{"id":782,"date":"2022-10-10T16:55:05","date_gmt":"2022-10-10T16:55:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lmja.com\/blog\/?p=782"},"modified":"2022-10-10T16:55:52","modified_gmt":"2022-10-10T16:55:52","slug":"psychological-availability-and-work-life-balance","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.lmja.com\/blog\/psychological-availability-and-work-life-balance\/","title":{"rendered":"Psychological Availability and Work\/Life Balance"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.lmja.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/article-2.png\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-784 alignleft\" src=\"http:\/\/www.lmja.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/article-2-300x141.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"141\" srcset=\"http:\/\/www.lmja.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/article-2-300x141.png 300w, http:\/\/www.lmja.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/article-2-768x362.png 768w, http:\/\/www.lmja.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/10\/article-2.png 860w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a>According to\u00a0Gallup research, before the pandemic, 76% of workers reported feeling burned out sometimes, while 28% of workers said they were burned out \u201cvery often\u201d or \u201calways\u201d at work. With the events of the past few years, you can bet those numbers are likely trending upward.<\/p>\n<p>In our last article we looked at the term \u201cpsychological availability\u201d and how it relates to employee engagement. One of the key components of psychological availability is work\/life balance, often a major issue within organizations. As many of us have experienced, a lack of work\/life balance often leads to burnout. According to the World Health Organization, signs of burnout at work include people feeling:<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Depleted or exhausted<\/li>\n<li>Mentally distant from their job or negative feelings or cynicism about their job<\/li>\n<li>Reduced professional efficacy<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Do any of the above sound familiar? Combating employee burnout and increasing team members\u2019 psychological availability takes some \u2018out of the box\u2019 thinking and a commitment to real and meaningful change. Here are a few ideas to get started both in terms of physical environment and organizational culture:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Equip managers to combat burnout: <\/strong>Most employees say their immediate managers matter more than upper-level leaders when it comes to well-being support. But often, managers don\u2019t understand how to talk to their employees about their well-being. That\u2019s where training plays an important role. Managers need to learn the skills needed to identify and alleviate employee burnout. And these managers need to feel supported by upper-level management as well.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Make work\/life balance a priority: <\/strong>This needs to be modeled by leaders and supported organization-wide. Work\/life balance initiatives can include: monitoring workload and scheduling, allowing flexible schedules to accommodate team members\u2019 needs, encouraging use of vacation time and incorporating wellness activities into daily office life.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Examine the physical work environment:<\/strong> Design environments that are as comfortable and inviting as possible. Examine the lighting. Monitor the noise levels and ways to reduce interruptions. Provide spaces that allow team members to connect with each other without disrupting the rest of the office.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>That\u2019s just the start. There are so many areas to consider and possible ideas to implement. The key is taking those crucial first steps. When it comes to employee burnout and disengagement, it\u2019s so important to look for solutions right away, rather than wait until productivity declines and turnover increases. Call <strong>Leah M. Joppy and Associates<\/strong> at 301-670-0051 or email us at <a href=\"mailto:leah@lmja.com\">leah@lmja.com<\/a> and let\u2019s start tackling any disengagement issues now!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>According to\u00a0Gallup research, before the pandemic, 76% of workers reported feeling burned out sometimes, while 28% of workers said they were burned out \u201cvery often\u201d or \u201calways\u201d at work. With the events of the past few years, you can bet those numbers are likely trending upward. In our last article we looked at the term [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.lmja.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/782"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.lmja.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.lmja.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.lmja.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.lmja.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=782"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.lmja.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/782\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":786,"href":"http:\/\/www.lmja.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/782\/revisions\/786"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.lmja.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=782"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.lmja.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=782"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.lmja.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=782"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}