Burnout is a state of mental and physical exhaustion that can considerably affect the enjoyment of your career. As a result of burnout, people often experience a negative flow on effect to their personal lives too.
Burnout often occurs from continual exposure to stressful situations, like managing hundreds of thousands of dollars for multiple clients at a time. Or the pressure to be organised for numerous looming settlement dates.
Unfortunately, for conveyancers, many day-to-day stressful situations are an occupational hazard.
Therefore, it becomes harder and harder for colleagues to spot, prevent or help one another with burnout. Fortunately, this blog outlines what the signs of burnout are, and how to prevent and overcome them.
What are the Signs of Burnout?
Whether you look for these signs of burnout in yourself or your colleagues, being able to identify them early in the year will help you stay more efficient and productive throughout the year.
There is multiple signs of burnout which include:
- Exhaustion. Feeling physically and emotionally depleted.
- Isolation. People with burnout tend to feel overwhelmed. As a result, they may stop socialising and confiding in friends, family members, and co-workers.
- Escape fantasies. Dissatisfied with the never-ending demands of their jobs, people with burnout may fantasise about running away or going on a solo-vacation.
- Irritability. Burnout can cause people to lose their cool with friends, co-workers, and family members more easily.
- Frequent illnesses. Burnout, like other long-term stress, can lower your immune system, making you more susceptible to colds, the flu, and insomnia. Burnout can also lead to mental health concerns like depression and anxiety.
How to avoid Burnout
When you start to see or feel the signs of burnout there are many simply techniques you can use to overcome it.
Short-term solutions like a small holiday is often jumped at as the first remedy, however, to avoid burnout long-term the following six strategies can be used:
1. Work With Purpose
Does your career as a conveyancer have a deeper purpose, other than just earning money? Most of the time, rediscovering your purpose can go a long way towards helping you avoid burnout, fortunately, when working in the real estate industry, you’re likely making someone’s dream a reality often.
A few simple questions to ask yourself to re-align your purpose could be: what is the deeper impact of what I do every day; how does my work make life better for other people? How could I add more meaning to what I do every day?
2. Perform a Job Analysis
Analysing your own job and what is and isn’t expected of you can go a long way to helping you become more efficient and help you avoid burnout from doing other people’s job.
Especially in the conveyancing workflow where so many tasks are required, this tool will help you identify what’s truly important in your role, so that you can cut out or delegate tasks that aren’t as essential.
If you’re assigning or being assigned more work than you can handle, or isn’t aligned to your job description, request a private meeting to discuss.
3. “Give” to Others
One quick and easy way to add meaning to your career is to give to others, or to help them in small ways.
When possible, take on additional tasks and help smaller teams within your conveyancing business. Helping your colleagues with their projects can help improve your fulfilment with your role and avoid burnout from a lack of enjoyment.
4. Take Control
You can avoid or overcome burnout by finding ways to create more autonomy in your role. Being micro-managed can not only make you feel cramped and over-worked but it is also less enjoyable working conditions and can speed up the process. Asking or providing more control over tasks, projects, or deadlines for yourself or your colleagues will go a long way to helping avoid burnout.
You’ll also feel more in control of your work if you manage your time, prioritise certain jobs, use a to-do list or action item program. Ensure all your work stays on task to your daily, weekly, or monthly goals.
5. Exercise Regularly
Regular exercise is so important for many reasons, especially for those in a stressful and booming conveyancing industry. Most importantly, it can help you escape from your desk and avoid building up stress, which ultimately leads to burnout.
You will also experience increased energy and productivity when you exercise regularly. You might also be more motivated to exercise by teaming up with colleagues, or by setting up an office fitness challenge.
6. Learn to Manage Stress
When not managed well, short-term stress can contribute to burnout. And if unchecked, will continue to lead to burnout throughout the year. Therefore, learning to manage stress is of paramount importance for avoiding burnout.
There are several strategies that you can use to cope with stress, some of which include: taking care of your body, making time to unwind, talking to friends, family and colleagues, etc.
With the real estate industry continuing to boom, conveyancers throughout Australia will continue to experience a high workload. Therefore, it is essential to consider utilising the most efficient workflow possibly for your conveyance.
Utilising the all-in-one conveyancing software and integrated search platform, triConvey and our talented and dedicated account management team can help you overcome burnout and keep your performing at your best. Book a demonstration now to find out more.
