Richard Muscat Azzopardi

Burnout has become a hot topic among business leaders in recent months, and with the pandemic continuing to add pressure to workers across different industries, it’s no wonder CEOs – both locally and across the globe – are taking note.

Switch CEO Richard Muscat Azzopardi shared his insight on the subject with Alain Hunkins in a recent Forbes article. In his view, “employees don’t burn out when they work for too long, or too hard (within reasonable limits). They burn out when they work on something that they can’t believe in for too long or too hard.”

In the article, Mr Hunkins quotes a 2021 survey from The Hartford, which found that 61 per cent of US workers are experiencing burnout at work – a figure that should merit cause for concern.

Among valuable insights from The Rosenstein Group founder Darrell Rosenstein, Chief Burnout Officer of The Breakfast Leadership Network Michael Levitt and Esha Bawa, Vice President of Global Client Management for American Express, the Switch CEO’s leadership solutions, as quoted by Forbes, are:

1.   Communication 

“We make sure that we have a great network of colleagues who make it their business to check in on the mental health of each and every member of the team, at least once a week.”

2.   Empathy

“We check that everyone knows how appreciated they are, especially in these times when loneliness and resentment can creep in so easily.”

3.   Appreciation

“If we can’t keep employees excited directly about the project that they are working on (not all clients operate in an exciting industry), we emphasize how important it is to the agency, to the client and to the people around them.”

4.   Clarity

“We make sure that work gets to people on time in a way that they are expecting it. It’s far easier to burn out a high-potential by giving them incomplete or confusing briefs than it is to give them too much work.”

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