Daily Lessons from Life 26 September 2010 - Chinese white collar suffering 'job burnout'

Chinese white collar suffering 'job burnout': China Daily 26 September 2010

"Young professionals in China also have to face issues on marriage, family, rising property prices and long commutes to work - problems all thrown up by rapid urbanization and equally rapid social changes.

Thirty percent of the 100,000-client base that Li's company has across China complain about work-related stress and burnout. It is an unusually high rate, given that the same comparative segment in the US is only around 6 percent.

The calls come from low-and mid-level management, the people usually sandwiched between senior officers who give orders and their subordinates, whom they have to coax into productivity. They have to deal with long working hours, low job satisfaction, little control over their role at work and even less support from senior management.

One theory said that those born after 1980 under the China's 1-Child policy are not able to reconcile their pampered treatment at home with the real life work environment as the chief reason for burnt-out!"

It is almost inevitable that we will hear someone somewhere reading this news article saying, aloud or to themselves, have I not read or seen this before? :-)

Work pressure and people who worked really hard and to the point of they losing control is a fact of life. Especially in a situation where the pace of change is fast and furious and unrelenting. These pressures are unlikely to be wished away. These are real issues as companies grappled with the need to continue to grow, to be more productive, to be faster/better/cheaper/stickier/valuable/etc.

The lessons for me are:

1. self - this everyone has FULL control of. If someone is able to make peace with himself or herself about what he or she wants out of working life vs. what he or she will have to put in to get there, there will be no pressure and no issue of burning out. Of course, if one has more wants and if those wants can only be had through throwing money at them, and the only way is to work harder and longer, then the burn out point will be hit someday. Just a matter of when and not if it will happen;

2. society - this is the bigger picture and harder to achieve so perhaps we can narrow it down to the companies or organizations that the people worked in. If the leaders of the organizations recognized that the root cause if the unrelenting pursuit of growth at all cost, then the people may have a better chance to sort things out about themselves. The leaders' mattered much. Though the Individual can walk away if they choose to;

3. at the end of the day, those who can find their own balance will be fine. Those who cannot and need medical help, hopefully they will recognize it and reach out for help. For those who cannot and are stopped by pride or shame or whatever, they will be the ticking time bombs - a danger to themselves and those who loved and cared about them.

May the EAP initiative be spread to more organizations if they must though I hoped they never have to as the leaders are enlightened and the employees are enlightened too.