Burning out to burning bright - bringing working women back to life

The culture of female responsibility runs deep. Company policies can only do so much. We need to work with women to find a way through the psychological minefield of the work/life balance.?

It was over 40 years ago that Helen Gurley Brown wrote her iconic book Having it All. And yet we are still asking the question: Can women really have it all? From the outside it all looks like progress - and don’t get it twisted, there has been some serious progress. But the barriers to female progress in the workplace persist. Yes, they may seem like different barriers from the outside, but the foundations remain the same. ?

In 2023, it feels simplistic to discuss the female experience in these terms. Every woman is different; we want different things. Perhaps now we can see that ‘having it all’ isn’t all it's cracked up to be. In fact, the very notion puts pressure on women. Perhaps we need to focus more on what individual women want and need, a little nurture to temper the cutthroat battle to the top. Some of our common traits and natural inclinations can keep us shoehorned in the business world, but those very qualities are what the modern workplace is crying out for – if we can only reclassify them from perceived weaknesses into strengths. Sure, things are different from in the eighties, but the scars still serve to remind women of a well-established culture – and it's for this reason that women need proper support to transform their psychology around work and the work/life balance.?

The ‘new normal’ is taking its toll on working women. Of course, there are major advantages to the increased flexibility remote and hybrid working affords us, but it can also make the work/life balance harder to manage, as lines blur and the responsibilities we carry in both places compete for our attention. Whilst some of this is about the day-to-day of working from home, there’s another aspect we tend to ignore - the cultural norms embedded in our psychology. Feeling guilty, over-promising our time, and picking up every loose end in sight, ends in that all too well-known phenomenon - burnout. ?

In our Future of Work for Women survey, we found that 36% of women see burnout as their main career challenge; a figure that rises to 43% once we get to the C-suite. And when Deloitte looked into it in 2022, they found over half of women had seen their stress levels rise in the last year. These are alarming statistics, and we need to address them together if we are to protect and nurture female talent. ?

Flexibility has always been desirable, and the legacy of the pandemic has made this more accessible to a lot of working women and men alike. Interestingly though, despite the new ‘normal’ of flexible work, Deloitte also found that 94% of women believed requesting flexible working would affect their likelihood of promotion, and 60% working in hybrid environments felt excluded from important meetings with limited access to the leaders who could facilitate their progression. It’s data like this that shows us the disconnect between what is offered in theory, and how it plays out in practice. Yet again, women don’t feel safe and supported to take the breaks that come to them. ?

?“Research has shown isolation and loneliness both cause, and are compounded by burnout, so really, fostering strong networks and connections is doubly important when it comes to preventing and overcoming burnout - especially with more people than ever working remotely. This could mean attending industry events, joining a professional network, or finding an online community that resonates with your goals and values. Whatever works best for you. At AllBright, we provide easy ways for women to do all of these things; I also encourage my team to make time to do this. It’s a must-have not a nice-to-have.” - AllBright’s CEO, Viviane Paxinos

Community is so important when it comes to shifting mindsets and feeling real psychological safety at work. Women need to feel safe to speak up when they are facing discrimination, burnout and mental health challenges. They need to feel safe to ask for the compensation they deserve and the working practices that work for them - because fear of appearing weak and ‘not up to the job’ adds further fuel to the burnout fire. Empowering women to flip that script and own the unique challenges they face as a source of authenticity and power is the only way out of a vicious cycle, years in the making. ?

For companies committed to supporting women to thrive at work, these priorities aren’t simply about ticking a box and getting a pat on the back for good employee care - they are actively feeding the success of their companies by fostering better motivation, innovation and retention within their female talent pool. ?

So let’s talk about the realities of being a working woman. Let’s talk about burnout. Let’s talk about the underlying cultural structures that have built the burden of worry resting on women’s shoulders. Without conversation there is only more hiding, more shame, and more burnout to come. ?

Find out more about AllBright Alliance and sign up to receive the Future of Work for Women survey here.