How can marketers cope with burnout and stress? 

Burnout and feelings of being overwhelmed are not unusual. In fact, it’s quite common, as WHO reported “approximately 10.7 percent of the worldwide population — 792 million people — have a mental health disorder”

Destigmatising having feelings of stress, burnout, and other overwhelming emotions is necessary to creating a healthy environment, both personally and at work. Everyone deals with these feelings at some point, and having access to resources, wellness centres, and empathetic managers makes a significant difference in people’s lives. And, of course, when people feel supported, company work culture is positively affected.   

World Mental Health Day

With the 10th October celebrating World Mental Health Day, here are three ways that you can support your marketing team’s mental health and build a cohesive inclusive culture across your organisation: 

• Market days off for self-care. Employees may be reluctant to take a “mental health day” if they fear being stigmatised. Yet seeking care takes time, and disconnecting from work is important. If employees are struggling to find the time to seek help, encourage them to take days off. 
• Use the power of storytelling to solve HR’s problems, and this problem can benefit from a storytelling strategy as well. Seeing our co-workers and leaders openly discuss mental health is a key step in dissolving stigma. Can you imagine the power of a CEO sharing their experience seeking counselling? If your leaders are brave enough to share, the impact can be monumental.   
• Listening is vital for every relationship. While this may seem like a simple tool, it is one that many organisations overlook. There’s a disconnect between talkers and listeners which needs to be addressed if we’re to improve mental health at work. We should embrace more generalised discussions that reflect the spectrum of human emotion 

Take a moment today to check on your team, your colleagues and yourself.

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Due to the last few years, certain principles have come to the forefront of what is necessary for employees to embrace and adapt to, and organisations to consider for future hires. The following are some of the relevant principles of the future employee:

Flexible working

Having the freedom of flexible working has become a high priority since the pandemic forced this way of work on us.  Employees have become used to the freedom of home working and aimed with the knowledge that the company needs can be met in this way, going back to full time office based jobs will not be an option for many.

Building your own career path

The traditional career path is no longer expected of the future employee. They will now be encouraged to look at their own way of progressing.  Building their own networks, sharing valuable ideas and utilising feedback will be encouraged and contributions will be recognised.  Showing leadership in this way can put employees on the path to becoming a future leader.

Information sharing

In the past employees have kept information to themselves in the hopes of getting ahead, now they freely share information with colleagues and collaborate on ideas together.  More organisations are moving to a structureless establishment to remove the hierarchy amongst peers, therefore encouraging employees to share ideas and information to work together for the benefit of each other and the business.

New ways to communicate and collaborate

Once relying only on emails and phone calls, future employees are embracing new technology and new ways to connect.  Zoom calls, Team meets and new apps for fast efficient communication are becoming the new normal.

Continuous learning

Future employees can no longer rely on just what they already know, to succeed employees will need to commit to lifelong learning.  Having the skills, ability and willingness to learn new things, how to access this information and how to apply it to their continuing work role is possibly one of the most valuable principles.  This links in to sharing information as companies don’t always have formal training programmes to adhere to.  Accessing online learning sessions, internal teaching and face to face interactions employees can share this information with others to teach and also learn from each other.

At Brighter Directions we pride ourselves on already having these principles as part of our company’s culture, if you would like to work as part of a supportive, friendly and empowered team then please contact us to discuss what vacancies we have available.

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