What if professional coaches, human resources managers and managers were to become key players in helping employees to overcome burnout and avoid work-related stress?
Burnout and workplace anxiety are still taboo and rarely openly spoken about in companies today and figures in France are hardly reassuring.
France is one of the worst countries in Europe when it comes to work-related stress, according to a new Workforce View survey conducted in 2019 by ADP (Automatic Data Processing). We still remain among the most anxious employees, with almost 1 in 5 respondents (19%) experiencing daily stress at work. In this context, 31% of French people think that their employer is not at all interested in their psychological well-being and 41% say that their interest is only superficial - proportions that are in both cases higher than the European average.
Despite these significant figures, unhappiness at work remains a taboo. 32% of workers say they are not comfortable enough to discuss it in a professional setting. Among the less reticent, 58% could discuss it with friends or close colleagues, while nearly 20% are ready to open up to their manager. Barely 11% would be ready to inform Human Resources.
The Study published by Cadremploi in June 2019 highlights a similar trend. While 86% of the executives interviewed say they have already suffered from burn out and "have not been supported at all in this difficult time", ... 40% of them never informed their manager.
Increasing awareness coupled with a specific and relevant training would allow professional coaches to detect early signs of burnout, to welcome those who are already suffering from it, to guide and recommend ad hoc treatment to help these women and men overcome burnout and regain their vitality.
Two senior professional coaches, Mario-Jacques Castonguay and Suzanne Peters, expert in the topic and management of burnout, are offering training courses in 2021 for in-house and external coaches, as well as for HR and managers, that focus on identifying the symptoms and supporting employees going through burnout and recovery strategies.
Suzanne Peters wrote the chapter "Stress or burnout" in Le Psycho Guide, a reference book on "well-being" edited by Dr Sylvie Angel and published by Larousse.
Chronic fatigue, loss of motivation and efficiency at work, feeling overwhelmed, self-deprecation, increasing irritability and lack of concentration... Burnout is not inevitable. It can be managed, and better still, prevented.
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