Sure, everybody wants to be successful and start their way up to the corporate ladder. Most people spend most of their hours in a day at work even at times to the point of bringing work at home. Weekends are spent with meeting colleagues for the upcoming events of the next week. There are certain moments too that work eats up more than the eight or nine-hour requirements. These are the workaholic employees.
On the other side of the fence, employees who are too lax and find office work so boring are very creative in pretending to work. They find means to make them busy or do other work rather than the office tasks delegated to them. These unhappy workers usually try to work on other rackets” in addition to what their earning and use company supplies to attend to these unrelated works. Most often, they absent themselves in staff meetings.
Both of these workers, whether they notice it or not, hamper their success in work due to different circumstances and at the rate they are going. Take the first example, the workaholic employee.” In time, this person will eventually feel extreme fatigue, stress and exhaustion. He will observe that he cannot get things done or he cannot do them properly and correctly. If this happens, burnout has occurred.
According to an economic professor in one of Americas prestigious university, Americans work habit of spending more hours working has been continuously increasing in the past few decades. It will not be impossible that Americans will return back to their old habit in the 1920s spending too much time in their jobs.
Burnout is one of the guaranteed career killers in our society today. Here are some recommendations to avoid such condition to happen –
1. Allot time for play. Have time for your families, relatives and friends. Spend time with them in out-of-town gigs and trips. Learn how to delegate and train staff under you so that you can be absent from work knowing that you will leave a competent staff doing your work on your behalf.
2. Walk you talk. Do not let anyone burn you out just because you fell short of other peoples or the company’s expectations of you. You have a different set of value system and therefore you have to follow that value system and make a balancing act of adjusting to other peoples value system as well.
3. Workout. Exercise can do wonders to your body and is an effective way to eliminate stress. Be sure to concentrate on exercising rather than the issues at work. Try to focus and leave work in the office.
4. Tap your support network. Always establish rapport and friendship among co-workers because you will never know when you need them. It is from them you will get your inspiration, motivation, encouragement, support and feedbacks.
5. Enjoy what you do and love your work. Bear in mind that even though this is the case, it is required still that you strike a balance between your work and personal life. If not, the tendency is for you to depend too much on work for satisfaction.
For the easy go lucky type of worker who displays a dishonest attitude in terms of the hours paid by the company without working and using company supplies for other purposes outside work, here are surefire actions he may find himself in and would totally kill his career if he does not change –
1. Do not follow through. These are the employees who perhaps are hardworking but do not produce and deliver results as they promised. They may execute tasks but without enthusiasm and keenness to details.
2. Not admitting mistakes. These are prone to employees who often justify their inadequate performance and manifest wrong judgment resulting to decision making mistakes. Employees who are able to admit their weaknesses and mistakes are signs of confidence and professional maturity.
3. Just being complacent. Those employees who are afraid to take risks get lost and at times left behind by much younger and newer employees. They are not brave to think outside of the box and live within their shells.
4. Having an empty battery. No energy means no quality work produced. Be sure to avoid being burnout. Take breaks during your days work.
5. Not practicing team spirit. This means negative attitudes are always on the high level instead of the positive ones. This results to low spirit, less motivation, easily discouraged and pessimism.
Avoid all these career killers and sure enough you will reach your distinctive place in the corporate ladder. Peel off your old skin of dishonesty and renew it with the new skin of determination and enthusiasm.