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
126. Rebuilding After Burnout: Strategies for Recovery in Schools
Hey Friend,
Is your wellness program acting just as a band-aid for a deeper issue? In this episode, titled "Rebuilding After Burnout: Strategies for Recovery in Schools,” we explore why surface-level fixes like remote work options or wellness initiatives often fall short in truly addressing burnout, particularly in high-stress environments like education.
Join us as we draw parallels between rebuilding after a natural disaster and recovering from burnout. We dive into the real damage it inflicts and discuss why both personal recovery and collective responsibility are crucial for true healing. This episode focuses on “HeartWork for individuals and “TeamWork” for organizations, emphasizing that burnout affects all aspects of life and requires a united effort to overcome.
We'll also unpack the metaphorical baggage that many organizations carry—outdated practices, harmful leadership styles, and resource shortages that all contribute to workplace burnout. Discover how fostering a culture of vulnerability and truth-telling can pave the way for trust and growth within teams. We guide you through evaluating what practices serve us well and confronting what needs to be left behind, steering you through a transformative process towards genuine healing.
As we wrap up, we'll discuss the journey of true healing and the importance of moving beyond superficial solutions. Stay tuned for future episodes where we'll explore topics such as building boundaries and discovering your unique brilliance individually and collectively.
Let’s journey together towards creating a more sustainable and loving work environment. Remember, you are powerful, significant, brilliant, and loved.
Love Always,
PBJ
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Friend, disrupting burnout at work is more than just creating a new wellness program or allowing people to work from home or even giving them a day off. This is a deeper problem that we are facing and there is a formula for it. There's an answer for it, but we're too busy trying to put a Band-Aid on it. Let's talk about it, friend. As I am traveling this country sharing this message of disrupting burnout, I have met so many leaders, managers, who really, truly have a heart to support their people and, if we're honest, to also help themselves. If the team is in burnout, I'm here to tell you, nine times out of 10, the manager is also struggling with burnout. And I know that, especially in education, we really try what is the best practice, what is the new program, what is the quick thing? We try our best to create a quick, swift answer to what's going on. We check the blocks, we do the programs, but the programs don't always solve the problem. And then we want to laud and applaud and share publicly that we did this thing or we did this program or we started this new thing, but we don't often stop to find out if it's working out, if it's working. So today I want to talk to you about disrupting burnout at work, because there are two parts to this story. There are two sides, two approaches that are both necessary. We will not disrupt burnout at work without both approaches here that I want to share with you, and I think we're trying to move too quickly.
Speaker 1:You've heard me talk about recovery before and what recovery looks like. Right, I think that we too quickly, prematurely, try to usher folks into some new normal, into healing, into thriving, into being passionate at work. But the metaphor that I always give you is if we had a hurricane today and the rains and the wind has stopped, tomorrow, I wouldn't look at my neighbor and say go back in your flooded house and be normal. We would clearly understand that there was damage and that we need to pause and assess the damage. We need resources, we need support, we need to fix what's broken before we will ever know what new normal looks like. And what I'm finding concerning burnout is we just want people to feel better, just be better, just be better, just be passionate about work again, just be happy about teaching again, just be happy about the students again, just be better. And I'm here to tell you that it takes recovery. If you consider all of the trauma and the crisis that we've all experienced globally, nationally, even locally, sometimes even in your particular school or college, and we keep moving like those things are behind us. It happened and now we're back to normal. That's not how it works.
Speaker 1:Burnout is crisis and we have to address it like it's crisis and in order to learn what new normal is going to be on the other side of a crisis, we must recover. So I want to talk to you about the two approaches to recovering from burnout that every workplace. I'm going to speak specifically to educators, because that's who I am and that's what I know best, but I also believe that these approaches are necessary for any career field, any organization, any company, anytime your organization has been through crisis. Crisis is deviation from your normal. So there are many, many different levels of crisis, many, many different levels of crisis, many, many different types of crisis. For the sake of our conversation today, we're going to talk about burnout, as we always do, because this is the Disrupting Burnout Podcast, right? So we're going to talk about burnout as it is a crisis. How do we help our teams, our organizations, recover from the crisis of burnout?
Speaker 1:You all know that I often share, always share, and even in my book, we talk about doing the heart work, heart, heart work. We talk about doing the deeper work. I've shared with you all that I don't believe that time management, work-life balance or even resilience are the answers or the solutions to burnout. I believe that they all have their place and they all have value, but they will not resolve burnout. As a matter of fact, I think if they could, we wouldn't be in the burnout crisis that we're in right now. So heart work is the deeper work that must be done, and individuals must do heart work right. So even in the book, I share with you that I don't believe work is the source of your burnout. Now, stay with me, stay with me, don't don't click off yet.
Speaker 1:I don't believe that work is the source of your burnout. Burnout comes from a deeper place of your burnout. Burnout comes from a deeper place. And also, I do believe that work can create an atmosphere that pushes burnout to the surface, that fosters a deeper level of burnout. So we cannot ignore the responsibility of work. I don't believe that burnout is just an occupational hazard. I believe that burnout impacts every part of your life. If you are burnt out at work, you are burnt out at home. If you are burnt out at work, you are burnt out in your relationships. Burnout is a state of being. It cannot be compartmentalized to just one part of your life.
Speaker 1:But I know that it's important for us to talk about the heart work which is as an individual. This is what I'm responsible for doing for myself, as well as the team work as a part of a team, as a leader on a team. This is what we do for each other, and when I talk about being a leader on the team, I'm talking about every member of the team. If we're going to recover from crisis, if we're going to recover from the crisis of burnout, it's not just up to the leader, the supervisor, the manager, the one who signs off on the paychecks or the time card. Every person, every human, has a responsibility to the team so that we can all recover. So when I say leader, I'm talking about all of us. So today we're going to talk about the heart work and the teamwork.
Speaker 1:Again, heart work is what each individual has to do for themselves. You can do the new wellness program, you can give people more time off, you can give all of the support mechanisms. But if burnout is still in that person's mind, heart, soul, if they have not done the heart work for themselves, no matter what happens at work, they're still going to be burnt out. And I'll tell you how I know this. I've worked with educators. I've coached educators who have changed jobs, changed cities, changed bosses, and they took the burnout with them. As a matter of fact, in my own story, when I left work due to burnout and sat at home for five months, being at home did not resolve the burnout. I took burnout from the workplace to my home with me. So the heart work is absolutely necessary and foundational so that we can even receive, so that we can even connect with whatever mechanisms are being put in place at work.
Speaker 1:Now the teamwork is also necessary. When we're talking about recovering from burnout at work, heart work is the foundation. But if I'm doing all of my heart work and still have to go to an environment every day that encourages, triggers and fosters more burnout, it is going to be a challenge for me to disrupt burnout. The atmosphere matters. The atmosphere matters, the environment matters. We cannot encourage people to do the hard work and not acknowledge the teamwork that is necessary for the workplace to change Friends.
Speaker 1:Let me say this we can no longer address work the way that we have addressed work in the past. Let me talk specifically to my educators. We can no longer expect teachers, administrators, professors, student affairs folks, even executive leaders, we can no longer expect folks to approach the work of education the way that we have approached and expected of folks in the past. I am hearing more and more personal testimonies of levels of responsibility that people were not trained for, that challenges that they are facing that they don't have the tools to address. I'm hearing more and more about not having enough expertise, not having enough hands, not having enough help. I'm hearing more and more about the financial burden of doing education well falling to the educator. So they are purchasing things out of their own pockets, and those pockets are thin enough because the income is not what it needs to be.
Speaker 1:So, friend, listen, the heart work is the foundation, but the teamwork is what changes, makes the change, the shift in our career field. So we're going to talk about both. What is this? Heart work versus the teamwork? And again, two perspectives. Both are necessary when we're talking about recovering from burnout in the workplace. So let's walk through it In heart work.
Speaker 1:You all know that I share three areas where we need to do the heart work. So, first of all, you got to check your baggage. Secondly, build your boundaries. And third, discover your brilliance. So, if we walk through those three areas together and let's talk about heart work and teamwork in all three areas, so let's start with checking your baggage.
Speaker 1:I'm talking about the ideas, definitions, standards, beliefs that we have picked up along the way, that we've been taught formally or informally, that define how we show up for work and life. So, when I'm talking about doing the heart work, personally, I need to ask myself some powerful questions that would allow me to open up my invisible backpack and to take everything out of that backpack in order to assess it, to determine if it's serving me well, that idea, that definition, that standard, that belief serving me well. That idea, that definition, that standard, that belief isn't continuing to serve me well. Does it allow me to show up, not just to do well but to be well, or has that standard belief idea become a stumbling block to me? What's in your individual backpack? What's in your invisible backpack? Where did it come from and is it serving you well now? So what is your definition of work. Where did you learn it and is it serving you well now?
Speaker 1:And in one of my workshops, I had a participant share how she was raised by a single mother and she watched her mother work herself into sickness. She watched her mother work two and three jobs to make ends meet, so that they with all good intentions so that they would be covered, so that they could eat, so that they could pay the bill. So again, checking your backpack is not about disrespecting what you learned, but it is permission to assess it and decide where you might need to make a change. And in watching her mother work this way, this person picked up those habits. And even though her financial situation was different she was not in the financial strain that her mother was in she found herself working herself into sickness. She could not say no. She had a part-time job and a full-time job. She was giving her best and her all, and it's not wrong to give your best, but to give your all over working and not having time for relationships, social connections, family time for herself. And she didn't even realize, she didn't even pay attention to how she was working. That's the thing about your invisible backpack it defines how you show up and it's so normal to you that often you don't even pay attention, you don't even recognize how you're showing up. And in this conversation, this woman made the connection to how she's been working, how she is in burnout, and she realized she learned that from watching the hustle of her single mother and she will always respect the sacrifice of her mother. But our conversation was that she did not have to continue the pattern of her mother.
Speaker 1:What is in your backpack?
Speaker 1:Where did you pick it up and is it serving you well? Does it serve you today? Is it helping you be your best while doing your best? So that's the heart work. But there's also teamwork and in the teamwork, what we have to do is we have to check the baggage of our organization, of our group, of our school. What are we carrying that defines the culture of our workplace?
Speaker 1:And there are two primary questions that I encourage you to ask in order to check the baggage of your workplace. First of all, what have we learned and experienced in this workplace that serves us well? Again, what have we learned and experienced in this team and this workplace that serves us well? So, what lessons, what traditions, what ideas, what values, what standards, what vision, what experiences have we had that continue to be a good foundation for us? Checking your baggage is not about throwing everything away. It is about deciding If it's helpful, we're going to keep it. If it's not helpful, we're going to change it.
Speaker 1:So, in checking the baggage of your team, what are those foundational pieces that continue to serve you well, that serve as a good foundation to hold you steady, that serve as an anchor for the team that will continue to serve well in the future? Talk about those mentors and leaders and people who came before you and what they taught you that continues to serve well. Talk about the values of the organization and what makes you different from anyone else. What makes your school different. I know that you're in the business of education, I know that you're teaching, I know that you're serving families, but how do you serve differently than any other school? What makes you different? What is your positive foundation? So what have we learned or experienced that continues to serve us well?
Speaker 1:And then you need to ask what have we learned or experienced that has become a stumbling block, that has become our kryptonite right, because we have a superpower and we have kryptonite. So what in our company culture continues to hurt us, continues to restrain us, to hold us back, continues to divide us. This is the part that we don't want to face Over and over. I've watched in education how we build on broken pieces. If we go back to the hurricane metaphor in education, what I've found is we will go through a storm and we'll get to the place where the rain and the wind has stopped and we'll take a deep breath. All right, we made it through that. Everybody back to normal. And that is not how this works when we are serving with and serving human beings. People need to recover. Infrastructure needs to recover. Need to recover. Infrastructure needs to recover. So we know that people need to recover and over and over and over in education, we continue to build on broken pieces because we refuse to face what broke us. So ask the question in this school, this team, in this organization, what have we learned or experienced that has become a stumbling block for us? What have we learned or experienced that is dividing our team and hurting our people?
Speaker 1:In order order to heal, we have to have the courage to look at the wound. There are wounds of hostile leadership. There are wounds of lack of resources. There are wounds of lack of value and lack of respect for our people. There are wounds of um, um, low resources and high demand. There are wounds of even external sometimes what our community or our state or even the country says about education and the ideas that are shared about education and educators. We have some wounds. There are values and definitions and standards and ideas that we continue to pass down that are not not just not helpful, but they are harmful to our people and to the work that we are trying to accomplish.
Speaker 1:So we have to check our baggage, and it takes a brave team to look at the ugly. It takes vulnerability to look at the wound. It takes a leader that is willing to see beyond themselves, because, if we're honest, we may have contributed to the wound. If we're honest, we may have, at the very least, allowed it to continue. So we need to stop and acknowledge where we've been, and I know that there's a fear to do this. We don't want to stir anything up, we don't want to make anybody angry, we don't want to make the problem worse, but what I've seen over and over and over is that vulnerability is healing.
Speaker 1:Telling the truth, telling the truth helps us reestablish trust in the team. There are so many ugly truths that all of us are aware of but nobody's willing to say, and it continues to fester, it continues to divide us, it continues to discourage us. It continues to discourage us, it continues to restrain our progress because we are unwilling to acknowledge the things in our baggage that are hurting us. So, in order to recover from burnout, we must acknowledge what we've experienced and what we've learned that serves us well, and talk about how we're going to hold on to those values, how we're going to continue to honor those values, how we're going to make sure that those values continue in our organization. And we must acknowledge the experiences and the lessons that have hurt us and that no longer serve us. And together, as a team, we talk about how to change those pieces of our culture. Think about traditions, think about standards, beliefs, ideas, think about expectations, think about even how we do business, our standard operating procedures. Are we continuing to serve in antiquated ways that no longer serve us or our students? We've got to open up that backpack. We've got to open up, and I know it feels like, oh man, that's going to be a can of worms, but I'm here to tell you, leaving those worms in that can does not make everything better.
Speaker 1:So the first step of recovering from burnout at work is we have to check our baggage. We have to do the heart work. That's the work that only I can do for myself, and I can do that with the help of a therapist, I can do that with the help of a coach, I can do that with the help of a book or some resource. But hard work is what I do for myself. Teamwork is what we do for each other and as a team, allowing everyone to have a seat at the table to talk about where we've been, where we're going, what serves us well and what no longer serves us.
Speaker 1:Friend, that's how we get on the road to recovery, and recovery takes time. I know we don't want to hear that. We live in a day and age where everything is instant. I don't even have to go get fast food anymore. Somebody brings it to my house. I don't even have to go grocery shopping anymore. Somebody brings it to my house through ordering through an app. I understand that we don't want to deal with things that take time, but everything can't be fixed through an app, through a best practice, through an overnight process. Some things. It took time to get here. It took time for us to get to the place where we are.
Speaker 1:It's going to take time for us to heal and recover. But here's the good news as we go, as we do the work, we begin to see the benefits immediately. Your people will trust you as you allow vulnerability and truth to come into the conversations of the team. They will learn to trust again. But it's got to be reestablished, all right. So here's what we're going to do.
Speaker 1:We're going to make this a part two and maybe a part three, because we still need to talk about building boundaries and heart work and teamwork, and we also need to talk about discovering your brilliance with heart work and teamwork. So we're going to keep this conversation going. It is time for folks to really recover. It's time for us to walk away from the band-aid solutions and really honor that people need true healing and true recovery and make sure that we know it takes time, it takes vulnerability and it takes truth. We got to check our baggage friends, heartwork and teamwork. All right, as always, you know that you are powerful, you are significant, you are brilliant and you are loved, friend. Love always. Let's keep talking about it. Love always, pbj.
