finding career zen
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finding career zen
Deciphering Burnout and Improving Job Satisfaction with Dr. Josh Hammonds
Whether you are a seasoned leader or a budding professional, we've all faced burnout. Are there ways to prevent burnout? Absolutely!
This Finding Career Zen Podcast episode uncovers fresh insights from special guest Josh Hammonds, Ph.D., a highly-respected professional in organizational communications.
Dr. Hammonds introduces listeners to his innovative course, Leading Beyond Burnout - A valuable tool for employees and managers designed to diagnose burnout and reimagine performance. He also describes the four types of burnout, which was a great education for host Pete Newsome (and will be for you too). The discussion emphasizes how aligning the company's mission with the individual's intrinsic values can fuel motivation and job satisfaction.
If you're ready to learn more about identifying and overcoming burnout, you can register for the free course here.
You can also connect with Josh Hammonds and Pete Newsome on LinkedIn!
You're listening to the Finding Careers Zen Podcast. I'm Pete Newsome, and my guest today is Dr. Josh Hammonds. Josh, how are you today?
Dr. Josh Hammonds:I'm doing very well, Pete. Thanks so much for having me on. This is great.
Pete Newsome:And we've talked about this for a little while not too long because we just met over LinkedIn before we met in person just a couple of weeks ago. So this is great to be able to interview you live and in person so soon.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:LinkedIn bringing neighbors together that they didn't know they were neighbors.
Pete Newsome:right, we're both here in the same city, so that's great, they're coincidences, right, but we didn't waste any time meeting live and what a great thing that was, and I'm so excited to not only have a new person to give a very interesting perspective on some things that are talked about a lot, but to have a new friend and contact. It's just how LinkedIn should work, right.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:Absolutely yes, bridging the commonalities, the things that we have sort of same energy on and same interests.
Pete Newsome:It's really cool small world stuff, and so your PhD is in organizational communications.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:It is.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:It is yes, I received my PhD in organizational communication several years ago, back in 2009.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:And I've been a working professor, researcher for ever since then so for several years now and my area of research really does focus on kind of the human communication element that happens within companies, within organizations, within leaders and their teams, and so a lot of the coursework and the research that I do looks at what drives employees to want to work, to want to be engaged, and then what strategies and tactics can leaders do to connect with, inform and influence the people that you lead towards productivity, towards life fulfillment in their careers, in their roles, towards engagement in general.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:So that's most of my work has focused on and then done quite a bit of consulting and even working with different companies on assessing things like employee engagement and what drives employees to want to go to work and their capacity and things like this. So definitely the early part of my career was focused much more on the academic and the research part, but over the last six or seven years I've put a lot of time and energy working in a different kind of classroom, in organizations and in companies which I get so much fulfillment from as well.
Pete Newsome:So it's easy to comprehend everything you just described, right Easy for you to say. Of course, a lot of the went into your education to getting to the level of knowledge you have now, but incredibly difficult to implement and what your specialty in, I think, is what businesses everywhere. So the biggest struggle that businesses have when it comes to employees specifically. Would you agree with that?
Dr. Josh Hammonds:Yeah, I think so, and I'm biased because I've been studying the field and the discipline of communication for a long time, and so when my world's collided with business practices and leadership, the big chasm that I saw that was missing was why aren't we teaching people how to communicate? Why aren't you using strategies and communication tactics to motivate, to influence and to inform the people that you're leading? And so it was just a great kind of right place at the right time where I said I've got all this communication background of how indirect versus direct messaging work and what does it look like to find relational overlaps and use those into one-on-ones, as you also talk about performance and good kinds of feedback versus ineffective forms of feedback. And so to me, I think, if you ask the average leader that what is it that you're missing? What would you need more of? A lot of people say communication, but for me, studying it for so long, I just said, oh, let's connect these dots in some way. But yeah, I think it's certainly needed for sure.
Pete Newsome:Why is it so hard for us? Is it generational? That's something that I think about a lot, because I'm Gen X and I usually, for the most part, fall straight in line with the cliches of Gen X. The millennials came along a lot of changes in the workplace. I didn't personally necessarily adapt to those changes as well as many did. I'm sort of set in my ways, my perspective not completely uncommon. Then we have the boomers, who are even older than me, even more set in their ways. Is that it, or is there much more to it? Has this always been a problem?
Dr. Josh Hammonds:Has communication always been a problem? I think it's one of those behaviors. We say I want to learn how to play an instrument you recognize where you're at on your competencies, and then you say I need to teach me everything. Let's start with the fundamentals, then let's build off this theory and then let's work towards this so that I can perform to my best ability in this instrument. With communication. We always have done it, since the age of 18 months. On that, we just always assume that we've got this. I know how to talk, I know how to communicate. I think that's part of it is that I've been doing it so long. It would be quite humbling to say I need communication training. No, I don't, you're the problem, I'm not the problem. That's the first part.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:Secondly, I think communication shows us how different we really are. I think a lot of people that I talk to say teach me how to be a great communicator, take me from zero to 100. Maybe someone's vulnerable enough to do that. I also have to remind people that sometimes the way that you communicate makes sense to you and your brain and your culture, but this person, the way that they communicate, might be completely different. You'll have a meeting where someone will be a communicator and you'll have four different interpretations of what was said, how it went down, what they actually meant.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:I think the big epiphany is that people communicate differently because we see the world differently and we have a different psychology and perspective about things. And it's just obvious with communication, because this is what's coming out of how I think about things with my communication. So that's why you get these two ships passing in the night, because people are wired differently and I'm going to match the style of communication and how I think in my perspective. That's why we're not communicating well, because we're different people, and so let's first admit that and then build off that.
Pete Newsome:Is there anything that makes it specifically more challenge at work than it is perhaps in other aspects of life? What we're going to talk about today. I knew this was going to happen. We're already going down a completely different path, so I do want to bring it back to what we're supposed to talk about today, which is burnout in the workplace a new course that you're leading on that. But before we get into that, let me just ask this why is it different at work? Why is what goes so well for us in other aspects of life just becomes much harder when we're in the office environment?
Dr. Josh Hammonds:Wow, I think, oh, wow, where do I start with that? I think that's a good question. I think with all forms of communication, always there's a task element and a relational element. So there is the task element, which is I need to be clear with my information and give directives and give, give the objectives that need to happen, and I'm clear and I understand what you said. And so there's that element.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:But then there's also what I sometimes don't think about is there's a there's a relational or cultural element. There's, there's, as I'm talking to you, there's there's tone, and I'm building a culture and I'm building a climate and I'm building on a relationship, as I communicated as well, and so the best communicators will understand that both of these Are necessary in different capacities, and so, from a work perspective, I have to be very informative and very clear, but then also need to be a great listener and and and understanding and empathic and relational at the same time, and if I can, if I can get both of those With my team, then I've got a great, successful team. But not everybody is necessarily an ambidextrous communicator and can handle both of those right, and so I think, with work, the greatest leaders have a grasp on both of those and usually when I do any kinds of training or educating, it's alright. Which side do you favor on so that I can help you with the other, the non dominant?
Pete Newsome:hand, if you will. So that's really interesting because I think you can be. You can be an effective communicator in certain circumstances, but a terrible communicator in others. And I, that's been a struggle for me personally, as we talked about off camera when, as a salesperson, career salesperson I've been in a very effective communicator but I know at times with younger professionals as a leader I have not been, and I see it in the body language, right, I see it in the, in the issue. You just see the reaction and say this is not resonating, right. This message is that I'm delivering, it's coming out one way, but it's being received An entirely different way and I think that's I hope that's common, I think it is.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:Sure, oh, absolutely, yeah, absolutely. And so that, yeah, when I do my assessments, I'm like all right, where? Where we out on the spectrum as a communicator so that I know that? All right, I no longer need to spend any time talking about being a concise, clear community. You've got that down great, when you deliver information, it's direct, it's clear, it's assertive, it's concise. Now let's focus on this right, and then and other people have to I have to flip flop and teach them being direct, how to be direct, how to be assertive. You've got the relational element down. Everybody loves you as a boss, as a leader, but every but people are confused and they're not hitting their numbers and the deadlines are off.
Pete Newsome:But Do you think that? So there's a responsibility for the person doing the speaking and there's some level of responsibility that has to lie with the person who's doing the listening, right, certainly? Do you think that has been a change? Because, over the over the years, where messages you know we live in a different time that existed 2030 years ago. Right, the short attention spans, information comes in so quickly, so much of it, I mean. I feel that my day is so much shorter today, even though I may work longer hours than it was 20 years ago. It's a struggle, and so now we have people who are professionals in the work workforce. No one intends to be a bad communicator, right? So we know that. But do you think that the way messages are received today are different than how they were received 2030 years ago?
Dr. Josh Hammonds:I do, and I'll hit on just two things you said. I think the first thing is yeah, we've got so many more channels coming at us at once, right, did you? Did you check my message? Did you slack it? Did you text it? Did you email it? Is that a video I'm supposed to watch? Remind me, when you say my message, to what channel is this coming at me?
Dr. Josh Hammonds:And so I guess I think I think, with with the abundance of channels, now we have some confusion on clarity. Where's back in the day? It was like we said it in the Monday meeting. That was the only time you saw me and that's where you got that message, versus all these different Mediums that happen. So there's a clarity issue there.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:But I think, secondly, as the work life boundaries continue to a road and I don't think it's going anywhere, I think it's going to continue being more integrated, more and more and more right, you're checking on your phone after dinner and things like this.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:As those boundaries are road, people are wanting more from their organizations, and so if I'm spending more frequent, intermittent, frequent times with my team on a project, you know we're hitting a deadline, so we've got a big sprint coming up, so we spent so many hours together that your work then does become part of your community, and there's a lot of people that do Long for or want a culture or a climate that they can feel comfortable in, feel safe in, be creative with right, because so much of our work is wrapped up Into our identity.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:If you're successful work and you get to use your strengths at work, that feels good, that's part of who you are, and so then I also then want the communication to be supportive in that way, and I want feedback regularly, and I want you to tell me what I'm doing great, just as much as what I probably need to work on. So I think the demand of the leader, who, who maybe has been leading teams for the past thirty, forty years, is going what's in the water? What's changed? What's changed is people are wanting more from their teams, in their organizations, more so than they ever have, because they're spending so much more time, and it's it's it's blending more into their actual, real lives as well.
Pete Newsome:It. What has been working from home certainly hasn't done anything to lessen that, it's only exacerbated it. And finding that separation is hard, which is a really good segue into what I told you. The purpose of today would be asked you to speak about which is your new, your new course on burnout, and you is what you shared with me. It's you're leading it from two different perspectives, you're teaching it from two different perspectives.
Pete Newsome:How you can help leaders be better at controlling that something that I certainly need could use some help with but also how individuals and that's what we're going to focus on today can handle it, manage it for themselves, because I think, at some level, we all have to take responsibility for our own actions, our own perspective on things. I mean you and I. I think the day we met, we ended up talking a little bit about stoicism and how I say something is one thing, how you receive it, that's on you, right, how that makes you feel. And so burnout is it? What is it? Let's start there, because we're talking about we want to help people with burnout.
Pete Newsome:I don't want people to feel burned out. I suspect I make them feel burned out, whether I intend to or not. Right, right.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:I think you know. And so it's a great question what is burnout? I think that question is what started my entire quest several months ago, about eight months ago really started, and dive deep into it, because we just use that term all the time. I'm so burnout. You worked on a project for an hour and you'll just get up from it and go, oh, I'm burnout, I gotta go take a walk, it's like. And so when you use that word always, then it doesn't mean anything. It just means you're tired, it just means you're a little bit stressed. And so what does that word actually mean?
Dr. Josh Hammonds:And so I delve deep into the research and we see this in the literature for the first time about 1982, and Christina Maslach and her team were doing lots of research on physician burnout and different kinds of workplace burnout, and she was able to really come to a nice definition which I really like. And then I took another step further. But she says and I wanna get this right the term burnout is a syndrome involving experiences of emotional exhaustion, depersonalization and then reduced self accomplishment while it works. So she combines this sort of large, nebulous idea that if you're really burned out, you're experiencing these sort of symptoms. And so I took that next step further and looked at several more studies and then conducted my own study, and I found out that there's really about four different types or four different dimensions of burnout. And so there are the physical burnout cases where I have been working back to back meetings 16 hour days for about a week. I am physically just burnout and I need rest and I gotta take a break. And so the study that I published, that Microsoft did back right after the pandemic right, showed that individuals who took just even a 10 minute break in between their back to back meetings showed a massive reduction in the stress version brainwaves that were emitted. And so if you could just rest for that moment, go take a walk and come back, you'll see a reset in your brainwave stress activity, and so that is a thing.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:Physical burnout, however, just because you're physically exhausted does not necessarily mean that you are or experiencing workplace burnout, and so I wanted to go a little bit deeper into that, and so the second one that I found was this idea of depersonalization or mental burnout, and that's the one we saw really crop up during the pandemic. And depersonalization or mental burnout says that, like my mind is no longer at work, I am mentally checked out, and so I've called this sort of the purpose problem that you no longer see a meaning or purpose in the work that you're doing. And we saw so many people during the Great Resignation not only leave their jobs, they left their industries. You had teachers becoming tech sales people, right, and so you saw everybody just switching because they woke up one day and say is this what I want to do? Does this matter anymore? I no longer see myself as an accountant. I don't know why I'm an accountant. Why did I even pick this and so and a global pandemic can certainly rattle a few cages to ask big questions, certainly like why am I doing this? What am I doing? Right? But mental burnout is that I've lost the meaning, and so diagnosing that there's different treatments for that cause than there would be that, hey, you just need to take a break. I love my job, but you're working 16 hour days, you got to rest, you take two days off and do not answer your phone at all, right, so those are different treatments for that.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:And then the third one, which I think maybe is the most problematic this is attitude burnout. And attitude burnout really starts to creep up when you notice cynical attitudes and so you no longer are. You know you've got a quick tongue at work, you've got a couple of toxic sidebar conversations that are happening, and really the root of this is you have not felt recognized or valued in a long time. Okay, and recognition can come intrinsically and extrinsically right. It could be that I've not gotten a raise or a pay increase in years and I have been busting my butt. Right Could be that kind of value, but it also could be nobody has really even spoken to me about how valuable I am, or even recognized me publicly or in front of my team on how much I do here, and so when that starts to happen, you start getting really cynical. Why am I here? Right, and so I am. I'm in a bad place, I am saying things that I shouldn't, I'm feeling things that I shouldn't, and so that's an attitude burnout. That, to me, is the yellow, if not orange, flag that if you don't start having conversations with your leadership or doing some real, either go out and get some coaching or talking to somebody through this it might be time for you to hit eject, because that one is tough, to sort of turn around and do it.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:And then the last one. The fourth type of burnout is this idea of skill burnout, and skill burnout says that I don't feel like I have the resources or the tools or the skills to accomplish what I used to be able to accomplish. And that starts happening when the tech evolution has increased, and so everything from machine learning to AI, all of these new integrations. So if you've been at your job for 20, 30 years, or if you're in leadership, and all of a sudden the tools are accelerating at a pace that is quicker than what you're picking up on or your ability to use them, you might feel inadequate, and so that's a skill burnout system.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:And again, that's a different treatment. That's a. I need to take a week off, go do a professional development course in AI, learn what chat, gpt is, how to use it for a company, and I'll be back because I'm feeling inadequate at my own abilities at this time and so, again, so that's a long way of answering your question, but I do see it as these four primary buckets that once you're diagnosed with, like okay, my issue is attitude burnout. You're right, that's exactly what it is. I still have lots of meaning and purpose. I'm not exhausted, I just don't feel appreciated and that's why I'm burnt out, and that's why that's what's feeling this. So each time you have a cause to these burnouts, there's a different treatment that you should be taking.
Pete Newsome:So it sounds like step one is to identify the problem, Absolutely Like anything. So on the surface of skill, burnout to me doesn't sound like the same category as the other three. When we're calling it burnout versus some better way of saying we're being left behind right or feeling inadequate, perhaps.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:It is, it is. But if, let's say, we decided to switch over to a whole new platform to do the job you've been doing for 10 years, we've got a whole new platform and there's a training seminar. They're coming in and we're gonna do a huge change over and make sure you take the online classes and then you need to be ready by Monday morning to do that. Your learning curve depending on where, how set you are, you could be very frustrated for those first three or four months during that change that you're going. I don't know if I wanna learn something new, I don't know if I can learn something new and I cannot catch up and I am burnt out trying to stay ahead of this evolution of curve. But you're right, it is a different kind of burnout. It doesn't involve the attitude or necessarily even the meaning or purpose. You're just exhausted trying to learn a new skill.
Pete Newsome:But that explanation puts it in a really good perspective and it makes more sense to me Hearing it that way, because your example of AI was perfect for that. Where, here we are with this thing going at a million miles an hour, the train is not only out of the station, it's well down the tracks. At this point, and if you've been in your role for a long time or it worked really hard to get to a point, I mean, I'm watching some college graduates come out now. They've just spent four years getting a degree in something that has almost been rendered moot by some of the new technology that's out, and you have that on one spectrum. The other end of the spectrum are people who've been in their profession a long time who are now being told to your point. You have to relearn how to do everything.
Pete Newsome:Yeah the payroll system.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:Good luck, department of Five. Yeah, I mean, and that happens right Throughout everyone's career.
Pete Newsome:I mean, the technology I use every day didn't exist when I came out of college. Needless to say, some of the technology I use didn't exist when we came into 2023. So it's a constant thing and it does. I get it right. I get that feeling. I don't, yeah. But let me ask you so when you're teaching leaders?
Dr. Josh Hammonds:Yeah.
Pete Newsome:Is it? Do you give? Is the guidance to anticipate each of these things, know what signs and symptoms to look for and then how to deal with it. But back to identification being the first step, I think. Do you plant that? Is it anticipation or is it reaction that you try to teach?
Dr. Josh Hammonds:I think the best one is to have a proactive right.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:So maybe you're leading a team and you've been thinking they might be burnt out, but you're not sure if it is burnout or if it's a different kind of burnout.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:Right, just explaining these different styles, you'll see the light bulbs go off, go, you're right, this one's cynical, but this one no longer finds purpose in it Now, oh, that makes sense, and so just giving it a category, giving it a name, talking about the symptoms, talking about the different treatment, can help a leader sort of be a little bit proactive so that when they see these signs coming right, it doesn't get to that point. Right, if you're at a point of cynicism, something broke way over here before you know you didn't wake up with a cynical attitude, ready to be toxic at every water cooler conversation that no one wakes up doing that. There were signs before there and it might have been physical exhaustion. I worked, you know, for two months on this project and no one said anything and no one gave me the recognition that I deserved. Right, and so getting ahead of that is always going to be the best plan if I'm leading a team.
Pete Newsome:So of the fourth, one of them is physical right. That is not something that we can control. The other three to what degree are they self-imposed?
Dr. Josh Hammonds:Yeah, I think that's a great question. So what if I am leading a team and this team no longer finds meaning or purpose in their role? So now, as a leader, right, am I seriously responsible for talking my accountant into seeing the purpose and the meaning of their role Like that's your issue? If you no longer see the meaning, that's your issue and so there's a part of that that, yes, it's on that person, but, as their leader, could you help connect those dots right? And so one of the ways that we do this or I talk about doing this the control that you might have, the only actionable thing that you might have, is say, let's sit down and ask, let's have a one-on-one with the people that I'm leading and say let's see what your role is and make sure that your role is very clear, Because sometimes you know scope creep happens and you're no longer doing accounting, you're doing 17 other things.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:You love accounting, you find great meaning in accounting. It's the 48 other things that I've now acquired over the past six months because of hybrid work, because of all these sorts of things. So having that role clarity conversation could bring it back in. Maybe they do love accounting, they're just doing so much. That isn't accounting right. So having that conversation and then also having conversations about like look, here is the purpose, the vision and the mission of this company. This is why you joined us. This is what makes us different. Let me remind you of that and see if that brings any more clarity and things like that as well. And so those are two things you can do as a leader. But you're right ultimately, if somebody wakes up and says I don't want to be this anymore, and then you can, I think a good leader should help the transition into even if that's another company, right? Great leaders don't just care about their own organization, but hopefully they care for the growth and development of people, and that's why they're in that business people leadership.
Pete Newsome:That makes complete sense, as is the individual who experiences this, maybe not knowing what words to put to it, but we feel it right, we all know what Dredd feels like. Oh yeah, we all know that feeling. I mean I've talked about it many times over the years being in the staffing industry. Where the second you decide you're going to quit right, I mean we've put the quiet. Quitting has been talked about so much. That's a little bit different to me, but when you're checked out and you know there's no coming back from it every day, every minute feels like torture from that moment forward. So we know it, when we feel it, even if we can't put words and phrases attached to it. How much control does the individual really have over being in? Is there a way to repair the situation, generally speaking, or, when that exists, it's time to leave right, like if you're in this accountant scenario. Yes, you like doing accounting.
Pete Newsome:Times have changed. Now we're working at home. Now we've had to scale back. The business has evolved. This is normal, this is stuff that happens. But do we need to throw the baby out with the bath water, right? Or is part of it? Hey, you know what. I need to isolate the things I don't like. I need to put them in a silo, identify them for what they are and just deal with it.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:I think it's always worth having a conversation with your leader, with your manager, before you bounce because you don't know what opportunities could be brewing up. And so having a conversation I've got this questionnaire guideline is a bore out or burnout right, and so I encourage people to take this questionnaire not only to do a self-reflexive with themself, but then take that with their manager. Are there opportunities that exist, task forces, strategy sessions that I could be involved in or get involved in that would ignite more passion and interest in me? So chances are. If you've been there for a while, you know what you like and you know what you don't like.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:And so having that conversation I've worked with tech companies before where somebody who was in sales just very much didn't see that anymore, but had a passion for product and creativity, and so they kept grafting this way, this way, until they finally said let's make the lateral move, we're hiring people in product. Why don't we make this move? You already know the company, we already know you're a diligent worker. And so having that conversation with your manager saying here's what I'm passionate about, these are the strengths that I would like to be challenged on and see if I can't increase my performance in that way Are there opportunities and or do you see opportunities in the near future? Maybe not today, but are there openings?
Dr. Josh Hammonds:And then having that conversation and then your manager can go? Absolutely not, that will never happen for you. This is why we hired you, right? And then you can go shopping and amicably exit and find out what that is. But having that conversation with manager I mean companies are changing so much and the skills required and the competencies required are always shifting and changing. So you know, the bottom line is know yourself well enough to know what the things that you do, that you like to do, and bring that to your manager just to see if there are opportunities.
Pete Newsome:Well, and problems can't be fixed unless they've been identified, and that's something that I it's easier said than done. I, where I encourage everyone, talk to your manager, just like you said, share that concern, do it in the right way at the right time. Right, do it professionally, but don't dwell on it and don't leave what could otherwise be a good situation that was a good situation could be again because you chose that path of leaving versus trying to do something about it.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:Right, because we know the grass isn't necessarily greener and in many cases it's most definitely not I wish I had the stat, but the number of people that left during the Great Resonation it was a large portion of people went, oops, you know. And so it's grass yeah, grass is greener.
Pete Newsome:Well, and that scenario has created a mess, for lack of a better way to put it that we're still dealing with right now, because the pendulum is making some pretty big swings, or has been over the last couple of years, and there's a lot of really talented folks caught on the wrong side of that right now. Where they made a move, it was in their interest to do it and it was short term right. Some of the biggest you mentioned tech companies some of the biggest tech companies hired a lot of people, let a lot of people go. Now they're hiring some of them back. I mean, it's you have to take responsibility for your own success and wellbeing in all of this to some degree, or I would say, to the most significant degree. Do you support that?
Dr. Josh Hammonds:Yeah, absolutely yeah. Leaders should always be proactive in developing their teams, always right, that's what I'm always going to put the onerous of responsibility on leadership. That being said, if I'm talking to employees, individual contributors take charge of your journey. You should have an in depth, intimate view of what you are strong at, what you are great at, what are some things that you need to grow in and know that about yourself. Communicate that to your leaders and your managers as soon as you possibly can, or as soon as it comes into your view, so that you can get a growth plan together.
Pete Newsome:You know it because you've studied it right. I know it because I've seen it play out both as an employee and an employer. Why is it so hard to do? Why is it so hard for individuals to stop and have those conversations?
Dr. Josh Hammonds:There's no time. There's never time to have those conversations. Yeah, I think the one on one, a meaningful, productive one on one, is the heart and soul of any organization. And yeah, I've dealt a lot with tech companies and a lot of them were remote. So if you didn't have those, you didn't have anything.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:But I think we rely so heavily on this return to office movement. Right, If everybody's in the office together, we all learn through osmosis and you just pick up things along the way and I can see you and there's accountability. Yeah, all that's good, all that's great, but if you're not having a one on one for 40 minutes every other week, where the first eight to 10, how are you really doing? What's frustrating you the most? What blockers are preventing you from doing your job in the best way possible, and what resources do you need from me? If you're not framing the first eight minutes in that way and then going through more of a systematic checking off goals, what you still need to do, what are some tasks giving some feedback, I don't know how you could possibly be growing your people if you're not engaging in those one on ones.
Pete Newsome:From. As a communication expert, do you think that those are Harder to execute on? Perhaps right, maybe less impactful is a better way to phrase it virtually versus being in person. Do we lose something by doing that over Zoom?
Dr. Josh Hammonds:Yeah, we could dissect that for a while. Sure, right, and anytime you go from a 3D to a 2D, you're gonna lose something on that. But I've heard of people just doing turning off the cameras and just checking boxes and things like this. If you're gonna use a one-on-one just to check the boxes, did you do this, did you do this? Don't forget that. Don't forget that. See you next week. If you're just doing that and you're not having future conversations about, like, all right, what are some ways we can grow you? What are some new things we could do? What are some things we could add, challenge you. If you're not doing that, then Zoom or face-to-face, it doesn't really matter. But if you are engaging in those more kind of real conversations, I think Zoom works. I've seen it work really well. So it's more about intentionality than it is about the medium. I think so.
Pete Newsome:I think with Zoom, it probably in many cases it leads to being distracted, Unless you're recording like this right Now. We're engaged at this point because we're sensitive to the camera being on. But when I'm in Zoom meetings, when I would go to meetings and sit around the table with someone, I wasn't looking at my phone, I wasn't glancing off. I have multiple screens outside of my peripheral vision. I know I do that during meetings I'm not as engaged. So I think, to your point, you have to really be conscious of that to make it effective.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:Yeah, I mean meetings. You can get by with probably doing three or four things at the same time while the meeting is happening. But a one-on-one I would think yeah, if I'm asking you a direct, open-ended question about what excited you this week, if anything, right, I would think hold on what. I would think it'd be obvious if I was quite distracted on a question that poignant.
Pete Newsome:Well, I asked my wife. She knows she will tell you. When I appear to be you go in zombie mode where I'm not actually retaining anything you're saying right now because I'm not engaged. So that, to your point, I completely get that. I just think it's easier to do, it's easier to fall into that mode when you're virtual and that's something to guard against. So, with burnout in this course, who should consider taking it? And then what are they going to get from it? It's great, yeah.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:So two groups. First of all, if you are burnt out and you need some clarity on which burnout it is and what method you should take to your manager, your therapist, your spouse, your best friend, whatever question guides, I think that's the first person that I'm looking for. I'm looking to help those who are stuck and they don't know how to get out of this right, and the answer may be it's time to move on. The answer may be time to have a hard conversation with management. The answer may be some soul searching and take a week off. But that's the first demographic. The second one is I hear a lot from CHROs, people, leaders, people, ops that are going what do we do? I don't even know where to begin. It's gotten so bad and so toxic and or everybody's just going through the motions. Hell, is there a treatment out there somewhere? So maybe you're not experiencing it, but you'll get some tools as well. So, from the course, that's what you can expect. There's gonna be four major sessions. The first session is gonna look at I will give you a diagnostic, a survey to use for you and your teams, so that we can get some quantitative scores on what's the highest, what's the thing that we go okay, well, it's not physical burnout, great, good, let's move on, we can check that off the list. And so you'll get some scores, things like this Each session will have a homework, an activity, right.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:So the second session so after you figure out what burnout you have, the second session is gonna really dive into this purpose problem. Did you lose your meaning or are you just adding things to your plate and it's clouding your role, right? And so we're gonna have a soul searching kind of activity where, similar to what we were talking about, the icky guy of this idea of, like, what is the thing that you love? What is the thing that matters the most to you? What's the thing the world needs? And so there's gonna be some soul searching in that session.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:Then the third session is gonna be all about people, and has your team been breaking you or making you? And so if you are developing attitude and will burnout, we'll look at what's the culture look like in your team, what's the feedback ratio, right? And so if you're a leader, this should be kind of an awakening going uh-oh, my team is burnt out. In this way, I need to be more intentional about how I get feedback. I need to be more intentional about how I'm creating a psychologically safe space that we can air our grievances, we can be creative with each other, we're not fearing ramifications, right, and things like this. Because if your team is a healthy, supportive team, you can have massive physical exhaustion and demands all over the place, but there is a comfort and a solace in your team and it can be a buffer and create resilience with you. So your microcosm of your team is going to have as much of a buffer against any kind of burnout as anything else, and so we'll look at that.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:And then the fourth one is this kind of performance. We'll look at performance as re-imagined, and so how are you being assessed on your performance as a leader? Or how are you assessing your team? And then how are you being assessed? And so we'll look at ways that we can track goals and performance and bring in our strengths in ways that maybe we've not really assessed or looked at before, and so we'll really kind of look at that kind of performance review aspect.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:And so each session live interactive for an hour. There's going to be people chatting about their lives, we'll have a framework, I'll present some research and then they'll have an action to take back to their teams or to take back if they're an individual contributor, they can take back just personally to fill out and things like this. But they're going to have tools that when they're done with the course, if they are leading a team that's burned out, they can take their whole team through all of the materials that I give them and hopefully get to the bottom of some of this and maybe remedy some of the burnout.
Pete Newsome:That's really powerful, and I say that from a very personal perspective as someone who has struggled as a leader with these things. So that's I confess that to you early on after we met, and that's it's not by lack of, from lack of desire, it's not being armed with those tools that you just described. It's something one of the reasons I'm so happy to connect with you to try to absorb some of this knowledge and to put it into practice, because having identified the problem long go doesn't mean I can solve it right. So while that may be the first step, there has to be follow-up steps or no progress is made. Right, exactly.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:Exactly. Yeah, it's comforting knowing. Okay, this is what I have. Now what?
Pete Newsome:Right and you said it. You said it. There's so many companies right now. I have a peer group I will go into further detail about that because this isn't gonna be the best statement that is that I communicate with regularly and leaders of organizations and they are experiencing this. We're in different markets, we different sized companies in the office, out of the office, very diverse group, but everyone, almost with that exception, is struggling with how do we get them as leaders, how do we? Everyone wants happy employees, right, we want productive, happy, motivated, engaged employees, but it's much, much easier said than done.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:Oh yeah, oh yes yeah.
Pete Newsome:So we need your course.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:Yeah.
Pete Newsome:We'll put the link in the show notes so you can sign up, of course. Let me have one more question, josh, and I'll let y'all hook today, because I already have like four or five more things I want to interview you about on a different day.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:That sounds great.
Pete Newsome:What surprised you the most through this research of putting this course together?
Dr. Josh Hammonds:Oh wow, I think that's good. Gosh, that's a great question.
Pete Newsome:Or that someone from the outside looking in would be surprised with. I don't want you to give away any secrets. Maybe we have to take the course to find out, but I'm curious as to something that surprised even you, given all your background.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:Yeah, I think to me. I think the biggest thing that surprises me is how much meaning matters to how engaged I am at work. And again, like we talked about before, is this a generational thing? Has it caught on? But you could look at somebody. This is why nonprofits exist People taking a third of the income that they could. But at the end of the day, this matters so much to me and this is why I'm doing it, and so I think the last numbers I crunched was a large data set, but I think it's 68% of why you're engaged at work can be attributed to the meaning that you give.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:And then the other thing is everyone's meaning is individualized. So if feeding the world and you join this organization and you're feeding the world and you're part of this movement and that matters to you, that's great, but that might not matter to somebody else. And so how important it is for a company to be very transparent about this is our purpose, this is our mission. If that aligns with something that you already have intrinsic in you, that drives you as well, let's connect, let's work together, let's align in our mission and our meaning together, and so I think that's such an important part. So, as a recruiter somebody's been in the recruiting business for a while finding that alignment from the get go is important, and then so, when it teeters or when it falters, getting them back on.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:This is why we're doing this. Remember, this is why we are here. This is why we're doing this. So, but again, that could be different for everybody. For some people it could be. I want to make a lot of money and build a legacy for me and my family and my extended family and then provide from there. Like, each meaning is no nobler than someone else's meaning, and so finding everybody's meaning and getting that to align is going to work itself out. That drives so much of why you're engaged to work. All these other parts that we talked about, too, they matter as well, but that's the big one.
Pete Newsome:And we don't do enough of that in the recruiting process as a whole. So I'm really glad you brought that up. It means a lot to me, because our internal recruiting process is to first understand the candidate's objectives before we tell them about the specific job we're recruiting them for. So while their resume is the reason for the initial phone call because it is skill sets matched up, right Background, experience, whatever it might be Just like a good fit on paper, that's just the cover of the book. You have to open the book to understand what it's about, right, and so we seek to understand what the candidate's motives, driver's, objectives are prior to telling them anything about the job, because once we start speaking of those details, it skews the rest of the conversation. And so we want that true answer because, to the point you just made, very well, if those things aren't aligned, it's not going to work right.
Pete Newsome:If you and we'll just take something obvious like working from home, now some people are putting out at the top of their priority list now, right, not a thing you saw much of four years ago. Now very common People are quitting jobs they otherwise loved because of that very reason. So you better get those relevant things on the table. And then even in your account scenario, which I find interesting, right, because you think of an account, you think boring job, look at it, numbers all day. Well, there's some accountants out there who say I want to make as much money as I can for the time I spend working. Right, that's one thing. Others, they want the meaning of their organization to align with their interests and what they place value.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:Yes, I worked with an individual several months ago and her passion in life was taking disorganized data and creating columns for it, like it gave her the most satisfaction, and so there are. Meaning can be very different for very different people.
Pete Newsome:Yeah Well, we're going to talk more about all this, because it's not a judgment of one in trying to decide which one is better than the other, but it is necessary to identify what the company offers in that particular regard, whatever that might be, and then what the employee needs in order to avoid being burned out. Because how unfortunate is it going to a situation where the outcome is inevitably negative because of factors no individual can control right, and that happens a lot, a lot. So, yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Pete Newsome:This is a good road to go down. We're going to explore it later, but for now let's focus on making sure everyone knows how to find your course. We're going to be on burnout for weeks, an hour a week. When does it start?
Dr. Josh Hammonds:Yep, october 23rd, monday. All right, so we'll share all that. If you miss a session they'll all be recorded, but yeah, and then of course you get month long coaching, and so I'm there asynchronously. You've got burnout questions that are very specific. I am there to answer, as best I can, what the research says and what my experience tells, and so, yeah, well, I can't imagine there's someone who's better for the times that we're at, whose knowledge experience.
Pete Newsome:What you know, Josh, is what we desperately need right now to enjoy our days more right, To get more fulfillment out of it and that's really what it's all about so then we can enjoy life as a whole. So thank you for your time, Thank you for what you're doing, and I look forward to hearing a lot more from you.
Dr. Josh Hammonds:Yeah, absolutely. Thanks so much for having me on, pete. Always great chatting with you and I'm excited about further conversations down the road.
Pete Newsome:Yes, indeed, all right, everyone. Thanks for listening. Have a great rest of the day.