The Reminder Remedy with Alena Conley

Are you Experiencing Burnout? Guest Host - Alicia Roebuck

• Alena Conley • Season 6 • Episode 65

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In this compelling episode of the Reminder Remedy, host Alena Conley welcomes Alicia Roebuck, one of her first life crafting coaching clients, for a deep dive into finding not just a job, but a mission-driven career. Alicia will be hosting a new monthly segment, Lead and Thrive that offers a deep dive into the life domain of career.

Over three years of transformative coaching, Alicia has seen remarkable personal and professional growth. This episode marks the beginning of a recurring monthly segment where Alena and Alicia explore the current state of work and organizations, addressing crucial topics like workplace burnout, everyday micro-aggressions, and the search for purposeful work.

Key Points:

  • Introduction to Alicia Roebuck: Alicia shares her journey of personal and professional growth under Alena's coaching, setting the stage for a series of in-depth discussions on meaningful careers.
  • Work as a Mission, Not Just a Job: The conversation focuses on the significance of finding work that aligns with one's core values and beliefs, going beyond the conventional notion of work.
  • Dealing with Workplace Burnout: Alena and Alicia discuss strategies to combat burnout, a common issue for professionals today, emphasizing the importance of recognizing early signs and taking proactive steps.
  • Navigating Micro-Aggressions in the Workplace: Insights into handling everyday micro-aggressions with grace and resilience, promoting a healthier work environment.
  • Challenges of American Work Cultures: The duo sheds light on the demanding nature of work cultures, particularly in the U.S., discussing the struggle to balance long work hours with personal life and the expectations of constant availability.
  • Sustainable Work Practices: Solutions for managing unsustainable work demands, including exploring opportunities within the same industry that offer a better balance.

Take the Burnout Quiz

https://kandiwiens.com/burnout-quiz/

Supplemental Resources:


You can connect with Alicia by following her:

TikTok and IG 
@Theealiciaroebuck

You can book a session to work with her at www.aliciaroebuck.com, tell her we sent you!

Alicia R:

Welcome to lead and thrive a monthly segment on the reminder remedy podcast focused on career empowerment. I'm Alisha Roebuck, career coach, recruitment leader, and career development enthusiast. And I am your guide through the realms of all things, career and overall growth. Join me in exploring the philosophy that drives our mission, cultivating environments where skills and experience are recognized, opportunities are accessible, technology and tools are embraced and incorporated into everyday life, and individuals thrive in careers that align with their passion and purpose. Let's dive into the essence of empowering individuals toward a future of fulfilling, meaningful, and well compensated work.

Okay, that's good. So this is helpful really helpful in thinking about just the conversations and the redirects, right? Because I don't want to come off as Okay, just do this and things will be fixed, like it is very temperamental when it comes to relationships and how to finesse these things. And so I hope that, some of these scripts are helpful. Now the third thing that they mentioned was that you're expected to over index on work. First of all, the term over index. Oh my God, like I've listened to a podcast where they literally say the word, the words over index like 10 times. I'm like, that's y'all version of cause they say, Oh my God. Anyways, so when you're expected to over index on work, what does that even mean? Yeah, you're just always on, you're expected to always be on. So even when you're. Not physically like in the office, you're expected to respond to emails and IMs. And, it's, there's no such thing as like work hours. They all just run together. What are the weekends, right? I'm on vacation, but I'll take a call or seven. And that typically, that shows up a lot with how our managers lead. They show you through. What they do when they're off. When I was a leader, I made very certain, like I would delete the apps off my phone because I knew I didn't want to make my team feel like when they were on vacation they had to be checking. So it's a very specific effort. Now, that's not to say if things are due or there's like very, important things that are happening depending on the level.'cause there are leaders on this call and on this podcast. It's not to say you can't be on when you need to be right, but this is like consistently not respecting your hours, not respecting your time and the way you do this, and this is something that's also very personal. You've got to set boundaries from the beginning, right? Like we talk about with kids, the second you say no, and it becomes a yes. Now it's just yes from now on, right? So when you find that people are responding to you. After hours, you respond during the work hours, right? And you can even say to them, Hey like what's the best time for us to communicate? Like for me, it's during these hours. I noticed you sent some notes yesterday. Were you expecting me to respond during that time? Or like what was the expectation? And it's not something that you have to be combative about. It's just asking the question, right? For a lot of people, they're in meetings all day. So the only time they get a chance to respond is after they've had dinner. And most will say, yeah, please just ignore that. It's like my stream of consciousness going off, right? We've all been victim of that. Oh, I just wanted to get this out before I forgot. So those are easy ways you can ask the questions. Now, if it becomes something where the boundaries aren't being respected, I would definitely put something in writing around how you're going to be, accessible. I would mark my work hours on my calendar. So like you can't even book time with me. You can even do an out of office after certain hours, right? Depending on how extreme you've got to go, there are ways and methods to get your point across. And this again, may not be what you signed up for. So you need to think through What your path forward looks like given this scenario. Oh, okay. Yeah, so it's two different recordings. Girl, this is a mess. My tech me and my fancy tech. I should just be doing my laptop, but. It's a new editing tool. It makes it great. I just go in and delete all of it. And chop it up. That's all. Yeah. So my question to that is, when we think about American culture, right? Especially like when I was in the workplace and I worked in banking and it was just No, it didn't even have to be said, or it was even said these are the hours you're going to be here at six. You're going to be here till midnight. And I better see an email from, that time forward, right? Give me something to let me know you was in here all night. Yep. So I think that there are some work environments where it's just no. And if you know that you're not in that season, it is time to look for something else. However, I do, my concern is when you have experience in an industry and the industry by nature overindexes in terms of people just work, this is their life. Yeah. I've had clients. And this, I've seen this a lot with clients who work with global teams. They're trying to lifecraft and do other things, but they almost have to be on all day because by the time it's time for them to go to sleep their teams, in Hong Kong are waking up or whatever, right? And so when it comes to setting the boundaries for international teams, it's a little bit more challenging. Yeah. Or. It's one of those things, especially with small businesses where you don't have a ton, like you, it's not Oh, get somebody else to do it. Such as on vacation. It's like I'm on vacation is not getting done because there is no other me. Yeah. It feels like you can't necessarily do that. And so it becomes a constant. Okay. This is not I'll just give an example. I had a client who, She pretty much got to a point where she realized like this is just not working out, Like I want more personal time. I want to have a baby. I want to do this I want to do that, but there's really no real wiggle room like there's yeah, I'm putting my email I'm telling them stop calling me They're going to still email me. I'm going to pretend like I'm not going to check it. I'm going to check it and now I'm at dinner thinking about it, right? So it's hypothetically, you're putting in you're putting in the work, like the tips that your coach tells you to do, but it's not really helping your well being. What would you say? When it's just I don't want to go without a job, but I also can't, this is not sustainable. Like, how do you finally just make a choice? I think for one, I think the opportunity can be to consider what other options could be available within your industry. So what I found, especially, post pandemic. Employers are looking to make things more approachable for employees, right? So just because your company exists in this industry doesn't mean that the same kind of work environment exists at every other company, right? Get curious, ask around what are the other. Groups in your industry doing right? What are the other benefits that exist within that industry as a first step to utilize your transferable skills and maybe go to another company in the same industry, right? The other option is what are the transferable skills you can take to another industry? For example, a lot of lawyers recently have talked about shifting outside of practicing law and within various industries, there are always a need for People who can handle, the legal work of the organization, like with an insurance, there's all kinds of ways to pivot from working in legal to claims departments and underwriting departments, just given the legal, ramifications of that industry and those services. So it's time to look at transferable skills. And I know that's daunting, but that's where the innovation. Happens. So I grew up in media and TV data mostly. And if you look at the heads of these organizations, it's no longer just a TV organization. It's a digital organization. They're pulling in the people that have no TV experience in a lot of ways, but understand streaming, but understand these monetization for content. And And honestly, there's a premium for those, experiences. Yeah, there's a premium like an outside perspective. They need it. It's going to help them to grow and be competitive, right? And so that's what I have. And we've seen a lot of that, right? Seeing a lot of those industries, right? Like recently they talked about the shortage of accountants and auditors, right? That's because we all know we went to fam, you and a lot of our friends are accountants and auditors and busy season. Remember all our friends and busy season, like you don't hear from you. You don't see them right now. We're seeing a lot of those individuals take their talents to consulting, take their talents to other areas of. Their business or other industries overall to find more balance, right? And so I do find that in these instances, you can find other companies in that industry that maybe aren't as strict or conservative to that industry that you can maybe go into or see where you can take your talents and find somewhere else where again, you can be valued. And hopefully get some of those objectives fulfilled within. Your list is what I look at as I'm listening to you, one of the things that is coming to mind is we have, I would say that the average listener for my show is like 30 to 45, right? And, would say pretty much upper management at this point, we're looking at almost 15 to 20 years experience. So there are some that, are looking to change careers, potentially burnt out, but many of them do have teams. And what I also, in addition to individuals coming because they're experiencing burnout, what I also have heard is I want to create culture that allows people to thrive on my team without burnout, right? So it's almost from that managerial and organizational development standpoint. Yeah. Do you have any outlook on If I'm listening to this, I personally am not in a season of burnout. I've been there, but I can see that some of my team members are, my junior team members are because we have demands in the organization, thus it's making me a little bit burnt out because I'm stressed because of what they have to do all night. So from, I know that you you work with a lot of senior management in developing how you are. Are innovating in this time. What is something that a manager who sees their team over indexing can do to support? One is having a conversation with that individual about their objectives personally and professionally. You start there because your team person, your team, they have perspectives on what they want to accomplish and what they want to contribute. So you want to. Start with understanding that and hearing that directly from them so that they can feel heard and seen. And then the article actually points to some really interesting perspectives, which I think is great. It's the three D's. It's delegate, de emphasize, or discontinue, right? So when you think about the personal goals of each individual team member, those inevitably ladder up to your team goals, ladder up to your organization goals, right? So your organization goals are not changing. But your team goals might need to, right? I love when you talk about like the law of three. If you've got 10 objectives for the team, let's tighten it up a little bit, right? Maybe it needs to be six. Maybe we can parking lot that one objective till 2025, given the change and maybe the resources for your organization or for your team, right? I think that if you think about those pieces, then you can effectively delegate, de emphasize, or discontinue. But it needs to start with what are the absolute things that we need to accomplish to be successful as a team? What are the individual things that my teams are saying that they want to do? So the things that might be on one person's plate might be a personal objective for the other person. You can delegate that differently, right? The things that aren't really a priority for the year. Let's deemphasize and say, maybe Q4, we'll start to talk about it again and go into 2025. And then the thing that we came up with in 2020, in, in January, 2020, that's no longer even relevant anymore. Let's just discontinue that. And just say Hey, that has evolved into this other thing, this other area. Just take it off our plate altogether. Yeah. No, that's super effective. We'll have to put those three D's in the show notes because I think that, having that framework is important because, it does get to a place where this is the thing that I personally am trying to develop in my skill set is how do I continue to develop myself as an individual, as a leader, but also using my leadership. Skills to then develop other people. Absolutely. And I think that is something that for many of us, the organizations, we don't really necessarily get to that point because we're just like, all right, I'm going to just be an individual contributor because it's too much, but I also, especially if you're dealing with burnout, it's no, I'm already like doing too much work for those of us who are trying to shift cultures and, corporations and do business differently. We realize, okay, I seem to have skill sets that could change the narrative in this workplace. I want to contribute, but I need to understand the best way to do that, right? So even, for me as an entrepreneur that works with organizations or that collaborates with other business owners, if I'm given, if I'm presented with a proposal and they're saying, okay, Alina, we want you to do this part of it. I have to have a full understanding of what is the ultimate objective? Don't just give me a piece of the pie when you tell me tell me the overall goal because number one, I'm going to be able to effectively contribute to that. But then I can also delegate to my team the priorities based off of how, our deadlines and our, the bigger goals for whatever the group partnership is. I think that those are super helpful. Okay, learning a lot. Fourth, he talks about how your work culture does not align with your values. And this is our sweet spot, but what, tell me more about that. Yeah. So the mismatch causes stress and turmoil because it threatens you at a fundamental place like your identity. At your core, right? And so this one is really important. I think the biggest thing is like having a conversation with your leadership voicing your concerns, looking for the proper channels to voice your concerns, right? I think there are typically phone lines you can call, like to just call out what's happening, but really, Okay. This is a place where, if you want to stay, you're going to have to really do your best to call out the things that are, causing you stress, that are misaligned, and figure out if there are other departments, groups, etc. that you can find solace within, but this one for me is I gotta figure out somewhere else I can go because there's not typically a great outcome in staying in these kinds of places. I think the biggest piece here is also figuring out like how quickly your exit strategy can be put into motion. Which I know is not the easiest way to think about this, but it could be. A lot of times, one of the things I've heard about with, This kind of taxing environment is leaves, there are leave options for you If you need to consult your physician and just speak to the stress of it on You can absolutely look into a leave But this for me is one where you should as quickly as possible alert the proper people let them know Talk to your doctor, make sure you're, taking care of yourself and figuring out your exit strategy. Yeah, I can think about a couple of clients, but one in particular comes to mind where she was essentially working for a religious organization. That kind of, it's Oh, I'm working for this Christian organization. So I'm assuming that these fundamental beliefs about how people, women should be treated are there. And then the moment that she had a child and realize even their maternity leave policy. Or the things that they have in place for parents, a parental leave were just non existent. Like it was like super short maternity leave. It was, the insurance was just like poor quality. And it's like, how can Support all of these things right in policy and politics and even in your religious organization, but the people that are here that you're fundamentally able to touch, you are not showing up for them in your work policies. Yeah. And so it made it very challenging for her because she was dealing with some level of postpartum. She was already dealing with anxiety and stress. Now her, her child had whatever things that was requiring, multiple doctors appointments, just what newborns require, right? And so for you to ask me to come back, knowing that I got to do all of this, or not even come back into the office, right? So it was like, okay, I came on, I was hybrid, I, didn't have to come in as often, now you all are saying that fundamentally you believe that people should be in the office and it's like, why? Nothing that we doing, that we're doing requires us to be here set five days a week. So now y'all are just exhibiting control. And so again, it just became one of those things where I thought I was signing up for an organization, a nonprofit or whatever, that's supporting this mission. And maybe they are to some degree doing their mission in the world, but how it was reflected in how they treat their employees says otherwise. And so that's something to me that's those are adult conversations because it's Like I've had people who are like, listen my work is not fun right now in this season, but they pay me to have kids. Like I still get paid. I got great benefits. So I'm staying, you know what I'm saying? So it's like you have to figure out like in this season, what do I value? Do I value hybrid work? Do I value benefits? Do I value Working with a manager who has kids who if I call and say little Johnny has a call, they're not going to judge me, that does not align. It's just impossible in my opinion. And that's why I say like you alert the proper people because in some cases there are repercussions. Like some people don't understand the policy so there could be repercussions. A lot of times like I always say we always think oh this company is not great. It could be the one person that you work with who's not in line with what's going on. So like I always say Take the proper channels to alert the proper people who can say actually you should get this or you should have this flexibility or yeah, you know what, work with me going forward kind of thing. So I do think like starting there to try to salvage it. Cause I've really, I empathize so much. We've all been there where it's this is not the time for me to have to go through anything else. I think that's a good strategy. I think that's a good strategy because that is actually what ended up happening. She escalated what she was dealing with her manager to HR, and HR was like, Oh, no, you can use FMLA, you can use, this. She ended up getting extended pay leave, and so I, I think that to your point, there are a lot of people in leadership and management that just don't know what is written. Okay. All right. Let's go on to our last one, which is. unfortunate cause of burnout for many people. And that is that your workplace is toxic. Yeah, so it talks about McKinsey's Health Institute found that the single biggest driver of negative employee outcomes is toxic work behavior. And toxic refers to behaviors that leave you feeling belittled, disrespected, intimidated, unsafe, or un, Undermined. And at work it can look like harassment, unfair treatment, cutthroat competition, manipulation, gossiping, gaslighting, unethical behavior, abusive management. So that's like a common driver of negative outcomes. It even speaks to if you are in a toxic environment, you're eight times more likely to experience burnout and burnout employees were six times more likely to quit within three to six months. It's. It's really a tough place to be in. And a lot of what they share is don't waste your time trying to advocate for change, right? Like in that kind of environment, like your safety, your mental health is. the primary thing, right? And the difference between the last one and this one are, there are maybe some confusions around the benefits, or it could be like a one off thing, or maybe there's just some things that you can, it hits you to your core, but it's something that if you're in another group, or maybe you have some clarity around the benefits, it would help. In this environment, there's just no everybody's talking about it. Put your mask on and save yourself, honey. This is where it's and that's why I wanted to clarify what toxic means. These are things that are truly Putting you in a place where you have to prioritize yourself. Yeah. And again, I think about like why I ended up ultimately leaving. It was toxic. Like I was literally crying in the bathroom every day, my first year. And I was like, This shit is crazy. I'm dealing with somebody who could care less about me as a human. He embarrasses me. He puts me to shame. It was toxic as hell. And I think, again, going back to, okay, you hear these horror stories. I felt like I put myself in that situation. Yeah. But then, once I realized Oh, I'm literally destroying my health, right? Once I had dealt with the ulcers in my stomach, the acid reflux that has to end up getting all, I'm like, I'm 20, 26 years old. Like why? And he immediately went and started having conversations. I think it would, might've been a week after my appointment, my doctor's appointment. And I was like I'm finding something else here. Cause this one person is not going to ruin my experience at this firm. I know that this firm stands for something better. I know that this team might not be a good fit and it stings my ego because it is a winning popular team. But like I gotta find something that's gonna align with like how I move. And that's all you can do is figure out how to limit your exposure to these individuals. Hopefully that's within the organization but again if you're feeling like it's something that's tolerated in this organization you will have to figure out again exit strategy and leave. But it's definitely something that You should not blame yourself for, right? No one deserves or signs up to be treated that way. Even in your most ambitious of seasons, which I think for me, this resonates a lot. In my ambitious season, I was like, do whatever, say whatever, I don't care. I'll just, or you, whatever you do, I'll just figure it out, right? That was me in my ambitious season, and A lot of the things that I did put up with, there were aspects of toxicity in different environments that I was in. And I just took it on the chin as something that I should do. And in hindsight, I never deserved that. I never signed up for that. So as much as you may be feeling that way, feeling ambitious, it's critically important to understand the longevity, right? You think about health. Will you survive however many more years in this environment, right? Like health wise, and is that worth it? Is it, is this career or job worth your health? And that's a personal question you have to answer for yourself. And I think that I don't know how many of you all have read the body keeps score. And we talked a little bit about this in one of our most recent episodes, but we talk about how one time, two times, three times it could feel like, Oh, I'll just ignore it. But what's really happening is that the body is storing it each time. So then over time, it looks like cancer. It looks like high blood pressure. It looks like ulcers. It looks like acid reflux. The next thing you know, you have a surgery like me because I don't mess up my esophagus because my acid is not reproducing because I got too much cortisol, too much stress. Literally. Oh, I know what the episode was. It hasn't come out yet. It was the gut health one. But in my gut health episode, I explained my work environment. I forgot these two episodes are actually connected. I'm gonna have to link them. But I explained the exact environment that I was just telling you about. The toxic one. Because I was like, this is where my, my gut challenges started. And I'm, I was like having an aha moment. Oh, it was the job, like the job, and I'm almost. I left my corporate job in 2023. So 11 years out. So at my 10 year anniversary of leaving my job, I ended up having to have surgery for some trauma that happened a decade early. And that's, I've dealt with chronic stress. I went to the hospital for heart palpitations. I've literally had to retrain my body to hear and feel the alert. going off because I was constantly traveling, constantly commuting, constantly in meetings, right? Like these are the things that were choices that I made for my ambition to get that promotion to get there. And it's just for me, looking back, it wasn't worth it. Now that I'm here, I'm choosing different. A different path, a different outcome. But I completely empathize with people who are in that season. Look, I'll just do whatever I have to do. I'll take on the toxic work, toxic workplace to get the check. I get it, and I empathize with you. I just hope that you can limit your exposure to those toxic behaviors, those toxic individuals, and eventually have your exit strategy in place so that you do have a way to get what you need through experience. And move on. Yeah, I think that's a good way to bring it all home. In the article, the guy who wrote it started off by saying, It's not you, it's your job. And I love that. Because it's we assume, Oh, there are things I'm just not good enough, or this is just what it is. And it's no, it doesn't have to be this way. But to your point, if you choose in this season, you just gonna ride it out, and move through it, being able to have awareness around this is what's causing it. And then start to undo some of the things step by step, whether that's creating boundaries, looking into your FMLA plan. Getting on a new team, even just having the language to support it, right? If you're just going to therapy and you're able to talk through it and release it, right? Because that's the other thing is that we store so much of the experiences that, that then becomes the issue. So being able to release it could also do it. So yeah, That's the success management piece there, like successfully managing these experiences. Okay. Burnout happens when you are not successfully managing these things, right? So some people could be in these environments and be fine, right? Because they are successfully managing these things. Okay. Okay. And I think that's a distinction. If you are in these environments and they are crazy and you're feeling okay or not feeling exhaustion or mental distance and dissatisfaction, and you're feeling like you're having these achievements. feel good. You're successfully navigating these spaces, right? And so if for some reason you are not, I think taking a page out of this experience that we've just had and talking through this, make sure you have a doctor that if you need to go on leave, they can support you. I said this to everyone and I would be remiss if I didn't say here while you are feeling your best. Talk to your doctor about what could happen if you, for some reason, start not feeling like your best. Can they support you? Have they supported other individuals who have dealt with leave or need leave? What does that look like? Familiarize yourself with your sections of the employee handbook. Make sure your spouses or partners have access to those documents as well, right? For some reason you can't operate on your own, who's going to be able to help you with this process, right? And I know it's like an extreme version, but there are so many cases where we see individuals who really just, you cannot function. You cannot take the steps to figure out the doctor or even figure out where to What questions to ask, right? Do it when you're feeling your best. In the month of January, as we near the end, the biggest thing you can do for yourself is, like we said, checking with, your objectives, what season are you in, but proactively put things in place for yourself if for some reason you start to experience burnout. The worst feeling is, on top of the exhaustion and the burnout feelings from work, now you gotta find a doctor, now you gotta read your, documentations. You don't want to talk to HR at this point. You want to Don't talk to anyone, right? So do that stuff now, right? I can't say that enough. Luckily, when I went on my leaves, I already knew who I was working with. I already had experience from other people leveraging that same person. We have similar doctors and I was able to go right in and do what was needed. And it was the best thing I've ever experienced. Having someone in that moment be like, I see you, I got you, let's do it. Not oh, you're fine. You sure? I've never met you before. So what's your baseline for exhaustion? Now we're doing this? Now? This is time to do baselines on exhaustion. Absolutely not. No, I think that's amazing advice. It's by the time you get there, it's too late. It's too late. You just barely surviving. And I feel for those people. I feel for them. This has been a great first episode. I have really enjoyed exploring this. You are. Such a eloquent conversationalist in all things, but in particular in this space of career development. So hopefully everyone's tuned in, took a ton of notes. We'll put all of the things that we referenced in the show notes. Alicia will be with us. every month, but she is also available online. Alicia, can you share with them how they can follow you? Yes, I am B T H E, Alicia, A L I C I A, Roebuck, R O E B U C K on Instagram and Career Conversations for the Culture on TikTok. One other thing that we're going to give you as a resource that I think we both took the quiz. There's a burnout quiz that this author provides. It takes like maybe three minutes. But it tells you like if you are in a state of burnout or not, and it also gives you resources to help you navigate through this process. So you'll see those in the show notes, take the quiz, tap in and see where things stand for you. But I am Alicia Roebuck and I'll be here every month with Lead Thrive. Thank you so much for this opportunity. I'm appreciative to your listeners. I want to hear more from you all about topics that are top of mind for you. We just couldn't ignore burnout. It was like just something that's just swirling around us all around in the media, et cetera. So this was a big topic for us, but. Whatever you guys think is important for future conversations, let us know. I love doing this kind of research. Yes, definitely. Feel free to email us at coaching at the reminder remedy. com and we will get your questions answered. Yeah. All right. Until then, we'll see you on the other side. See you later.

Alena Conley:

Thank you for tuning in to yet another episode of the reminder remedy. If you haven't already, be sure to follow us on Instagram at the reminder remedy, as well as my personal page at Alina Conley and check out our latest workshops and resources at the reminder remedy.

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Alena Conley

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