Vacations, Self-Care and Avoiding Burnout and Disengagement

As I’m sure you noticed *insert self-deprecating eye roll* there was no article last week and that’s because I was on a rare no-device vacation. Was it the restorative break I was hoping for? Perhaps not, I seem to have suffered from the same affliction I hear is widespread these days - the insufficiency of the break as compared to the intensity of the work over the past few years since the world went topsy turvy, somehow becomes even more evident as soon as I stopped at all which made the vacation feel woefully short. But, with truly flexible working being the norm at PeopleNotTech, it is really up to me -and my responsibility- that I ensure my batteries are recharged. I’m not sure if that will involve a few half days when needed, another vacation or simply re-auditing and then refocusing on my meditation routine (and other self-care mechanisms I’m relying on), but whatever it will take, I know it’s not the type of work I can avoid if I want to ensure I’m sustainability competitive.

Put plainly - my vacation only made a minute dent in my need to decompress and mentally restart so it is now up to me to nurture and repair my own mental state and ensure I’m well in whatever capacity I need to. This incidentally comes complete with a serving of gratitude as I can’t help but feel super fortunate to work in a place where 1. my mental state matters and 2. I get to do something about it due to flexible working, and neither of these points is the case for the vast majority of the work population.

So for me, being honest that I haven’t had enough rest, being mindful of it and in-building alternatives that will alleviate some of the pressure that builds, is a rather basic de-risking strategy because the last thing we need is one of our leaders succumbing to burnout. And while only a paragraph ago I admitted my position is super privileged, I will also clearly say that this same level of care towards our own wellbeing should definitely exist as sheer personal responsibility at every executive level where, let’s be honest, flexibility is inbuilt.

In other words, the more senior that someone is, the stronger a duty they ought to have to take care of themselves.

What is it that makes the difference between their ability to stay in charge of their own wellbeing and that of their direct reports? It really all boils down to one thing only - the lack of fear and limitation that accompanies command and control. The execs get to be adult enough to notice “Wow, my reserves of resilience are down, my level of engagement is dropping, I’m less and less connected to the purpose and passionate about our people and our work, I’m impatient, tired, easily annoyed, I’m not at my best and I may be approaching the danger zone of pure burnout” and their reaction to be “I absolutely need to do something about it right away” and then execute on what that is, be it a stronger self-care routine or bigger breaks or more interesting challenges and exciting growth scenarios. Their less fortunate direct reports may well be coming to the same self-realisation about their capacity and current capability, but feel like any of the possible remedies are utterly outside of their reach as they require a degree of autonomy they simply do not believe they have.