Preventing burnout starts with awareness and proactive coping strategies, with research increasingly showing that mindfulness practices can help professionals avoid burnout. For example, a recent workplace-based trial found that a digital mindfulness meditation intervention significantly reduced perceptions of stress, job strain and burnout among employees at a large medical centre, while improving well-being and work engagement. (JAMA Network)
Other studies and reviews have drawn similar conclusions: mindfulness-based interventions (MBIs) reduce emotional exhaustion (a key component of burnout), improve resilience and job satisfaction, and help workers regulate stress and maintain better mental health. (PMC Pub Med)
Using mindfulness involves practising being fully aware of your experiences in each moment, your thoughts, physical sensations, emotions, and how you perceive the world and your workplace. This awareness can help you:
- Challenge negative or distorted thinking, ask yourself whether you really have evidence for the conclusions you draw.
- Acknowledge different emotions and practise self-compassion when you make mistakes or things don’t go to plan.
- Notice and appreciate positive experiences; express appreciation to others when warranted.
- Set meaningful goals that enhance your sense of satisfaction and self-worth and acknowledge when you make progress.
These practices support individual resilience and help reduce the risk of burnout.
Organisations can also play a key role by doing the following:
- Raise awareness about burnout and encourage use of effective strategies like mindfulness to all employees.
- Provide skills training to all managers so they are equipped to optimise ways of working, identify potential workplace stressors so these can be addressed, spot early signs of burnout and know how best to support their team member/s in an appropriate way.
- Create Psychological Safety and promote open communication between colleagues and managers so that employees feel safe to discuss stress, ways of working and workload.
- Signpost all available employee resources and benefits to employees so they can access them easily and in confidence e.g. workplace accommodations, support groups, information about managing stress and counselling.
- Offer peer support, mentoring, or coaching because social support helps buffer stress.
- Create a culture that normalises talking about mental health and stress, reducing stigma so that early signs of burnout are noticed and addressed.
By combining individual mindfulness practices with supportive organisational policies, employees are more likely to preserve their psychological and emotional wellbeing, and organisations benefit from a more engaged, stable, and productive workforce.