communication to resonate with a data-oriented leader. By conducting a time audit, I transformed qualitative struggles into quantifiable data, turning anecdotal evidence into hard numbers. This episode is a masterclass in speaking your leader's language and using data to fortify your advocacy—essential skills for anyone in a leadership role, especially when your natural tendency leans towards storytelling.
Burnout in educational environments isn’t just a trendy topic; it has profound financial implications. We dive into Gallup’s alarming statistics from the State of the Global Workplace report, which pegs the global cost of low employee engagement at a staggering $8.9 trillion. The impact is massive, affecting productivity, safety, and overall well-being.
Don't miss our upcoming webinar on July 10th, where we'll provide leaders with actionable strategies to combat burnout and revitalize their teams. This session is designed not just to inform but to equip you with practical tools to drive significant change in your communities. Register today at https://join.disruptingburnout.com/home.
Tune in to this episode for a deep dive into how engaged teams can dramatically reduce absenteeism, turnover, and safety incidents, all while boosting productivity. Let's transform our workplaces into healthier, more engaged environments together.
Love Always,
PBJ
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Listen, friend, I've learned a secret about getting leadership to hear me. Now, I'm not talking about manipulation, I'm not talking about getting everything I want, but I've learned an approach for making sure that my perspective is heard and I want to share that with you all today. If you're new here, I'm Dr Patrice Buckner-Jackson, but you can call me PBJ. Welcome to the Disrupting Burnout Podcast, where we are giving you the strategies for pouring out purpose without continuing to live in the consequences of burnout. Let's get started, friends. This is going to be good.
Speaker 1:There was a specific time in my leadership where I was leading a staff who was extremely exhausted and overwhelmed and all of the signs and symptoms of burnout was manifesting in my team. The challenge was those signs were manifesting in teams all over campus, so I had to find a way to advocate for my folks without it being lost in the background noise of everybody's tired. We're all dealing with this and I learned in that moment and I think I learned it before this appointed time, but it was an opportunity for me to practice speaking in the language of the listener. I'll tell you what I mean. So I am a qualitative person, meaning I am focused on your story and who you are as a person, as an individual, and where are you from and what have you experienced and what has all of that created in you. And I am very connected to the stories and experiences of other people and that is a part, I think, of my superpower, because I share vulnerability, but I can also hold space for vulnerability very easily. It's a part of my brilliance. I had to learn very early on in my career that everybody doesn't hear or connect in the same way, and it doesn't make them a bad leader, it doesn't make them wrong, it just makes them different.
Speaker 1:So in this particular space of time where I was trying to figure out how to support and advocate for my team, I had a leader who, who was very quantitative, data-driven, numbers-driven, and this is their normal makeup, but also for their entire career, those were the pieces that they were focused on, so their ears were primed towards what is the data telling us? What direction are we going in based on the data, on the numbers? So you know, data are there are many different types of data right, but based on the numbers. What are we looking at? How are we trending based on numbers? What are we looking at? How are we trending based on numbers and I am not naturally bent towards the numbers. I am not naturally turned towards or impacted by what the numbers are. I am more impacted by individual and group experiences.
Speaker 1:So I had to find a way to communicate the need for my team in a way that this leader would hear it. So if I were the leader hearing this, you know my natural bend is to say my folks are exhausted, they are not spending a lot of time with their families, they're not feeling connected to the work. They may be looking for other opportunities. They're not well in their bodies. I'm also worried about their mental health. They're showing signs of fatigue Like these are things that I was paying attention to and I was aware of. Right, but for a leader who thinks in quantitative terms, that may sound a lot like well, you all are tired, but everybody's tired, so what can we do about that? So I had to find a way to communicate in a way that this leader could hear it. So, knowing that this leader is impacted by quantitative data, impacted by numbers, I had my team do what we call the time audit. So for three weeks I had them make note of the number of hours they are working, particularly outside of the regular 40-hour week, and also what they were doing during that time, right? And also what they were doing during that time, right? So not just tell me you worked until 9 pm, you know, on particular days, or you came in early on particular days, but what were you doing that was so significant, that's causing you to work so many hours, because I knew that would make a difference.
Speaker 1:Hey, friend, if you are a leader of a team and you are witnessing increased turnover, absenteeism and even cynicism among your faculty and your staff members, if you know that your team is struggling with burnout, I want to invite you to a special webinar just for you. This is for the leaders. I want to give you some strategies for your team, not just for yourself. We're doing this on Wednesday, july 10th, at 12 noon, eastern. Listen, this is a lunch and learn. You bring your own lunch, but I'm bringing new research. I'm telling you why the surface solutions fall short. I'm giving you the innovative strategies to tackle burnout beyond the conventional methods. Friend, we're going to restore purpose and productivity within your team. If you know you need this, go to disruptingburnoutteam. Again, it's in the show notes disruptingburnoutteam. Get signed up for the free webinar. I want to help you, help your people, meet me there.
Speaker 1:So, in speaking to my team, I enrolled them to help me in this project by making sure they knew that they were not in trouble. No one was questioning if they were effective at work, that they were assisting me in advocating for them. I've always been transparent with my team to help them understand I, as the leader, in order to advocate for them, I have to be equipped Right. Right. I have to have the information that I need in order to be an effective advocate. So I enrolled them to help me advocate for them by completing this time audit, and folks were willing to do it. Of course, we had to circle back to some people and that kind of thing. We didn't want anybody left out. But when I tell you the data were so significant and, like I told you, I am not necessarily bent towards the numbers, but when I tell you, numbers tell a story. So, even though that is not my normal course of conversation or the way that I normally naturally just take in information those numbers spoke loudly.
Speaker 1:So when I got the data back and we did this with all of the departments reporting to me at the time when I got the data back, I had evidence that I had folks working 60, 70 hours a week on a normal basis. This wasn't a special week like homecoming or move-in week, which if you work in higher education, you know that those are huge weeks. These were normal weeks. So that meant that this was the lifestyle of my people, right. So it would have been one thing for me to go to the leader to say, hey, my folks are overworked and they're exhausted I don't know how much attention that would have gotten. But for me to go and show data to say I have this number of employees who are working this number of hours over 40 every week, then I could communicate.
Speaker 1:Not only am I concerned for my staff but this may be a problem for the institution that this is happening on a normal basis. It allowed me to have conversations to say I understand offices need to be open from eight to five on campus, but I also need folks to understand that the offices in my area operate differently. My folks may be at work from eight to five and then they start setting up for an event for students at five. The event starts at seven, the event goes to nine, nine, 30, then they're cleaning up to 10, 30, 11. Then they go home and they do it all over again. And this is on a normal basis and especially when you have a smaller staff, at larger spaces there may be more people to spread the responsibility so that everybody's not working every night. But when you have a smaller staff and it takes all hands on deck to do the work that you're doing, then you end up in a situation where everybody's tired, everybody's exhausted because everybody's working these hours.
Speaker 1:For me to have a conversation with that leader of how we can justify making some concessions, making some adjustments in the working time or the office time, or how we required our folks to show up and do this work because of this data. It also empowered my leader to go to their leader to say, hey, I'm going to approve these adjustments in this area, and here's the data that supports these adjustments. So it doesn't mean that my folks got some sort of benefit. Y'all, y'all hear your friend. She's got to make a guest appearance. She was totally asleep before I started talking to y'all and now she wants to get up and make all this noise. But anyway, everybody focus, get back on track, right? So it doesn't mean that my folks got some special privilege. It means that we brought some. We brought some fairness to the process, right, because my folks were working so many more hours than most people all over campus. Because we were. We were meeting the expectation that everyone has to be at work from eight to five, but also meeting our specific responsibilities of engaging and programming and connecting with students, and students don't live eight to five. I mean, many of them don't wake up to 12. You see what I'm saying. So, according to who your students are, so that data empowered us to have a conversation and make some adjustments that allowed my people to love their work but also feel valued, but also to live a more well-rounded life.
Speaker 1:Here's what I'm trying to say to you. It may not be that your leader is ignoring you. It may not be that what you're sharing is a bad idea or people don't believe you. It may be that you need to start speaking the language of the listener. Who are you trying to influence? Who are you trying to impact? What do they need to hear in order to understand what you are explaining? Hear me closely. This is not about manipulation, friend. This is about influence. Your leader needs you to equip them with the appropriate information so that you all can collectively make the best decisions, not just for the students, the, so that you all can collectively make the best decisions, not just for the students, the people that you serve but for the people you're serving with. They need you to equip them, but you have to equip them in a way that they can hear you and they can understand you.
Speaker 1:Speaking from the perspective of a leader and speaking from the perspective of someone who moved from one position to another in promotions, even though I worked closely with my mentor and with my boss, I could not, could not, understand the entire breadth of their responsibility until I was in those shoes. As much as I thought I understood about the work that they were doing and the load that they were carrying, when I was promoted into that position, I had no idea of the amount of responsibilities and pressure that that leader was carrying that they did not, could not, share with me. So I'm not making excuses for bad leadership, but I want to add to your perspective that your leader has more pressure on them than you think and they have more responsibilities and more expectations and more trouble, trauma, things happening than you can even imagine so. In order to serve your people, in order to serve yourself and in order to serve your leader, communicate with them in the language in which they speak. And I'm not talking about English, spanish, french. I'm talking about if they speak in quantitative numbers. If you know that they respond to numbers, if you look at their career path and they have always been focused on data give them the data, give them the numbers. If you know that they are a sociological, story-based, individual-focused person, then give them the story. And how do you know this? Pay attention to how they communicate with you, how they send emails, how they request, what they request from you. That will tell you what matters to them and how they best receive information. And give them the information in the format in which they receive information. And not only is it going to help you to advocate for your people, not only is it going to strengthen the bond and connection between you and your leader, but it is also going to equip your leader to advocate for you and your team.
Speaker 1:Okay, so, in this conversation of moving from burnout, burned out, to engaged, you all know we've got our webinar coming up on July 10th, where I'm inviting leaders and listen, if you lead in education in any way, if you have a staff, if you're responsible for people, then you are invited to this webinar. This webinar is specifically for leaders those of you who have a team, who have a staff, who have recognized the signs of burnout in your team and you want to do something about it. This webinar is for you. You and if you have a leader that you want to encourage influence, that it may be impactful for them to participate in the webinar or for them to start paying attention to the impacts of burnout on the team. You are seeing these consequences, but you're not sure if your leader is seeing these consequences.
Speaker 1:I want to give you some examples of how you can have this conversation with your leader and, specifically, if you have a leader who is focused more on quantitative data as opposed to the stories and individual impact, I want to equip you with some data that will help you have this conversation so that your leader will understand how imperative it is to start now doing something about the impacts of burnout on the team and on your community. So just a few pieces of data that I want to share with you. You all know that I've been digging into this Gallup state of the global workforce data for the last couple of weeks, and when we come to the workshop, I'm going to give you other data other than Gallup. I want you to know, but this data is just so rich and it's so impactful. So I just want to share a few things with you, especially if you are a quantitative data person, but also if you need to communicate with someone who is focused on data.
Speaker 1:There are some impactful numbers here. So, according to the Gallup State of the Global Workplace report from 2024, low employee engagement cost the global economy Watch this Eight point nine trillion US dollars. That is, trillion with a T, trillion with a T. We are in such a burnout, disengaged work crisis that it is costing globally 8.9 trillion US dollars. How does that impact your school, your college, your university? Think about your absentee rate. Think about your turnover rate. Think about students who have a bad experience and they transfer or they go to a different place. Think about conversations with leaders on your school board or your system or your state system that have not been impactful. Think about accusations or lawsuits that you may be struggling with, either by a mistake that has happened or just by accusation. It is costing financially for our folks to be burnt out and disengaged.
Speaker 1:There's also some data in this report that proves that highly engaged teams have, quote fewer negative outcomes, more positive outcomes and greater success for the organization. I'm going to give you just a few of these numbers. So the outcomes of highly engaged units and teams. What Gallup found is there's a 78% decrease in absenteeism Y'all schools. How does it impact you when you have to find substitute teachers? How does it impact you when your faculty and staff are missing days just because they cannot do it? 78% decrease in absenteeism when our folks are engaged and not burnt out.
Speaker 1:Gallup found there's a 21% decrease in turnover for high turnover organizations. And high turnover organizations, quote, are those with more than 40% annualized turnover. Low turnover organizations, which would be those 40% or lower. 51% decrease in turnover in low turnover organizations. I cannot tell you how much I've heard from educators on the road about how they're losing their best people and how it's difficult to replace those folks, and we talked about that a little bit last week in episode 116. Increasing engagement and we're going to talk about what that means in the workshop, but increasing engagement in our team decreases turnover 21% in high turnover organizations, 51% in low turnover organizations. There's a 63% decline in accidents and safety incidents. There's a 30% decrease in quality defects. There's a 10% increase in customer loyalty and engagement so that may be your students, that may be your parents. There is a 13% increase in productivity when it comes to records and evaluations and assessments. There's a 68 percent increase in well-being, thriving employees for organizations that have engaged team members.
Speaker 1:So I want you to know that it's not one way or the other, it's a both and or, an and also, as one of my favorite teachers says, it's an, and also the individual stories of your folks matter and also the organization is being impacted in a major way. The health of your staff and your faculty matter, and also the cost of them being disengaged and burnt out is overwhelming. The lifestyle of your team and your faculty members matters and also this turnover rate is crazy and we've got to do something about it. What are we going to do as we continue to lose our best teachers, our best faculty members, our best? Not pretending that our systems, our organizations, are simple, but I do believe that there are some simple things that we can start to do now to turn the tide. So I invite you, I hope that if you lead a team, you will join us. I hope that if you have a boss that you can influence to join us, that you would consider doing that. I hope that you will sign up.
Speaker 1:The web address to register for the free webinar is joindisruptingburnoutcom slash home. Don't worry about it, it'll be in the show notes so you can just click on wherever you're listening, click in the show notes and you can get registered for free. Friend, I'm not asking you for any money. I'm just asking you to join me for the conversation. I'm just asking you to join me for the conversation. I'm just asking you to come together and let's start talking about what we can do right now to take care of our people and to build engagement with our teams. People need their passion back, they need their fire back, they need their breath back. They need to be able to breathe, and I think there's something we can do about it. All right, so listen, that's all I got for you today. I hope you will join me.
Speaker 1:Again, this is next Wednesday, july 10th, noon Eastern. When you register, you'll receive all the information and it will adjust itself for your time zone, but I hope you will. I hope you will join us because it's time to do something about it. We got to stop talking about it and we got to start doing something to help our folks, so let's do it together. Friend, as always, you are powerful, you are significant, you are brilliant, you are a brilliant leader, and I know that you may be in a tough spot, and it's not your fault, but I want to equip you with something you can do about it. All right, I hope to see you next Wednesday. In the meantime, share this podcast with somebody who needs it. Love always, pbj.
