- What Is Job Burnout?
- How Does Job Burnout Impact Your Business?
- How Does A Virtual Receptionist Help Prevent Job Burnout?
Q: Can a virtual receptionist prevent me from experiencing burnout?
A: By delegating your business phones to virtual receptionists, you reduce your workload, work more efficiently, focus on the task at hand, and as a result, avoid the risk of burnout.
There’s never been a better time to launch your own small business.
E-commerce has proliferated the marketplace, meaning anyone with a vision and the work ethic to start a company can bring their offerings to the world.
As a result, solopreneurs and one-person startups have exploded.
Small business owners face a lower barrier to entry, empowering them to work for themselves without needing massive funding on the front-end.
Many of these small business owners are directly responsible for managing every aspect of their business. While this is great from a budgetary perspective, it can quickly lead to job burnout.
The enormous amount of work required to handle every element of a business at once leaves you stressed, foggy-headed, and less efficient than you would be otherwise.
What are the signs and symptoms of job burnout? How can you prevent and recover from it?
This article will teach you all about burnout and provide you with practical solutions to help you prevent it.
- What Are Symptoms Of Job Burnout?
- How Can Job Burnout Impact Your Business?
- What Can You Do To Prevent Job Burnout?
What is Burnout?
Scientifically speaking, burnout is the response to prolonged periods of heightened stress. That stress can stem from relationships, mental health problems, financial issues, or work.
While not always pleasant, a bit of stress is a good thing. The worry and heightened responsiveness you feel when stressed can help you tackle important tasks and give you the push you need to perform at your best.
With acute, healthy stressors, the stress subsides after you’ve handled the task. You’re then able to recover back to baseline and recuperate before the next stressor appears.
However, when stress is never-ending, the story changes.
Prolonged stress wears you down, taxing your body and mind alike.
While any stressor can cause burnout, it is most often seen when the thing causing the stress doesn’t hold intrinsic value. If you are taking on a large burden for something you don’t fundamentally care about or agree with, burnout becomes far more likely.
Burnout leads to a variety of emotional and physical decrements that we’ll cover in a bit.
What is Job Burnout?
Job burnout is a specific type of burnout related exclusively to work.
Statistics say job burnout impacts over half of the workers, with the pandemic worsening these symptoms.
Work burnout is highly prevalent in all sectors of the workforce. It tends to occur when workers or employees don’t find what they’re working on meaningful or don’t feel that they contribute to the overall company mission.
For example, someone filling out spreadsheets all day may be performing an incredibly important role in their company. However, if they don’t ever see the impact of their spreadsheets down the line, they may wind up feeling that their work is meaningless.
Once this sense of meaninglessness creeps in, burnout is just on the horizon.
The stress associated with work stops being a motivator and instead becomes more than a psychological burden.
Small business owners are especially susceptible to job burnout due to the exhaustive nature of their work.
If small business owner has to manage every aspect of their business alone, they can easily feel overwhelmed.
This overwhelming nature can alter their outlook, making them feel like they are working incredibly hard without the results to show for it.
Like any other form of burnout, job burnout negatively impacts your psychological well-being, your enjoyment of your work, and your ability to concentrate and bring your best to your business.
Symptoms of Job Burnout
If you’ve been running your small business by yourself, you may be facing job burnout. Key symptoms to look for involve both your emotional and physical well-being.
One of the biggest indicators of job burnout is a lack of motivation.
Those experiencing burnouts feel apathetic about their work and may even dread the thought of performing their duties.
You may also experience a steep decrease in your energy levels. Physical and psychological lethargy are highly prevalent in those facing chronic work stress.
Irritability, cynicism, and lack of empathy are also common. If you suddenly find yourself snapping at people or viewing events in an uncharacteristically negative light, you may need to focus on burnout recovery.
Physical symptoms can also occur, such as:
- Heartburn
- Headaches and migraines
- Muscle tension
- Lack of sleep
If you’re experiencing any of these symptoms and have been over-extending yourself at work, you may have already entered a state of burnout.
How Does Burnout Impact You?
Burnout impacts you personally in a number of ways.
For starters, it can strain your relationships. When you become overly irritable, you may find yourself snapping at friends and significant others for no reason.
This can drive a wedge between you and your loved ones, furthering the melancholy and sense of hopelessness that comes along with burnout.
Additionally, you may find yourself experiencing previously-absent mental health problems. Lethargy and pessimism can lead to full-blown depression.
Those with burnout often fall into a spiral in which their lack of energy keeps them from engaging in the very activities that help them feel happy.
Burnout wreaks havoc on your personal life by disempowering you, distancing you from loved ones, and keeping you from doing the things you love.
How Does Burnout Impact Your Business?
These symptoms extend into every aspect of your life, meaning job burnout also negatively impacts your business.
The lack of motivation keeps you from putting in the work needed to grow your business.
You may find yourself doing the bare minimum instead of innovating and pushing into new ground.
Over time, this can stagnate your business and, if left untreated, cause it to fail completely.
Even if you do try to bring your best, you may find burnout makes it impossible to do so.
The foggy-headedness and difficulty concentrating can leave you unable to focus, preventing you from accomplishing the goals you set.
In some cases, burnout can even lead small business owners to close their doors. Without a sense of intrinsic worth, you question whether you even want to run your business any longer.
How Can You Prevent Job Burnout?
The best way to prevent burnout is to manage your stress levels.
While a bit of stress is necessary for almost all jobs, you need to set yourself up so you can recover between bouts of stress.
Maintaining a strict work schedule is critical. As a small business owner, you need to set time aside for your personal life.
Decide on your daily work hours and stick to them. Once you’re off the clock, try not to think about work and instead be present with your non-work activities.
Setting specific and reasonable goals can also help keep you from burning out. Having vague, unrealistic goals can make you feel like you’re not getting anywhere with your business.
Having smaller goals that you can consistently check off builds momentum and reminds you that what you’re doing leads to positive results. This helps you stay motivated and allows you to take a break between each achievement.
Finally, delegation is key.
While you may want to take on everything yourself, having an unrealistic workload will only leave you exhausted and ineffective.
One of the best ways to manage your workload is to hire a virtual receptionist.
How Does a Virtual Receptionist Help Prevent Job Burnout?
A virtual receptionist is a professionally trained receptionist that answers incoming calls on your behalf.
Bringing in a virtual receptionist helps prevent job burnout by reducing your overall workload.
For instance, if your business receives a high volume of calls, you may be spending hours on the phone each day that eats up your time spent on other tasks.
By bringing in a virtual receptionist, you free up time to relax and recover without compromising your business’ responsiveness.
Your schedule also becomes easier to manage. Virtual receptionist plans come with scheduling software that allows you to set callbacks when it’s most convenient.
This prevents you from overreaching, ensuring you maintain a healthier balance with your workflow.
Psychologically, a virtual receptionist also helps you maintain a better work-life balance.
By providing you with a dedicated business number, they free you from carrying your work home with you via your cell phone.
You’ll be able to relax and recharge without the constant temptation to re-engage with work or the looming anxiety that you might receive a business call after hours.
Conclusion
Job burnout occurs when you’re overworked and stress accumulates. Its onset is hastened when you don’t feel like what you’re doing is making an impact.
Job burnout can make it harder to be effective at work and leave you feeling psychologically and physically drained. It can also impact your business by preventing you from accomplishing important tasks.
The best way to avoid burnout is prevention. Maintaining a healthy balance between work and life is key to keeping stress from building over time.
If you’re looking for a way to reduce your workload so you have time to recharge, Alliance Virtual Offices’ live receptionist plans are here to help.
Your receptionist will handle your business phones for you, leaving you free to focus and unwind so you can keep building your business in the long run.
