Today’s healthcare providers are stressed, overwhelmed, and on the verge (if not already over the edge) of severe burnout. We need not ask why, as the reasons are firmly embedded in everyone’s mind: a long-term staffing shortage that collided squarely with the stretching-on-forever COVID-19 pandemic. These unprecedented times have rewired staffing concerns in every type of medical facility and exponentially magnified the workload of medical personnel in medical facilities and long-term care communities.
Burnout has already claimed countless front-line healthcare workers who have left the medical field, some temporarily, but others will not return. To prevent losing even more healthcare staff to the debilitating effects of burnout, management teams must commit to easing the stress and helping their employees find ways to recharge.
1. Create check-in points
Keeping the lines of communication open is essential. But go a step further by making it easy for your employees to share their concerns and the situations pushing them toward burnout. Host regularly scheduled luncheons or staff meetings where the main agenda focuses on how things are going. Create an atmosphere that not only welcomes but expects total honesty and full disclosure about how individual team members are coping. Make time for one-on-one sessions with those who prefer to share privately. The bottom line: take a proactive approach rather than wait for an emergency to grab your attention.
2. Fix what’s broken
Red-tape-laden procedures and slower-than-we’d-like processes are part and parcel of the world of healthcare. We deal with those because we have to. But some roadblock issues can and should be dealt with because they add unnecessarily to your workers’ stress level and because something can be done to either resolve or improve the situation. So, routinely ask your management staff what’s working and, more importantly, what’s not working. How can we capitalize on what we’re doing right, and again, more critically, what can we do to address stumbling blocks? Any remedy that eases the level of stress can help reduce the incidence of burnout.
3. Provide your team with relevant resources
Chronic stress leads to burnout which can have serious, long-term mental and physical health consequences. That’s why connecting employees with a toolbox of resources is so important. Anything and everything from online resources and hotlines to virtual or in-person counseling and support groups should be made available to your staff. Encourage them to seek the help they need by posting detailed information where it’s easily accessible—the break room, paycheck inserts, and newsletters. And then, take every opportunity to verbally acknowledge support for using any of these resources without jeopardizing their reputation or future with the company.
4. Create a Workplace Wellness Program
Promote a focus on wellness with various proven programs that can lead to lower turnover rates, fewer absences, and higher job satisfaction. Recruit a committee of volunteers from the folks known to be “into” wellness. Gather ideas and initiate one program at a time, from options such as exercise or yoga classes, cooking classes, a walking club, host monthly or quarterly meetings on topics such as self-care, relaxation techniques, nutrition, sleep, etc. Negotiate discounts for local gym memberships. Offer free smoking cessation resources. Make wellness a tangible priority.
Now more than ever, invest in your workforce by acknowledging the reality of burnout and taking a proactive approach to easing its damaging effects.