Burnout more common among female employees: Four ways to combat Human Giver Syndrome
It’s July. Many families have vacations on their minds, maybe at a beach, amusement park or campground, and every working adult has to figure out how to extract themselves from business for those precious few days of relaxation. We have to work ahead, pre-meet deadlines that fall during vacations, and prepare for things set to happen as soon as we get home from our trips. Whoever first said going on vacation is a lot of work sure knew what they were talking about.
A recent study, though, indicates that many working women feel a disproportionate amount of stress and burnout compared with their male counterparts.
The McKinsey & Company 2021 Women in the Workplace study found that “women are rising to the moment as stronger leaders and taking on the extra work that comes with this.” It also said, “Compared to men at the same level, women are doing more to support their teams and advance diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts.”
That all sounds good, but the extra work women seem to expend comes at a cost. The study also reveals that 42% of women reported feeling often or almost always burned out, whereas only 35% of men felt similarly. Human Giver Syndrome is real.
I started reading about Human Giver Syndrome through the book Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle by Drs. Emily and Amelia Nagoski. The syndrome stems from the belief that one has a moral obligation to give every bit of yourself for the betterment of others — family, friends, bosses, subordinates — even if it physically and emotionally wears you down to the point of injury or impairment. It’s an internal pressure to be all things to everyone who depend on us.
While more disparate amounts of childcare and household duties still reside squarely on women’s shoulders, it’s no surprise that during the pandemic the U.S. saw a sharp rise in the number of women, especially mothers, who left the corporate world altogether. According to a 2021 report from the National Women’s Law Center, the majority of pandemic-related job losses were experienced by women.
That’s alarming.
In the past two decades, our resource industry has struggled to include more women in our educational pipelines and ultimately in our workplaces. Now is not the time to lose the gains we’ve made. Let’s ensure we understand the ways we or our coworkers may be struggling with Human Giver Syndrome.
1: Recognize it. Take time to look around, read, and listen. Look at your work and home expectations, and the expectations you have of your employees. That means taking a critical look at your relationships with friends, family and co-workers, especially bosses and subordinates. Know that you may be reacting to a societal expectation and do your best to re-evaluate those expectations.
2: Self Care. This may be the toughest of the four steps because it means carving out time for yourself. Eating more healthfully, exercising, meditating, mindfulness, relaxing. All of these may allow for more inner peace, but can also help combat the anxiety and internal pressure we put on ourselves, and the external ones we put upon others.
3: Refocus. Evaluate what’s truly important in your life, in an attempt to better prioritize it all. That means different things to each of us, but we can all benefit from appraising our personal and work situations.
4: Remind yourself. Remind yourself that you’re only one person and you can’t do everything. Also, don’t ask your employees to continually do more. Just because some project should happen, doesn’t mean that it’s more important than the stress you’re putting yourself or your employees under to make it happen.