Burnout Prevention Tips for Small Business Owners.

According to a study by Walmart Business, a staggering 70% of small business owners experience burnout at least once per month while only 10% feel they’ve taken enough time off. This study makes it clear that burnout is the one true obstacle to achieving a healthy work-life balance.

This Pacific Prime CXA article will discuss tips for small business owners to efficiently prevent monthly burnout and achieve a healthy work-life balance once more with tips for both employers and employees.

What is Burnout?

Burnout is a state of physical, mental, and emotional exhaustion caused by long-term stress and feelings of constant pressure. While caused by stress, burnout is not the same as stress, as the latter is usually short-term and manageable while burnout can affect your ability to function and leave you hopeless and unmotivated.

The Signs of Burnout

Common signs of burnout include exhaustion, lack of motivation, impacted work productivity, and more. If you experience any of the following symptoms, it may be something more than just work stress:

Exhaustion (even after a full night’s sleep)
Lack of motivation at work
Inability to find joy and enthusiasm in activities you once enjoyed
A decline in work productivity and performance
Emotional disconnect from your business or clients
Irritability and mood swings
Possibly physical symptoms, such as headaches, stomach issues, or increased illnesses

How Employers Can Prevent Burnout for Employees

Employers can prevent burnout among employees by opening up opportunities for feedback, giving reasonable workload, and more. Below, we will discuss how employers can help their employees prevent burnout at work.

Opening Up Opportunities for Employee Feedback

Nothing matters more to employers than ensuring your employees’ voices are being heard, which you can do by opening up opportunities for feedback.

You can leave a box for employees to anonymously drop written pieces of paper in to collect feedback, or you can do it electronically with QR codes that take them to a Google Form survey.

Creating Reasonable Workloads

Employees swarmed by tasks they may not be able to prioritize correctly may be more susceptible to the symptoms of burnout than others. Thus, when creating workloads and scheduling tasks, it’s advisable to have a chat with your employees regarding the workload and come up with a reasonable work completion timeframe.

Break the entire workload into smaller, manageable tasks and distribute them equally throughout your team so that every employee is working on their tasks in a stress-free manner.

Offering Flexible Scheduling

Flexible scheduling will allow your employees to create their work schedules so that they can show up for work as usual, but are also able to leave when they’d like so they could take some time off in case of stress or other circumstances.

For instance, you can let your employees choose to work between 8am to 5pm or 7am to 4pm, etc. By doing so, your employees will feel understood and valued, which leads to a better-performing workforce and increased productivity overall.

How Employees Can Prevent Burnout for Themselves

Preventing burnout for employees involves accepting the state, sitting back and taking a break, reconnecting with your passion, setting boundaries, and seeking support. Below, we will discuss how employees themselves can prevent burnout.

Accepting Burnout

The first step in preventing burnout is acknowledging the state. Allow yourself to understand and accept that burnout is a common experience among employees. Refrain from self-blame and self-criticism as that will make you feel even more stressed and pressured to live up to your expectations.

If you’re feeling stressed at work, take a few minutes to practice meditation and breathing exercises to calm yourself down.

Taking a Break

As you allow yourself to come to terms with and accept the experience, sit back and take a break by taking some time off and doing what you enjoy. Every little bit of time off counts, whether it’s after work, the weekends, or taking a leave and going on vacation.

By allowing yourself to take a break for as long as you need, you can resume work with a fresh mind once more.

Passion Reconnecting

As you resume work once more after taking some much-needed time off, you can also take a moment to reflect on yourself by asking yourself what was it that fueled your passion for work. Think back to what you are already good at as well as want to learn more and develop for the next couple of years in your career and work on from there.

By looking back at your passion for work, you can re-motivate yourself to work efficiently.

Setting Boundaries

As you’re taking time off, whether it’s in the form of an after-work routine, the weekends, or taking a vacation, be sure to establish a clear boundary between work and personal life by avoiding overworking and practicing self-care.

Seeking Support

As you allow yourself to accept that burnout is a normal experience, if you feel overwhelmed by certain symptoms to the point that it’s starting to impact your physical and mental health, don’t hesitate to seek support in the form of guidance from therapy sessions or seeing a doctor in case of physical symptoms.

Conclusion

While symptoms of burnout can be serious, particularly if it also causes physical symptoms, that doesn’t mean management is outside the realm of possibility entirely. Both employees and their employers can easily prevent burnout through simple steps that involve mere understanding.

We deeply understand that each employee’s individual needs are unique, and a one-size-fits-all employee benefits scheme just wouldn’t work very well. We also know that flexible benefits are the key to catering to each employee’s specific needs and improved wellbeing for employees.

As an experienced health insurance broker and employee benefits specialist, Pacific Prime CXA can not only help you with finding the right health insurance plan, but also effective employee benefits solutions to ensure your employees’ voices are heard and that their unique needs are met.

Whether you’re an expat or local Singaporean citizen seeking health insurance in Singapore, or a business looking for effective employee benefits solutions for improved talent retention, we will be more than happy to help you out with completely impartial advice at no additional cost.

If you are interested in learning more, please get in touch with us or get a free quote from us. Moreover, feel free to request a free flexible benefits demo on our CXA Portal!

Wish Sutthatothon (Nickname: Guy) is currently a content writer at Pacific Prime Thailand, an insurance broker that connects individuals and businesses with insurance providers worldwide. He creates and edits blog articles, guides, reports, webpages, and other types of digital content.

He graduated with a Bachelor’s Degree in Communication Arts, Media & Communication major (concentration: Creative Content) from Mahidol University International College (MUIC). During the compulsory major elective period in the summer of 2021 and voluntarily during the summer of 2022, he also interned as a video and photo editor at Mbrella Films.

He has experience working as an English Content Writer at a real estate buying/renting/selling platform in Thonglor. There, he crafted company blog posts on a multitude of topics. Topics include market trends, legal issues and disputes in property businesses, financial guides, expat guides, home insurance, home decoration and maintenance, and weekly real estate news quick-recaps. Occasionally, as part of the blog-writing process, he would also translate existing Thai blogs to English.

In his free time, Guy enjoys doing scriptwriting and storytelling for comic strips, watching movies, and listening to music (particularly film scores).

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