DEVELOPMENT will fix it . We need new ways to outsmart overwhelm before we reach burnout – beyond just calling for more self-care . Start with these five techniques that will help you stay alert to rising levels of overwhelm at work :
w Know your triggers . What gets on your nerves or winds you up ? Knowing what accelerates or advances your overwhelm is important . See these things ahead of time and they ’ ll have less power over you .
Five techniques to outsmart overwhelm at work
Deadlines approaching , to do lists that don ’ t end and back-to-back meetings . Argh ! Overwhelm at work is more a case of when it is going to happen , not if it will happen . Thankfully , Lynne Cazaly has all you need to combat it …
THE EXPERT
Lynne Cazaly is speaker and award-winning author on new ways of working . She helps individuals and organisations think and work in more productive , collaborative , creative and effective ways .
Few people get to work overwhelm-free and all EAs have pressures and expectations to reach targets , achieve what ’ s asked and do a good job . Work can overwhelm with quantity or workload as well as information overload and the emotional overwhelm of having to show up and ‘ carry on ’. Meanwhile , employers are making big decisions and big changes , announcing restructures and new systems , while you deal with challenging colleagues , bosses and customers .
The problem with overwhelm though , is that if we don ’ t manage and monitor it , it can grow and turn into the beast that is burnout . Researcher Jennifer Moss reported in Harvard Business Review that from more than 1,500 people surveyed in 46 countries , 56 % said their job demands had increased . And 62 % who were struggling to manage their workloads had experienced burnout ‘ often ’ or ‘ extremely often ’ in the previous three months .
Burnout , as the World Health Organisation says , is “ more than just an employee problem ; it ’ s an organisational problem that requires an organisational solution ” and it comes when we experience ongoing stress with no relief . Not even a weekend in the country or a week by the beach w Write out the work . Instead of juggling your to do list in your head ( you know , those 3am wake-up-in-a-sweat moments ) make them visible by writing them down . Even though the number of things might be more than you ’ d like to see , ‘ externalising ’ information is a powerful technique in the process of outsmarting overwhelm .
w Stop juggling so many things at once . It ’ s impossible to multitask all day and expect to feel good at the end of it .
w Conserve your energy and focus on fewer things . Doing fewer things but doing them well , or at least finishing them , helps take them out of your mind . If you do still wake in worry , see point # 2 and write your thoughts down . You ’ ll get back to sleep easier .
w Manage yourself . One of the best career success tips is to be a good manager of yourself , your workload , your time and your energy . Knowing what you ’ ve got on and when it ’ s due shows you ’ ve got your head around the work to be done . That ’ s much harder to do when you ’ re feeling overwhelmed .
Overwhelm is an important part of our human functioning and we need the extremes of “ It ’ s easy , I ’ m chillin ’” through to “ I ’ m smashed , it ’ s too much ” to know where our boundaries are . But we also need to know that too much of anything isn ’ t healthy . Working longer hours , stressing over deadlines and worrying about reports isn ’ t a sustainable way to work long-term .
There ’ s a middle line here of balance – it ’ s where you can get good work done and achieve your goals while being aware of the rise of overwhelm and its damaging effects . It ’ s rewarding to still be able to reach a deadline and high five someone ( even if it ’ s yourself ) rather than drowning under the weight of everything being too much to cope with . S lynnecazaly . com
52 Executive PA | Winter Issue 2022