Prevent Burnout: Ask This One Question

When it comes to balancing work and wellbeing in your team, one simple question does the trick.

‘Are your resources and requirements in balance?’

I’ll explain.

‘Requirements’ encompasses everything we need to do.

It’s our deadlines, our correspondence, our projects, paying the bills, cooking dinner, kids’ lunches, kids’ dinner, kids’ bathtime, kids’ EVERYTHING.

‘Resources’ encompasses everything we have to meet those requirements.

Our time, our energy, our focus, our skills, our colleagues, our partner, our software, our hardware, our footwear.

When our resources are far greater than our requirements things are easy (if sometimes a little boring).?

We’re getting along fine but certainly not working to our potential and maximising productivity.

We might think we want this but when things are easy we’re often not learning anything or growing as individuals or as a team.

When our requirements start to get closer to the limits of our resources, we have to kick things up a notch.

We have to plan more efficiently, collaborate more effectively, work harder, sometimes work longer, produce more.

Our productivity increases and so does our self-worth.

When our requirements become greater than our resources, s**t starts to get real.

This is where stress really kicks in and we have to narrow our focus and work hard as a team to get everything done.?

In the short term, this period is where we experience our best growth.

When our backs are to the wall and things have to get done we know we need to put in as individuals and as a team and it makes us stronger, better, more capable.

If this state persists, however, this is when the cracks start to show.

We’re running at full capacity and now we’re starting to neglect the things that got us there and keep us there.

Our sleep suffers, our exercise drops off, we spend less time with our families and friends, there’s no time for fun or relaxation, which only diminishes our resources further and widens the gap between them and our requirements.

This is where we start to see signs of overwhelm, burnout and eventually, breakdown.

This is obviously what we’re trying to avoid in ourselves and our teams so the question we need to ask in our team and 1:1 meetings is, ‘are your resources and requirements in balance?’

The answer we get leads us down a natural path of follow ups.

‘No, my requirements are a bit low and I feel like I could handle more’.?

Great. Assign more challenging work to increase their contribution and self-fulfilment.?

‘Yes, I feel like I’m in a good balance right now.’

Fantastic. Maintain this level where possible and know that they have the capacity to take on more if it comes to that.

‘No, I feel like I’m getting overwhelmed.’

Ok. Now you know they’re taking on too much and one of two things has to happen;

Either their requirements have to bdecrease or their resources have to increase.

This now becomes a practical exercise between the two of you on how to do one or both of those things.

Once your team understands the nature of resources vs requirements they have the means to articulate where they’re at and what they need in order to perform well and not burn out.

So, how do you institute these things in practice?

Glad you asked.

Step 1: Gather your team and explain the concept of requirements vs resources.

Step 2: Get a piece of paper or a document and list as many resources as you possibly can on one side, then all of the requirements your team have on the other.?

Take your time with this and really get into the nuances of each as it will help you and your team understand what each of you are going through.

Step 3: Establish regular team and 1:1 meetings where you ask the question, ‘Are your requirements and resources in balance?’

Step 4: Adjust accordingly based on the answer.

This is a simple framework but one that is incredibly effective at getting to the important stuff quickly, which is what we’re really after.

So give this a try in your team and watch how much of a difference it makes.

You won’t regret it.

Question: Are your requirements and resources in balance right now??

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FYI, at Kinex Health, this is what we do.

It’s our mission to create workforces that have the skills to be self-sufficient in their health and wellbeing, and workplaces that make it easy for these skills to be applied.

If this sounds like something you could use, send me a DM and let’s talk.