Melissa Doman

Oh, gosh.

Even if people are burned out and functioning, a lot of people don't do a great job of hiding it.

It tends to come out...

When they don't want it to, in ways they don't want it to, towards people they don't want it to.

And especially if they have folks that are very empathic or who may identify as an HSP, a highly sensitive person, you know, or someone who's just generally observant, you know, people will notice.

And so it really creates a culture of, I would call, destructive resilience.

where there is an expectation that no matter how stressed you are, you keep going and you don't say anything.

So there are many cultures where, and that can even be accidental, where they don't mean to create those cultures where they're pushing forward, they're pushing forward.

They don't want to create a sense of negativity about how stressed they may be.

But in that silence, they send the wrong message.

where the expectation is that you work and work and work and have a can-do attitude and a nice smile.

Because if you don't, then you're creating obstacles or you're being negative or you're changing the culture.

You know, there's a lot of

accidental workplace practices and norms that develop and kind of get away from the company.

It's kind of like a thought infection that spreads and no one knows how to treat it.

But people don't do a great job of hiding their burnout, at least not indefinitely.

Oh, yes.

And that's why I think that talking about, you know, and again, there is a difference between talking about an emotion and talking about struggle versus staying in it perpetually.

There is a difference.

So if a leader is is letting people know that.