Preventing Burnout & Building Resilience

Last month, Trailhead’s Director of People & Strategic Initiatives, Lisa Olcese, provided a space to deepen our understanding of burnout in the workplace and discuss strategies for prevention during a virtual Burnout Prevention Workshop that journeyed through:

  • The three components of burnout – exhaustion, cynicism and inefficacy
  • How to recognize burnout in ourselves and others
  • The environmental factors that contribute to burnout (think: unrealistically high workloads, low levels of job control, interpersonal workplace dynamics, poor organizational resources, low social support, and other factors)
  • Strategies for healing, building resilience and prevention through organizational design, cultural change, reclaiming our digital space and building mental fitness

To watch the webinar recording and access resources for how we at Trailhead are building an understanding of burnout prevention, check out Trailhead’s blog through the link below.

Watch the Workshop

Why Talk About Burnout?

Over the course of the last year, the pandemic has brought incredible strain on communities. As leaders in the public health field, we’ve seen firsthand how the lack of public health infrastructure here in Colorado and across the country has exacerbated existing public health threats such as food safety, housing insecurity, substance use disorders and vaccine hesitancy with disproportionate impacts on marginalized and indigenous communities.

As the needs of communities become greater, the need for a well-supported public health workforce also becomes increasingly important. In addition to solutions that focus on long-term sustainable funding and nurturing public understanding of and support for public health, it is equally important that we care for and retain our existing public health workforce by addressing the widespread burnout that many in the field are experiencing.

Tools We’re Using to Think About Burnout

Everything from podcast episodes and recent headlines to Gallup studies and TEDx talks.

The 7 Types of Rest that Everyone Needs

Drawing a distinction between sleep and rest, Board-certified internal medicine physician Saundra Dalton-Smith shares the seven types of rest available to us and the real reason why we are chronically tired in her eye-opening presentation at TEDxAtlanta. Read and watch.

Gallup’s Perspective on Employee Burnout: Causes and Cures

A perspective paper on the root causes of burnout, the harm that employee burnout does to both the employee and organization and best practices for prevention. Download for free.

Brené Brown with Emily and Amelia Nagoski on Burnout and How to Complete the Stress Cycle

From Brené Brown’s podcast Unlocking Us, listen as Brené and guests Emily and Amelia Nagoski discuss the impact that burnout has on our bodies and how we can move through our emotional exhaustion. Listen on Spotify.

Zoom Burnout is Real, and It’s Worse for Women

Written by New York Times gender reporter Alisha Haridasani Gupta, “Zoom Burnout is Real, and It’s Worse for Women” discusses video fatigue and the recent study from Stanford University published last month that found that women experience significantly more Zoom fatigue than men. Read here.