At an engineering all hands meeting in 2019 my boss, the CTO, took questions from the audience. Isaac asked about burnout. I'm pretty sure it was Isaac, but I can't remember the exact question. I certainly remember the answer. Our boss said he'd never been burned out. Next question.
Somewhere in the COVID-19 pandemic "Occupational Burnout" entered my vocabulary. I'm a empathetic manager. I read Harvard Business Review articles about supporting colleagues through mental illness. I took mindfullness and inclusivity online training courses. In stilted, awkward ways I tried and failed to support my teammates.
In the first half of 2025 I was leading product, design, engineering, and QA for a rapidly growing startup. I was also singlehandedly the IT and Security team. This was about 2 years into tenure. My mental health ebbed and flowed, but the last few months had been unbearable. Burnout was no longer an abstract concept. I was burned out.
One Saturday morning an IT contractor botched our internal email migration. I found myself uncontrollably scream crying. That afternoon I wrote in my journal, "Haha this is the burnout I've read about." Through this period I was catastrophically depressed, unable to eat, exercise, or enjoy anything. I suppose I'm privileged to say this was the worst I'd ever felt.
To avoid burnout a workplace needs:
- Autonomy
- Commensurate reward (social and financial) for efforts
- Community: trust, respect, reciprocity
- Fairness and consistency
The worst part of burnout is you'll blame yourself. This happens to everyone. You'll think that you could fix it if you only worked harder or did something differently, but systematic failures are not personal failures. In the midst of burnout you won't know the difference.
To fix burnout you have to stop. Full stop. Depending on your employer or country of residence stopping may be difficult. I quit. I took six months off. It took me three months of aimlessness to rediscover joy in living. It's the manager's job to stop burnout. Recognize the signs and offer real support.
YouTube videos to watch: