Something of a sector buzzword, employee burnout remains a perplexing phenomenon. The 1970s-coined Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI) defines it as emotional exhaustion, depersonalization and a reduced sense of personal accomplishment.

Heavy workloads and stress put employees in all sectors at risk, yet ongoing research finds strong links between burnout and the social service and nonprofit sector.

Dr. Carolyn Dewa heads the Work and Well-Being Research and Evaluation Program at Toronto’s Centre for Addiction and Mental Health. The Experience of Client Aggression and its Emotional Impact on Staff, a recent study she co-published, finds that direct service staff are particularly vulnerable to burnout, attributed to the burden of dealing with challenging clients, and, often, client aggression.

“Human service workers…are at risk of burnout given the demanding, care-driven nature of the work they do…susceptible staff will experience the cumulative effects [of burnout] over time,” the study reports.

Other research finds all nonprofit staff are at risk, given the tendency towards greater emotional involvement in their work and the feeling that what they do has direct impact on others.

“To the extent that the service sector or nonprofit sector attracts people who believe in the mission of their organization, they would be subject to higher chronic stress,” reads Responsibilities between Job Stress and Worker Perceived Responsibilities and Job Characteristics.

Dr. Dewa says having the right supports at work seriously affects an employee’s ability to cope with stress — and may prevent burnout altogether.

By recognizing triggers and symptoms, nonprofits can establish support systems to alleviate or stave off burnout, both at a managerial and institutional level.

Know the triggers

Miia Suokonautio is director of programming at Phoenix Youth Programs, a Halifax-based nonprofit that services homeless and at-risk youth.

She has seen staff on their way to burnout and attributes this to their setting weak personal and professional boundaries. Disclosing personal information to clients can put staff at risk, as can bringing personal issues into the workplace. “You can see how that weighs them down in their job.”

A lack of boundaries around acceptable work hours can also be a trigger. “I’ve worked in nonprofits where it’s a race to the bottom,” Suokonautio says. “It’s like, if you leave before 8 p.m., you’re letting the team down.”

Enid Grant is a senior manager at Delisle Youth Services, a Toronto-based multi-service agency that provides support to youth and their families.

“I prefer the term compassion fatigue to burnout,” Grant says. She believes staff that work directly with clients experiencing long-term issues, such as trauma or severe mental health challenges, are at particular risk.

“That trauma begins to impact you over time, when you hear story after story.”

Dr. Patricia Fisher is a clinical psychologist and president of Fisher & Associates Solutions, a multinational company that offers assessment, consultation and employee wellness services to high-stress workplaces.

Dr. Fisher says nonprofits are typically subject to system stressors like heavy demand and minimal resources.

“[Human beings] are designed to do acute stress responses. What we’re not designed to do very well is stay in high levels of chronic stress response, and that’s where we start getting into all the really big long-term health consequences.”

Keith Harding is regional director of Ontario FSEAP, a national social enterprise that provides employee assistance programs to hundreds of nonprofits.

Harding says burnout is increasingly prevalent sector-wide due to an unrelenting shortage of resources. He stresses that no nonprofit group is any worse off than another when it comes to burnout susceptibility. “Whenever you’re relying on a third party for funding you’re going to be subject to burnout.”

Signs and symptoms

In Suokonautio’s experience, burnout often manifests as inflexibility, a tendency to see conspiracy everywhere and an inability to deliver services.

For an organization that works with homeless youth, depersonalizing clients is a real flag.

“One of the most important things is the ability for staff to nuance, to see every youth as an individual. So if you start going, ‘Oh, you’re just another [homeless kid]’, that could be when someone’s burning out.”

Grant says extreme stress in the workplace can alter an employee’s attitude and physical health, causing a person to feel constantly tired, irritable or have difficulty adapting to change.

Other indicators are if an employee suddenly takes a slew of sick days but doesn’t report a major illness, is unable to keep up with phone calls and paper work and demonstrates that seeing clients has become a chore.

While any of these symptoms may signal personal problems unrelated to compassion fatigue, they offer an opportunity for a manager to check in with the employee, to look if something is out of the ordinary.

Dr. Fisher says the past few years have seen an explosion of biological, physiological, neurological and immunological research on burnout. Studies show stress creates compromised immune systems, which can in turn lead to a litany of physical and mental problems.

In addition to chronic pain and digestion issues, mental health problems like anxiety, depression, concentration and memory difficulties may occur. At a cognitive level, Dr. Fisher says issues of self-esteem and cynicism arise, and individuals become prone to rigid, black and white thinking.

“When people are caught in that ‘I have to do this or everything will fall apart’ thinking, where everything is a crisis, that in of itself is symptomatic of someone under high levels of stress.”

Organizational support systems

Dr. Fisher maintains that access to employee assistance and workplace wellness programs is ideal. If a nonprofit cannot afford to offer EAP or health insurance, the organization should strive to establish a culture that reduces stressors.

Having good sick leave and vacation policies — and encouraging staff to actually take those days off — is fundamental, and staff should never be penalized for missing work to attend a therapy appointment.

Support from managers

Managers must nourish strong relationships between staff and supervisors, ensuring safe and respectful workplace environment, says Dr. Fisher.

To achieve this, supervisors should engage staff in regular discussions about whether they perceive their workload to be accomplishable, and give recognition on a day-to-day level.

Grant says managers can normalize burnout by talking openly about burnout and offering staff dealing with stress strategies to continue to work effectively.

One such strategy she experiments with at Delisle is rotating staff, so those working with long-term clients can get some diversity.

For some staff, burnout may require taking short-term leave, to renew and reassess if the particular job, or even the sector, is the right fit.

“I’ve told people to take a week off on our dime, because I’m attuned to the fact they’re really exhausted,” says Suokonautio, who practices various methods to keep stressed staff engaged.

Recently, a member of her team failed to get an internal position she had applied for. Suokonautio saw a real drop in the employee’s morale, and took action by consulting with her to build additional challenges into her existing job. Ultimately, the staff member was involved on a policy piece and a hiring committee.

For staff reluctant to open up to supervisors, she suggests giving anonymous surveys from time to time, to check in about job satisfaction, stress levels, salary and quality of supervisors.

Helping themselves

Managers and directors often get pulled in many directions at once, expected to look after both their staff and themselves. Dr. Fisher says her experience finds managers to be “some of the most stressed people in our organizations.”

She says managers need to feel like they have a manageable workload, clarity about their responsibilities and support from colleagues in the same way as those they supervise. To combat feelings of isolation, they should be encouraged to seek social and professional support from others in their cohort, within an organization or the field at large.

At Delisle, emphasis is placed on managers getting burnout education. Managers have attended training workshops about combating stress, and the management team typically takes a day or two each year to go offsite and confer about their stressors and successes.

Prevention strategies

“Part of what we see as protective against the native aspects of stress are the social support networks at work,” explains Dr. Dewa. This can be as simple as ensuring staff have adequate time to eat lunch together — not at their desks.

Dr. Fisher agrees that a workplace lacking outlets for socializing is “a great recipe for burnout,” and leads to inefficiency.

A good manager preemptively models working hard, taking substantial breaks and leaving the office at an appropriate time. Further, an ideal manager or director refrains from sending emails at 10:30 p.m., setting up an expectation for staff to work into the night.

Grant agrees that building socializing into the work routine reduces stress. Delisle makes a point of coming together to acknowledge their successes as a team.

“Any time there’s an occasion to celebrate, we celebrate. There’s lots of cakes, lots of ways to look after ourselves and have a good time,” she laughs.

“Sometimes [in the nonprofit sector] we fight an image that we’re never supposed to do anything nice for our staff. But companies do it all the time and know it’s important for morale. It would be nice if people gave us permission to invest in our staff — and that doesn’t mean using outrageous amounts of money.”

As a sector so often susceptible to burnout, nonprofits need to address ways to remove the stigma and mitigate the stress that causes it. Understanding symptoms and triggers of burnout is key for managers and staff, as is ensuring an organization is equipped with systems to manage it.

While every individual responds to stress differently, by building social elements, strong communication and support networks into the workplace, organizations stand a better chance at developing the resilience needed to combat burnout.

Jodie Shupac is a Toronto-based freelance writer. She contributes to a range of publications, covering culture, urban issues, health and the environment.

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