More than Burnout

As society implodes people find themselves unable to function in untenable, immoral situations. From Fast Company:

Employees—physicians and fast-food workers, teachers and hotel staff—are resigning in unprecedented numbers, often in distress. Managers are at a loss for how to respond. Attempts to address employee dissatisfaction and burnout with bonuses, mindfulness, and extra time off do not seem to be working well enough; employees continue to quit, sometimes angrily and dramatically, airing a range of grievances on social media.

But what if the problem we typically call “burnout” is not just burnout? What if it is not the other “usual suspects”—depression or anxiety—either? What if it is something that may appear similar, but has a different cause and, if incorrectly addressed, can make individuals feel increasingly worse?

Appropriately dealing with the epidemic of employee anguish and quitting requires correctly identifying its causes and using precise terminology to describe it. And while burnout is by far the most popular explanation of employee distress, in many cases, the problem might be a less known, but more insidious: moral injury. Preliminary data from my ongoing research indicate that, conservatively, the experience of at least 25% of those reporting feeling burned out might be better explained by moral injury. 

Consider the story of someone we’ll call Henry. Henry joined a well-known not-for-profit organization to use his accounting talents in service of a social cause he strongly endorsed. But he discovered egregious donations mishandling—and was told to cover it up. Discovering the embezzlement was bad enough, but now Henry faced a dilemma: blow the whistle on individuals involved and risk a massive backlash against the entire cause he believed in, or keep quiet, save the face of the cause, but become a party to the problem. Henry found himself struggling to sleep at night and controlling his emotions during the day, including anger at organization’s management for tarnishing the cause and shame over his own lose-lose situation. In addition, his health issues that were under control returned with a vengeance. (Read more.)

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