The human side of overwork and the 'Great Attrition' - part two: how leaders can avert a crisis

In part one of this story, I shared the real story I’m hearing time and time again about the cumulative effects of overwork on teams in my work as an organisational anthropologist.

In part two, I share some reflections on why this pattern is alarming and what leaders and companies can do to look after their people.

This isn’t an individual issue; it’s a sign that something is broken

Going back to our story in part one, it’s easy to see how an 8-hour day has gradually crept to an 11-12 hour day for many.

You could argue that people need to set firmer boundaries and learn to say ‘No’. You might even be right about that. This is essentially what the trend of ‘quiet quitting’ is about. But those suggestions place the burden on the individual and focus on coping with the problem rather than solving the deeper problems and addressing the root causes that go beyond the individual. You can be the best swimmer in the world, but you don't stand a chance against an overwhelming tide.

Others may read that scenario and suggest that employers are taking advantage of the goodwill of their people and taking them for granted. You could be right about too. Or you might be right to point out that an obsession with productivity and filling people to 100% capacity without any slack or flex is another issue that’s bleeding people dry.

Either way, there’s a looming crisis on our hands. Overwork and burnout – accelerated by the Great Resignation with added pressure from the cost-of-living crunch – is a pending crisis that workplaces need to deal with going forward.

We can’t keep expecting people to work such long, unsustainable hours – especially if their compensation isn’t adjusted for it.

Is it ethical to pay people for a 40-hour week while implicitly expecting them to work 50 or 60?

The cumulative effect of overwork

Something has to give. If it’s not management being more generous, understanding or supportive in ways that are meaningful to employees – then people are going to burnout and/or leave.

Without leaders changing resourcing, compensation, timelines or expectations, pressure will diffuse on the remaining team members, creating more stress and feeding a dangerous cycle of higher turnover which results in an entirely different team in a matter of months.

The result for the company is lost years of accumulated, internal knowledge of systems, tools, processes, as well as people and their networks of relationships that are the heartbeat of the company’s culture. While they may be underappreciated, culture and accrued internal knowledge are key differentiators for the company’s continued performance and success.

What good leaders can do

Solving any problem begins with acknowledging that something’s wrong. You can’t fix a problem you don’t believe exists. Here are some things you can do as a leader to make your world of work more sustainable.

See this crisis through a human lens

Start by understanding that overwork is not merely a threat to your business in terms of P&L sheets and numbers or gaps in the org chart, but it affects real people. Thinking about this crisis through that human lens is a fundamental first step to making your organisation more human-centric.

Once you’ve acknowledged that overwork and an unsustainable workload are issues and you’re thinking in a human lens, you need to find ways to support your people in meaningful ways, whether that’s adjusting pay, resource, hours, timelines, expectations or a combination of these.

Ask and listen

If you don’t know what meaningful support looks like, don’t assume – ask and listen. You may want to do some listening sessions with your people around workload, wellbeing and sustainability. Ask them what would help them the most in relieving pressure. This should give you a clear sense of what’s most important and most helpful for your people.

Asking and listening also build trust by creating touchpoints for conversation, mutual understanding and opportunities for employees' voices to be heard.

Help where you can and be honest where you can’t

If you can bring some of their suggestions to life, great. But even if you can’t (for example, if you can’t raise wages by 10%), give them a transparent and honest answer why not. Recognise that this also isn’t an instant fix and be willing to support your people long-term and not merely in the short run. That might look like giving them 5% this year with a pledge to giving them 5% next year. Or it could look like giving people more time off for annual leave.?

Move beyond an obsession with productivity

If your company has normalised overdrive as standard operating procedure, you’re at high risk of having a toxic culture where people lack the psychological safety to set and maintain healthy boundaries.

Yes, it’s important to be productive, but there’s only so much you can fairly ask of people. If you trust your people – and I assume that you do because you hired them – you’ll know that most of them are willing to do their fair shift and get things done as long as they feel like they’re being treated fairly.

Take a good look at your culture and your expectations

Is it ethical to pay people for a 40-hour week while implicitly expecting them to work 50 or 60?

Is it fair to expect a 4-person team to do the work of a 5-person team (especially while only paying them the salaries of a 4-person team at 40 hours a week)?

While we’ve all pitched in extra during the pandemic, there’s a line between asking people to temporarily help out in a crisis and taking advantage of people.

If your teams are experiencing burnout and turnover because of overwork, you need to think about your expectations and resourcing. The solution may be paying your people more, expanding your team or simply adjusting your expectations around scope or timelines.

?

For better or worse, people are a finite resource. We can only give so much for so long before burning out.

As an anthropologist, my fear is that asking too much of people for too long – especially without enough compensation to combat our mounting anxieties – will only lead to disaster for both company and people.

But it doesn’t have to be this way. Empathetic and supportive leaders can avert this crisis in the making by acknowledging the danger, listening to their people, identifying what their people need and making adjustments where possible around expectations, targets, personnel, pay and workload.