Why we should prioritise mental wellbeing to avoid burnout and build resilience

Our mindset is the engine room of our performance. Leaders and performers need to prioritise their mental wellbeing and if we want to create a working environment we can all thrive in, we need to look out for signs of burnout, and recognise the compounding effect of our choices.

The Winning Mindset

The Netflix documentary The Last Dance is one of the most-talked about documentaries of 2020. It takes us inside the team culture of The Chicago Bulls during their eight incredible seasons of success in the 1990s. Their star player, Michael Jordan, recalls the mental part was the hardest and separated good players from the great players. Jordan’s physical presence and strength, combined with incredible determination, resilience and ability to perform at his best under pressure, made him one of the greatest players of all time.

This idea that the mental game is as important as the physical has been echoed many times by elite sports stars. Sir Viv Richards, West Indian cricketer, is widely regarded as the greatest batsman of all time, renowned for his confident swagger. When I interviewed him in Melbourne, he too highlighted the relationship between his mindset and his performance: “It is the most crucial because everything that operates at the top here filters down into the body language…the mental side of things, regardless of what you are involved in, is the engine room.” 

The winning mindset[1] is about setting goals, then being courageous and focused enough keep going after those goals, whatever it takes. We also need to enjoy achieving these goals and milestones, because if we don't, it becomes relentless and that's when we start to have burnout, which is another key element in our mental ill health. It all starts with our mindset.

Avoiding burnout

In a recent Mental Wellbeing and Resilience webinar[2], I asked the delegates a simple question: how big an impact does your mindset play on your performance at work? Try asking yourself the same question before continuing and score yourself out of 100. The delegates on this particular webinar started at 50%, ramping up to about 98% at its most. So many of us see mindset as pivotal to our performance but how much time and effort do we spend training our mindset? We’ve almost become conditioned not to think about these things and yet some of the most common questions I am asked, concern performing under pressure, controlling elements like anxiety and the tendency to burn out. It is critical we find a balance between the challenges we face and our coping skills so we can deliver our best performance.

Anna Hemmings, six times world champion canoeist, is a brilliant performer and Olympian but with a tendency to train so obsessively that she had some real problems with burnout and chronic fatigue syndrome. She talked to me about the difference between stubbornness and resilience: “A big part of resilience is about having the energy to deliver…being well-equipped mentally, emotionally and physically in the face of life’s challenges.” However, “being stubborn is just ignoring the signs” of tiredness, stress and irritability. We need to “be aware of what some of the warning signs might be for you in the first place” and recognize “the consequences of not listening.” Have a think about the warning signs for you: it might be blocking people out who are trying to help; losing sleep; neglecting exercise; crying; catastrophizing; drinking more alcohol or perhaps OCD kicks in. These are real responses to this question during the same webinar and it’s a worthwhile exercise for all us to consider how pressure manifests itself in our thinking, behavior, and habits. 

In order to be resilient, we need to be aware of our pressure points, which are often driven by aspects out of control (particularly in light of Covid 19). We should aim to spend at least 70% of our time and effort on areas we can influence or control. Try daily strategies such as breaking workload down into smaller chunks, working in time sprints and taking regular breaks. Monitor anxiety levels and measure the impact and output you have rather than just thinking about general busyness. Elite athletes often complete wellbeing checks so medical experts can track their trends on recovery and develop strategies to aid performance. Be aware when you’re having a low-scoring day and take control of your recovery.

Choosing health and wellbeing

When we are so focused on the impact we have at work, we don’t really consider how we’re setting ourselves up for an energetic day. Dr Dorian Dugmore, a cardiovascular specialist who works with a lot of Premier League football managers in the UK, talked to me about the wellbeing choices we need to consider in order to be healthy executive, capable of sustaining energy of long periods of time, under pressure. He outlines the day of the typical corporate or executive leader where choices like getting into “work early because it’s quiet time and they can deal with their emails, post and self-assessment” results in choices like substituting a healthy breakfast with a quick muffin and coffee.

Likewise, as the day goes on, increasing in pressure, lunch is a quick sandwich grabbed by their secretary and in order to beat the afternoon slump, a quick sugary fix is needed. Once home early evening, they might have a “wine…a big meal” having not drunk any water, so their “mental function and clarity is not great.” Sleep will be “erratic” and “REM sleep” instead of the “deep sleep they need to relax, repair and recover.” Worryingly this becomes their “operational norm” even if they feel exhausted most of the time.

Dr Dorian Dugmore’s insights demonstrate our responsibility to take control of our daily choices. James Clear’s best-selling book Atomic Habits [3] explores how to build better habits and break negatives ones. We should consider every daily choice and consciously choose to break the chain of bad habits like drinking too much alcohol and eating unhealthily. His book is a great way to build more resilience into your day, whether it’s making good choices more accessible – I often put my alarm clock three metres away from my bed and put it in my running shoes- or keeping a friction of distance between yourself and your bad habits. In other words, if there’s a chocolate bar on your desk, you’re probably going to eat it. Choice architecture is crucial.

The importance of support networks

Many companies claim their people are the most important asset they’ve got but in times of challenge, we can really judge whether their actions are in line with their slogans. If we’re going to sustain a high-performance environment, there needs to be high support to balance it out. Daniel Lerner, expert in positive psychology, feels our “relationships are absolutely key to our ability to thrive in any domain… Chris Peterson, one of the fathers of positive psychology boiled it down to three words: other people matter…Whether we’re talking about enjoying our lives at home or thriving in the workplace” it depends up having people “that we feel close to in our lives.”

This is a powerful reminder that resilience and mental wellbeing is a team sport. Anyone that leads teams or people or even as a family member, knows that one of the symptoms that people talk about when they're slipping into mental ill health is becoming isolated. We take to take a proactive approach to our own tendency to self-isolate and recognise it others.

Responsible leadership

This is a really important time for leaders. Their staff are people not performers and they should work to create the right environment for them to thrive. How do we create the right conditions to help people have the most impact and do brilliant work?

Kirk Vallis, global head of creative capability development at Google, has the following answer: “Think about the mental and psychological conditions you are trying to create. The physical conditions help to drive that. But fundamentally, in an organisation like Google…we're paid for our brains” so “psychological safety” is crucial “ensuring our people feel able to be at their best, bring all of themselves, not only work every day, but the specific conversation or the meeting or the issue that's arisen.”

As leaders, we have a responsibility to think about mental wellbeing and resilience, allowing people to feel scared but also allowing them to feel safe enough to express their fears. Consider how to create the conditions for success and obtain psychological safety in your teams and watch them thrive.

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This article has been adapted from Jeremy Snape’s Inside the Mind of Champions podcast, episode 10 : Mental Wellbeing and Resilience[4]

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References & Citations

[1] https://www.sportingedge.com/programmes/the-winning-mindset/ 

[2] https://www.sportingedge.com/services/webinars.html

[3] https://www.amazon.co.uk/Atomic-Habits-Proven-Build-Break/dp/1847941834/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=atomic+habits&qid=1593024413&sr=8-1

[4] https://www.sportingedge.com/podcasts/episode-10.html