Survey: The average worker experiences career burnout – by the age of 32
studyfinds.org
studyfinds.org
Probably career suicidal (never admit it in your application) but honestly the thing I've found helps is just not caring about work at all. It's like the equivalent to acceptance in grief. Get the day done, look forward to the weekend, when you book time off make sure to book the following Monday.
I'll do the job as best I can for as long as I'm paid but if you think I'm here for any reason other than money to pay the bills you're completely delusional.
Watch the film Office Space, be inspired.
I mean things like enjoying your colleagues, be happy for a well done job, have fun with interesting problems, appreciate that your work is valuable for other people.
Yeah, those are not things you should accept _instead_ of the money, in general, but they count too.
- be happy for a well done job
- have fun with interesting problems
It may be a bit cynicsl, but there’s your problem. It’s much easier to find jobs without these things that still pay very well.
Sometimes you get lucky and get one of the good jobs that tick some of these boxes, but most people don't get lucky.
I have friends outside work, the problems are easy but tedious, I have access to the analytics of the sites I build and can see nobody uses them.
Burnout is like arguing with someone on Twitter, you're not convincing it otherwise in the moment
I'm 31 and actually, I've gone through phases and got bored and miserable about my job (I have ADHD and this happens easily). The thing I've found that helps is to keep things fresh, and find a job where you care about the company and product and have more flexibility in what you do and are still learning and keeping stuff interesting. I'm learning Rust at the moment because I know just doing front-end stuff (I've done all kinds of stuff in the past 12 years, but at the moment front-end is what gets the money). Even doing more jobs using React Native and opening up the world of app development has kept thing interesting.
Also maintaining a work life balance, aggressively enforcing flexibility (I was straight up with my new employer that some days I am useless and just want to go for a walk, but I will work hard enough on the days my brain wants to play ball, that it won't be an issue).
Burnout is a lot easier in corporates because there is less flexibility and you are so removed from the people at the top and are much more of a cog in a machine, there are arbitrary seeming rulebooks because they require consistency, and that is demoralising for individuals. Basically the more corporate a company is run, the less I like it.
Once I lose interest I'll end up doing stuff that will end up in my being let go which has happened a couple times in my career, so maintaining interest and keeping things fresh in whatever way is absolutely imperative. Also the product I'm building is a factor for me - I've worked at companies where despite having a good team, what they're building is so mundane and dull I can't force myself to be excited by it.
Remember what excited you about your field and why you got into it. If that was purely money then yes, previous advice is all you can do really, but if it was a passion for your field, then keep feeding the fire and reigniting that passion by whatever means necessary. Sometimes you need a break, sometimes you need a change, sometimes you need something new.
I'm an average person. I'm not qualified for those roles. I make websites in WordPress and I now hate the process of writing code of any flavour with such passion I'll take anything else that pays more. I don't have the capacity to learn some new thing on the off chance I go work somewhere that isn't just the same old.
Also I now work for a small indie company for the very reason of having more responsibility and purpose. You know what that led to recently? I moved all our kit to managed hosting in case I went through with offing myself.
It's burnout, not a bad day. I'd love to just take some time off all willy nillily as you say but that would result in a performance improvement plan and an eventual firing, which I can't afford right now.
I'd fucking love to go back to Sysadmin work but I've been out so long everything's gone cloudy - again, not qualified.
All these excuses and more in your nearest person with burnout :)
Why not start learning more languages and whatnot? What do you mean you don't have the capacity? I was a PHP dev back in the day and progressed to things like Python/Django, but there's a whole world of resources that are accessible to you as an existing coder if you wanted to skill up and take it to the next level. There were points in the last few years I was bored of coding and rarely did it outside of my work hours. Recently I started looking at Rust and it dazzled me into being excited again.
For instance the CI/CD I set up is f-in cool how it just works. I'll start from there.
I find him to be a breath of fresh air, in his books and interviews, in describing how miraculous yet constrained our lives are. It helps me not burn-out. I think.
If that is the case, then Ribbonfarm has an excellent (and in depth) piece on how The Office portrays modern life.
https://www.ribbonfarm.com/the-gervais-principle/
In essence, Michael never got fired because he is the graphite control rod in the reactor of capitalism. A clueless person that posture-talks to all, but is baby-talked to back. His class absorbs the hits for his sociopath bosses that come from the loser employees. He can't be fired because if his class was removed, then the cycle of strikes would start up again. He is a sacrificial galvanic anode, rusting away to save the ship.
At least per what Ribbonfarm says.
It's not a kind look at The Office.
The difficulty of understanding someone taking their own life is made greater when that person was a role model. Their descent into the abyss was a personal journey, but the torch they’d been carrying was a communal flame. I find myself doubting what they said, worrying their flame leads me down the same path they traveled without deviation.
- Nietzsche
Requiring everyone to only present solutions which have personally worked for them seems like an overly-drastic way to limit useful human knowledge.
What about consciousness? The nature of reality? Suicide feels like a trivial topic compared to these two.
The second part is the root of my difficulty with DFW. If someone says things that matter to me, but then commits suicide, is that them declaring they don't think those things mattered? What that really means, the act of suicide, encapsulates all the violence of being brought into this world without choice and the search for peace within those confines. It is an answer, in a world full of questions, I suppose.
To give a construction I just was mulling over based on your response, I think the meaning of life is like a prison cell, whereas consciousness and reality are just features of the cell. Yes, we can ask "Why is a bed here" and it might give us comfort to know that it is so I don't need to sleep on the cold floor. But at the end of the day, the question of most importance is "Why am I locked in this cell?". We can only understand the cell completely by understanding what desires drive men to break out.
Before he killed himself he had written (at least a few times) about finding meaning in the companionship of dogs and how he was finally “happy” with his state of being which, I think, contributed to stopping his medication.
Layered on top of that is an inability to escape with now. My family all live overseas, where it isn’t practical to visit them, and holidays are a complex nightmare right now.
I’m incredibly fortunate to have a job during a pandemic-induced recession, but man am I feeling exhausted.
I'll bet your company won't stop running some kind of extra project or workload even after all this is over, it'll just become the new normal.
For us, we're on "50%" across two projects (some on "33%" across three projects) which all have full time loads, expectations and deadlines.
This. Not only the number of developers on our project was halved, but also all who remained are now expected to work 50% on another project. Sometimes the other project is a small one, but it still distracts a lot to have two Jiras to follow, two daily standups, two sets of planning meetings, etc. Twice the number of managers, but half of teammates. Agile be praised!
Seems to me that a frequent reason to start new projects is a change in management. Essentially, a new manager gets more credit for starting a new project than for maintaining the old one. So a new project is started, even if it does more or less the same thing as the old one. But the old project also must be maintained, because it is necessary to keep the company running, and it will take a few months, maybe years, until the new project can reliably replace its entire functionality. Plus there is the third project, because you sometimes also need to actually create something new.
Many decisions in corporations start making sense when you ask yourself "how would this be described on my manager's CV". Then you realize that the actually useful work would sound completely boring. But those things that drive you crazy, the change for change's sake, they usually can be described as "brave technological leadership" or whatever are the right buzzwords. And this is once-in-a-lifetime chance to get the "brave technological leadership in the middle of COVID-19 pandemic" achievement, so everyone runs like crazy to grab it.
Most of us already recognize it when developers try to do something in order to boost their CVs. "Let's (re)write this in the Newest Framework, preferably also in the Newest Programming language! There is no business reason to do that, and maybe the newest technologies are still full of bugs and miss many important features, but hey, a year or two later when the technology matures enough and the market is full of well-paying jobs, I will be the one who has a year or two of experience in my CV." The secret is, successful IT managers have been already playing this game for a long time.
The expat thing is definitely real, as if your whole social circle revolves around people you met at work, you'll probably work more.
But yeah, there's substantial inter-team variance within FAANG so might be worth looking for a better fit for you.
It's worth keeping in mind remote work doesnt normally require this sort of isolation. I'm normally able to see friends more often since i'm not stuck commuting.
> It feels relentless, and the lack of in-person social contact with colleagues makes it worse
Yup, every meeting seems like people just going on and on, every conversation seems grim and people are always doing something on their laptop while you're talking.
The things which have helped me: 1. Morning walks, I was slowly falling into the cycle of waking up and opening up my laptop 10 to 15 mins later. Now I make it a point to just go for a walk for 30 mins, sometimes I'll get a coffee, I'll listen to music, talk to friends/relatives in a different time zone, etc.
2. Evening workouts. Especially outside for me. Join a gym, cross fit class, something. If you're not comfortable going to public places, I've had some friends who've had some success with the peleton bike, so it might be worth looking into.
3. Not having alcohol readily accessible. Having cold beers in the fridge, makes me wanna have a beer or 2 every evening. I just cut out keeping beers in the fridge and only put them in if friends are coming.
4. Meeting friends/acquaintances/colleagues. Make plans once a week, meet other people who you trust outside of work setting. Try to avoid discussing work and talk about anything else. In my experience the conversation doesn't need to be deep, but I feel much better after meeting and speaking to someone.
another suggestion: if you've got a dedicated work laptop, when it's time to clock off, pack the thing away and stow it until it's work time again.
- limit your work hours to something reasonable during the day, no excuses. Everyone has a different capacity. No point over exerting now, you are just borrowing from the future self.
- use pomodoro to take frequent breaks
- don’t work for bad managers, they are the leading cause of stress
- do meaningful things. If not now, strive towards that at least. Make effort to get there. Because often if your mind thinks you are locked into this position seemingly forever, it will start hurting you.
- exercise daily. Anything. Just walking for thirty minutes to an hour is good enough. This is crucial!
I burned out at 34, that was 8y ago. Now cant still do productive work more than 4h/day. And thats on a good day. Im lucky to have sufficient expertise and high enough hourly rate to pay for my modest lifestyle.
Meds and therapy help only so much. While some meds are available under social security its usually not very modern meds, so a good part of income goes to self paid therapy and more modern meds that help me be at least somewhat functional ans productive.
4y ago, my productive hours were 2h/ workday on good days. Or 1 day per week. I survived at that rate but couldnt afford necessary help to recover faster.
2y after burnout my inflammation levels were still so high that doctors suspected i had cancer. (Wasnt the case). I had to move to small town, close to nature, cut out all even the slightest stress factors from my life.
Of course if i could have avoided burnout or proper medical attention and time off after burnout it would have gone better faster.
Now it serves as info for others what not to fall into
It's a miracle drug for me. Strong effect, no tolerance buildup, few side effects. And it's dirt cheap, even on the black market.
Ask around, read reviews, call the offices and be transparent about what you want. You'll find a doctor that will want to help.
Modafinil/armodafinil might actually be a harder ask than adderall just because they're less common. YMMV.
Im currently using caffeine (french roast, double cup espresso on the rocks) which provides a moderate boost and is available legally over the counter where i live. Lol
Pushing the body with meds, to work be able to work longer, may be just really contra productive to recovery.
From my background in chemistry, biochemistry and genetics, modafinil reduces sleepines and keeps you awake. It would be dangerous for someone with burnout as they wouldnt feel the tiredness naturally and wouldnt take time to recover. The research on its effectiveness as cognitive enhancer is not conclusive yet. Probably good for people with sleeping disorders not related to burnout.
But we probably shouldn't need stimulants to have careers.
I think that's why you get downvoted for suggesting that people take drugs to fix their problems.
Source: I also take drugs to function with a career and am sad about it.
It seems to me that some consider it a form of cheating when you don't change your diet or the sports / exercise regimen, work-life-balance etc. I've tried changing my diet and different workout styles, they just didn't have the effect that stimulants provide. To me, it's essentially "if it works, it works".
What makes you sad about it?
If there is a stimulant that only hurts your health a little, and it becomes popular in your industry, you will have to take it in order to remain competitive, because the workload will be adapted to the new standard.
> It seems to me that some consider it a form of cheating when you don't change your diet or the sports / exercise regimen, work-life-balance etc.
The difference is, if you later find out that some specific diet or exercise regimen hurts your health, you can change it. If you find out that coffee (or modafinil, in the future) hurts your health, but you are socially expected to use it, then it just sucks to be you.
If it was possible to go into stasis, floating in a vat, hooked up to a computer, where your employer could extract optimal productivity from you... would you do it? How long would you stay in the vat?
Because that's how I feel taking stimulants every day to get my job done. Sure, I'm an effective employee. And yes, "it works". But I can't help but feel something important has been lost.
I've actually thought about being hooked up to a computer and not deal with this failing body that has annoying quirks and issues and makes me see doctors. I'd love to try at the very least. But I'm self-employed and like what I do - not sure how I'd feel about it if productivity gains didn't translate into income gains very directly, which translates to financial security, which helps deal with anxieties.
Do you struggle with side effects that make the experience not overwhelmingly positive?
It's all still "overwhelmingly positive" to set out the problem you started taking it to solve...
But now that you're making me unpack it, I guess it's because when I'm on stimulants I'm working. When I'm off stimulants, I'm resting but very exhausted from the stimulants.
It makes me into an efficient worker drone though, which is the problem I set out to solve in the first place. So... mission accomplished?
If I could somehow make the same money without having to drug myself, I think I would feel better about the situation.
What do you do when you do this? Do you travel?
They would work IT contracting 8-9 months a year and during the other months, would do another job. One case, the chap was a waters-king instructor and did that in the summer as he loved it. Another was a Ski instructor and in both cases, they enjoyed their side-gigs more.
For me, I thought that was brilliant, an ideal balance and best of both worlds kinda approach to the problem.
[EDIT funny spelling mistake - Ski instructor - not skin :-]
I go out and run a few miles. For the last week and a half, I couldn't go outside because of the smoke. It was driving me nuts. It cleared up yesterday, and it was a great relief to go out and run.
It’s not like all managers are soulless number crunchers. They were like you once. There are the good ones who authentically care. We need to find efficient ways to find those people.
At least you were in Denmark though. Getting fired in the US would surely have been worse.
> At the end I just didn't care about what I was doing and the pointless office politics
Has this changed?
Working at a FAANG. It’s nuts.
It’s almost like if you have a family the deck is stacked against you. My manager low key told me to come to work in our office (which is now open) so my kids don’t distract me working from home. (And don’t tell me to go to HR, we all know how that’s going to end up..)
The other senior engineers who try to be human by asking “how’s everyone really doing” it’s more cute than anything.
It hasn’t gotten any easier folks!
The only way I’ve found to survive here as a young parent is to just give up sleep. We’ve got some young kiddos at home.. no idea how folks do this, and no surprise at all folks are burning out and it seems like less and less people are having kids any more.
If you’re going through it, hope it gets better for you!
Alternatively, stick it out for a year, save as much as possible and then take some time off (although I hear Google is a really great place to retire).
After the acquisition was finalized, all our products where put on the back burner, and we where all inn in on integrating our production as a feature in their offering for their next release.
Unfortunately for me, the part of the organization I was in, was minuscule compared to the size it would have been in the mothership. Which meant that the expectations of what my team could accomplish, was wildly inaccurate.
So for the year I stayed on. Every workday, no matter how hard I worked, the stack of unfinished task was always higher at the end, than at the beginning of the day. I was so stressed out during this, that if I wanted to fall asleep in the evening, I either had to drink or go for a run.
After a year of this, I managed to get a new job, and leaving was the best decision I've ever made. But getting a new job while struggling is hard, and I was lucky to pull it of, in hindsight, I should probably have started looking way earlier, before I was as stressed out as I was at the end.
Now ten years later, I'm doing fine, and the whole ordeal is just a bad memory. But I do know that one of my colleagues from an other team, ended up burnt out and spent at least a year on sick leave before getting somewhat on their feet again.
So my recommendation to those that are struggling. Take action now, rather than later. For me, leaving worked, but I'm sure that it isn't the only solution for everyone. If you think that there is nothing you can do, that sounds wrong, and you should look again. Maybe talking it out with someone else, either a mental health professional, or a friend would help figuring out the next step? I did not do that, and that is something I regret, I think that would have helped me handle the whole thing better.
If you feel that burnout is encroaching on you just quit and find something else to do.
Good on you for taking action to change your situation! That sounds like a pretty fantastic outcome.
Since COVID started I've slowly been losing myself into workaholism. It feels like there is nothing else to care about besides work; I am single and while I had an active social life that's naturally very limited during COVID. Often on Saturday and Sunday I'm just waiting for it to be Monday, and at least once I worked through Saturday afternoon since I had nothing else to do.
All the extra work feels completely unappreciated. I got wrapped into a roller coaster of a conflict with my lead - within one week he said I wasn't performing at entry level, then was begging me not to leave the team. That just keeps escalating (it's dragging through HR now, but nobody is, according to them, going on a PIP). The experience is, I think, driven by COVID - my lead's mental health is degrading, and I'm suffering as a result.
I'm working hard, with no clear expectations, and no clear understanding of what the point of that work is. I was promised a new position when I joined this team, and I don't know if that will ever come (it's been close to 2 months since my lead and I can have a normal conversation). I am paid very well (yay, the stock is up) but there's no way to spend that money (clothes nobody sees? Trips to closed down cities?).
Meanwhile all my other outlets for energy are cut off. Most of my friends are either sliding into depression or screaming at me to somehow care even more about the political disaster of the day. There's no dating, there's no bars, there's no clubs. All the events I look forward to every year are canceled. All my spots are permanently closing down one at a time.
So there's only work, and the story there isn't very different from my friends; mental health is declining among everybody I know. Sick days are up, people are asking me how my conversations with HR about depression went last year since they're going to have one soon. Engaged as I am there are times I just want to walk out the door. Well, if there was a door. In practice that would just be switching back to my personal computer from my work one.
Frankly, I'm not sure how anybody is not heading to burnout. Either you are overwhelmed with other things (like childcare) and feel like work is killing you, or work is all you have but it feels hollow since there's no other life context to give it meaning.
I tried to take a vacation, it didn't work. I spent 4 days obsessing over what to say in the next wild conversation with my boss (which didn't disappoint, he was sobbing at the end). Sitting in a room somewhere else while everything is closed or operating on a very weird and limited basis around you doesn't feel like vacation.
I suspect the lockdowns and such have led to a large amplification of our political divisions.
However, there are many people who I can't talk to without them insisting I donate more, I call all my representatives, etc., etc. etc.
It makes sense when I think about it. We all want to feel like we can actually do something when we feel so powerless. I have tried hard at work, they pick politics. We need something to do.
But I don't need to be reminded how terrible the latest event is; I want to get away from the news cycle, not lose myself in doomscrolling.
I wouldn't call this statistically significant.
So i wouldn't complain about n number here.
Plus you are not making any points here really, just a quip with no follow on.