You’re not alone if you’re tired from sitting in back-to-back virtual meetings all day. Meeting burnout is a growing problem with severe consequences for individuals and organizations.
Burnout is now recognized as a workplace phenomenon by the World Health Organization (WHO), which has included it in the International Classification of Diseases.
Employees’ mental health is being affected by burnout, specifically meeting burnout, all around the world. In-person meetings have become rare, especially since the Covid-19 pandemic, with most of us working from home and our new normal consisting entirely of virtual meetings.
In this post, we will be looking at 15 signs of meeting burnout and how to avoid them.
Ensure you read this article carefully, as it’ll be super helpful.
Table of Contents
- What Is Meeting Burnout?
- Signs of Meeting Burnout?
- 1. After a Meeting, You’re exhausted Or Tense.
- 2. You’re Irritated By The Prospect Of A Meeting.
- 3. You Easily Lose Focus During Meetings
- 4. Excessive Close Eye Contact Is Distressing.
- 5. Tension, Muscle Aches, and Insomnia
- 6. It Becomes Challenging To Manage Responsibilities.
- 7. Isolation.
- 8. Escape Fantasies
- 9. Frequent Illnesses
- 10. It’s Tiresome To See Yourself In Video Chats
- 11. You’re Feeling Overburdened With Data.
- 12. Declining Work Performance.
- 13. Increased Absenteeism and Accidents
- 14. Loss Of Confidence In Work-related Responsibilities and Goals.
- 15. Increased Negative Attitude And Sensitivity.
- How to Avoid Meeting Burnout
- Conclusion
- FAQs
- Reference.
- Recommendation
What Is Meeting Burnout?
Burnout is a debilitating mental health condition due to mismanaged professional stress. This results in certain sorts of burnout, such as meeting burnout, which is chronic stress caused by the number, duration, substance, and design of meetings.
As a result, meeting fatigue causes a breakdown in the relationship between the individual and their organizational obligations.
Due to a significant rise in screen time, the widespread use of video chats and video calls since the epidemic began has resulted in even higher levels of stress and meeting burnout.
Meeting burnout occurs when people become distracted and weary from meeting commitments, which has been more widespread since the start of Covid-19.
Burnout is mental and physical tiredness that can take away the joy from your job, friendships, and family interactions. Repeated exposure can cause this stress condition stressful conditions, such as caring for an ailing family member, working long hours, or watching disturbing news about politics or school safety.
On the other hand, burnout isn’t always noticeable. Burnout is far more challenging than ordinary exhaustion since it makes it difficult for people to cope with stress and manage day-to-day tasks.
Burned-out people often feel they have nothing more to give and hate getting out of bed in the morning. They may even have a negative attitude toward life and despair.
Burnout is a condition that does not go away on its own and, if left untreated, can lead to severe medical and mental disorders such as depression, heart disease, and diabetes.
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Signs of Meeting Burnout?
Are you concerned that you may experience burnout but aren’t sure what to look for? We’ve put together a list of symptoms to help you out.
1. After a Meeting, You’re exhausted Or Tense.
You need a lot of focus and energy if you feel tired or stressed after a video conversation or meeting. With so many stimulants simultaneously, such as chat notifications, digital replies, delivering resources or papers, listening to people speak and responding appropriately.
Not to mention all the other distractions that come with working from home. Furthermore, virtual meetings require to concern about your internet connection, app crashes, and other technical faults.
2. You’re Irritated By The Prospect Of A Meeting.
When the mere concept of a meeting makes you angry, you’re probably attending far too many of them. Because so many of us now work from home, it’s almost as if we’re expected to be “on” all the time because we’re more available online.
Weakened by frequent video conversations, we need to take pauses from our screens to maintain our mental health and sanity. Because people are more likely to refuse or not attend team meetings, our anger becomes disruptive and unproductive.
3. You Easily Lose Focus During Meetings
You lose focus during meetings, another indicator of Zoom fatigue or meeting burnout. You’re not alone if you switch off your camera because you can’t stand being visible all the time.
You are not present and cannot maintain enough productivity throughout the day if you cannot focus during meetings.
4. Excessive Close Eye Contact Is Distressing.
Do you become overwhelmed when you make close eye contact? This is another indicator of meeting burnout. The quantity of eye contact we make while watching a video is unnatural.
Individuals may only gaze at the speaker, take notes, or glance at other participants’ in-person, real-time meetings. On the call, though, you must maintain constant eye contact with someone, which is exhausting.
5. Tension, Muscle Aches, and Insomnia
Pay attention if your physical body is in distress. Many people endure muscle soreness, tension, and discomfort in their bodies due to virtual meetings, forcing us to stay in the same position for long periods.
Remote work puts a more significant strain on our eyes from staring at screens all day, and looking at so many things simultaneously only adds to the headache. They will harm your focus and productivity capacity due to physical discomfort.
6. It Becomes Challenging To Manage Responsibilities.
Another critical indicator of meeting burnout is recognizing that your typical tasks have become too demanding to handle.
When burnout sets in, it’s nearly impossible to keep up with the workload you’re used to, especially if you’re also dealing with other mental health issues like anxiety and despair.
7. Isolation.
Burnout causes people to feel overwhelmed. As a result, individuals may withdraw from social situations and confide in friends, family, and coworkers.
8. Escape Fantasies
People with burnout may fantasize about running away or taking a solo trip because they are dissatisfied with their work’s never-ending responsibilities.
They may use drugs, alcohol, or food to dull their emotional agony in extreme circumstances.
9. Frequent Illnesses
Burnout, like other forms of long-term stress, can weaken your immune system, putting you at risk for colds, the flu, and insomnia. Burnout can also contribute to mental health issues such as sadness and anxiety.
10. It’s Tiresome To See Yourself In Video Chats
Do you get tired of looking in the mirror all day? Everyone else feels the same way. Imagine being able to watch yourself at every one of your in-person meetings.
We become more critical of ourselves than usual, which exhausts us mentally.
11. You’re Feeling Overburdened With Data.
There is much to consider when attending an online meeting compared to in-person meetings.
You’ll have to put in more effort to make motions and nonverbal indicators that show you’re following along or paying attention (even if you aren’t).
12. Declining Work Performance.
Simple tasks you’re used to performing efficiently in the workplace become very difficult. You can’t just seem to give any job your very best anymore.
13. Increased Absenteeism and Accidents
For no just cause, you deliberately miss meetings or make silly mistakes that you shouldn’t make. This is one of the most common signs of burnout that people rarely notice.
Because you’re already overwhelmed by these meetings and have made inevitable mistakes, you begin to lose confidence in your ability to deliver.
What this does is make things worse. Because without confidence, you can’t effectively deliver what you naturally can.
15. Increased Negative Attitude And Sensitivity.
Once negative attitudes set in, you’ve probably gotten to a very terrible stage of burnout. Here you begin not to care how things turn out. You pick offence in everything, even positive compliments.
How to Avoid Meeting Burnout
1. Provide Stress-Reduction Techniques.
Make stress management strategies available to your staff. These can include things like increasing the frequency of breaks or engaging in healthful habits; they have found both to help with mental health.
Increase the number of breaks between online meetings so that people can relieve eye strain and maintain better focus. Incorporate healthy practices such as mindfulness exercises, meditation, and yoga into the breaks between online meetings.
2. Allow Employees To Be Active Participants In The Creation Of Their Work.
Giving your staff more autonomy and control over their responsibilities will improve their job happiness. Here are some suggestions to help you get there:
- Allow employees to negotiate their duties with freedom and flexibility.
- Allow employees to choose assignments that play to their strengths while yet presenting a challenge.
- To avoid boredom, provide both skill and work variation.
- Provide amazing development possibilities.
Social support is significant for employees during stressful periods like the Covid-19 pandemic. This entails creating a safe environment for employees to express their concerns and challenges so that appropriate help may be provided. Here are some suggestions for how to accomplish this:
Build trust through cultivating genuine connections with colleagues, using empathy to put yourself in their shoes, and providing ample opportunities for coworkers to discuss or reflect on their job.
Reduce the number of stressful or unnecessary social contacts. Encourage time spent with non-work friends, family, and the community as a social support.
4. High-Quality Performance Management Should Be Implemented.
When employees are experiencing symptoms or full-blown burnout, having a high-quality performance management system is critical. Here are some examples of how you can provide your team with high-quality performance management:
Give clear, frequent, detailed, and consistent strengths-based feedback. Establish developmental targets and encourage employees to define their ambitions.
Assign monetary and non-monetary rewards to performance management. Implement a performance management system that is fair and equal for everyone in the team.
5. Employees Should Be Involved In Decision-Making.
When you involve employees in decision-making, you show that their input is appreciated and significant. Individuals will be empowered and motivated if they feel heard by management.
Here are some further suggestions:
- Determine the resources employees require to perform at their best.
- Provide avenues for employees to contribute to decision-making and include them in these decisions by clearly communicating how decisions are made.
Conclusion
Burnout is no laughing matter. It reminds you that you’re doing too much for everyone else while neglecting yourself. To make this work, you must take the time to deal with the burnout you’re experiencing.
We hope you found this post very helpful. Feel free to let us know what you think.
FAQs
Burnout can make people weary, unmotivated, nervous, and cynical, with potentially disastrous effects. Research reveals that severe stress levels can damage social skills, overload cognitive ability, and eventually lead to changes in brain function, in addition to affecting professional advancement.
You’ll require eight to ten hours of sleep, plus three 15- to 30-minute naps or retreats, once you’re “burned out.” If you ignore these guidelines, your body will soon lie still — in your bed, a hospital, or a morgue.
Face-to-face interactions need more mental processing than video calls. Nonverbal clues such as facial expressions, tone and pitch, and body language require more processing effort. This extra focus requires a lot of energy, which could explain your tiredness.
Meeting anxiety can trigger a variety of unpleasant emotions and thoughts. You may feel concerned about being judged. Fear of speaking up in front of the group.
However, you may be burned out if you always feel this way. Burnout doesn’t happen overnight, but it might sneak up on you. The signs and symptoms are mild initially but worsen over time.
People who are persistently burned out suffer brain damage similar to those who have been traumatized. Burnout affects brain connectivity, diminishing creativity, working memory, and problem-solving abilities.
Memory and concentration problems, sleeplessness, widespread aches, intense weariness, impatience, worry, and a persistent feeling of being emotionally depleted are just a few of the symptoms of burnout.
Reference.
- healthline.com – A Guide to Burnout
- fellow.app – 8 Signs of Meeting Burnout and How to Combat it
- bravowell.com – Know the Signs of Burnout in Employees: How to Help Prevent Stress
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