Society has set us up for failure. With the glorification of busyness and the pressure to check things off the list, we don’t have time to do the most important work: the strategy and innovation organizations need to be successful.
But there’s a small shift starting to happen, one that allows for slowing down to speed up. Because individuals and organizations are starting to see that busy mode isn’t sustainable. It’s a recipe for burnout and resignations.
We feel the need to constantly be busy because we feel like we don’t deserve the success that we have or strive for. But we do, and this week’s guest is here to tell us why.
Listen in to Jess share how to start getting past imposter syndrome and what organizations can do to support team members at all levels. (Spoiler alert: having conversations is top on that list.)
It’s time we stop glorifying working through lunch, taking work home, and skipping vacations and start balancing life with some work…not the other way around.
Listen on your favourite podcast player
About Jess Stuart:
Jess Stuart, International speaker, coach and author of five personal development books specializing in mindset, performance and women in leadership. A well known Imposter Syndrome expert with a background in Senior Human Resources roles and a decade working in leadership development.
A brush with burnout in her corporate career lead Jess across the world to train with Buddhist monks and Nuns. A decade later, after coming out, writing five books and running her own successful business she shares what she knows about mind-set, resilience and self-belief to empower people to unlock their potential.
Highly acclaimed event speaker featured on TV3, BBC, RNZ, Dominion Post, Stuff and NZ Business Magazine. Described as inspiring, articulate and relatable by audiences. Jess has a passion for sharing her knowledge and motivating others with her words. Follow her on Instagram, connect with her on LinkedIn, and subscribe to her YouTube channel.
Mentioned In This Episode:
- What is imposter syndrome and how can you combat it? – TED-Ed
- Jess’s Website
- Burnout to Brilliance by Jess Stuart
- Join the monthly digital subscription
Transcription:
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
burnout, people, impostor syndrome, strengths, organizations, leaders, jess, brilliance, busy, mental health, feel, busyness, skills, minutes, workplace, normalize, brain, negativity bias, conversations, support
SPEAKERS
Jess Stuart, Lindsay Recknell
Welcome to season four of mental health in minutes. The podcast where we normalize mental health conversations at work, and share the strategies and tactics that make those conversations ones you actually want to have. I’m your host, Lindsay Recknell, the psychological health and safety advisor, a workplace mental health consultant, a speaker, facilitator and an expert in home. If you’re listening to this episode, you know, our people need us more than ever, and I know you want to support them, but maybe you don’t know the words to use to engage them in conversation, or how to respond when they do open up. That’s what this podcast is all about. My guests will share tactical, practical and simple ways to connect with your people. Let them know you care about them and are there to support them and believe in them enough to continue investing in their career and personal development. Each episode we’ll also discuss the future of mental health in the workplace, and the top ways we can engage our leadership in the workplace mental health conversation, and have them endorse and pay for a positive culture shift within our organization. It’s hard to put into words what the first three seasons have meant to me as a workplace mental health professional. I’m honored to learn from my guests and walk alongside them as they solve some of the biggest issues faced in their organizations today. One of these issues, dare I say the biggest issue I hear from leaders right now is that they and their people are suffering from burnout is syndrome resulting from chronic workplace stress. Burnout is very personal to me. The first time I experienced burnout was November of 2017. And this experience started me on the path to learning everything I could about burnout and what I could do to prevent, especially at work, be assured you can stop the slide. Burnout is not forever, and you do have the power to come back from the edge of burnout, you and your people. I’ve included a few simple strategies and tactics in my free training try out a package of materials you can download for free right now from my website at mental health in minutes.com. Forward slash tryout. without too much effort on your part, you can get started engaging with your team and teaching them to stop the slide into burnout for themselves. Included in this training tryout, you’ll find two different lengths of presentations, a 15 minute and a five minute version, as well as the speaker’s notes for each along with a quick training video and a checklist to help you get started. Easy peasy. Just go https://www.languageofmentalhealth.com/tryout and download your free copy now. I’ll also link to the download in the show notes of this episode. Let me know how it goes. You know when you come across those people that you just seem to have an instant connection with this week’s guest was one of those people for me and I’m really excited to introduce you to her. Jess Stuart is an international speaker, coach and author of five personal development books specializing in mindset, performance and women in leadership. And well known expert in impostor syndrome. Jess also has a background in senior human resources, and a decade working in leadership development. A brush with burnout in her corporate career led Jess across the world to train with Buddhist monks and nuns. A decade later, after coming out, writing five books and running her own successful businesses. She shares what she knows about mindset, resilience and self belief to empower people to unlock their potential. Just as a highly acclaimed event speaker featured on TV three, BBC, our NZ Dominion Post stuff, and New Zealand business magazine described as inspiring, articulate and relatable by audiences. Jess has a passion for sharing her knowledge and motivating others with her words. I feel super lucky to have Jess here on the show. So let’s get to it. Hello, Jess. Welcome to the show.
Jess Stuart 03:26
Thanks, Lindsay. Nice to be here.
Lindsay Recknell 03:28
I am so happy to have you here. I hear you have a new book out why don’t you share with us a little bit about the work that you’re doing, who you are and who you do it for?
Jess Stuart 03:38
Yeah, the new book is my fifth Burnout to Brilliance. And I kind of feel like it’s landed just at the right time. And so my background, I had a career in HR. So I worked in senior HR roles across the UK, across Australia and New Zealand, which is where I am now. And it was probably about eight years ago now I stepped away from my HR career to start writing books and coaching. And just I guess, taking the bits that I really loved about HR and creating them into a lifestyle as well that would work for me. So running my own business and making a direct impact. Particularly with my with my clients and writing books has always been a thing that I guess I did it for me initially. But it’s also been a great way of sharing the message and reaching more people. And so yeah, Ben actually brilliance is number five. And I’ve learned a hell of a lot along the way.
Lindsay Recknell 04:25
I bet you have. And so I’m going to ask the obvious question. Tell us. So what is burnout? And how do you get from burnout to brilliance?
Jess Stuart 04:38
Yeah, that’s a great question. And the reason I wrote the book really, because my experience working in HR, I’m gonna guess it HR, we’re very privileged in that you have, you’re a member of the leadership team, but you’re also the confident of the leadership teams. And so you get to see a lot of what happens behind the scenes and in people’s heads that they may not share with others. And the conclusion that I drew after My decade in HR, and then decade of coaching was that the pursuit of brilliance is often what leads us to burnout that we have, particularly in our modern world, this more better, perfect, this assumption that will, we think will lead to high performance that, in fact, is making us more burned out than we’ve ever been. So I wanted to write the book to really flip the narrative on that, and to redefine high performance and really dig into what does brilliance mean. And of course, this is brilliant, both in our working life and then when we get home and be with their families, you know, still being able to be our best at work, but still have the energy to do life when we get home as well.
Lindsay Recknell 05:44
Because that is the brilliant part of feeling healthy at work is that we can we can enhance our lives as well. And I’ve been using the language lately instead of work life integration, life work integration, because it feels like life needs to come first. And what you’re talking about, if we can feel good at both work and life, then we can be brilliant. Definitely, like why? How did we get to this place where we were forever striving for more where we were, you know, perfectionism was a thing where, you know, imposter syndrome. And I want to talk about that a little bit. But how did we get to this hustle culture?
Jess Stuart 06:28
Yeah, I think you touched on it beautifully, then the work life balance thing. I think we’ve been sold a myth that life starts when work stops. And of course, it’s all the same thing. Work is part of life. So work life balance should not be a separate thing. It’s all life balance, and work sits within that. But I think what’s really exacerbated This is our attachment to busyness, busyness, for many years now, particularly in our corporate environments has been glorified as almost like this badge of honor that we wear that says, I’m needed, I’m valuable, I’m productive. And we see it as a pathway to success. So often, the busier I am, the more I will produce. And of course, the reality is, the busier we are the closer to burnout we’re likely to be. And if we’re close to burnout, we’re not at our best we’re not effective. So for me, it’s how we redefine is the difference between busyness and effectiveness. And for so long, we’ve assumed that they mean the same thing. And I think part of what I wanted to do with burnout to brilliants is really unpack our attachment to busy, because let’s be fair, a lot of us do get our self worth from being busy, because it means we’re needed and valued. And I think for me, when I recall my own burnout, I was also busy throwing myself into my work because I had a lot of problems in my life I wanted to avoid. So this procrastination piece, and you touched on impostor syndrome. And I think there’s another underlying reason that so many of us are busy, is that we feel we need to prove ourselves. We that for so many of us were busy trying to over deliver, because we don’t feel we have earned our place yet. And of course that feeds into the reasons and the behaviors that drive this busyness
Lindsay Recknell 08:10
often is so powerful, it gives me chills even think about those concepts, because we don’t think about it often enough. And when you’re so busyness traditionally we have associated busyness with execution of tasks, right, doing checking, checking lists, and doing things, activities, tasks, and even now, and I’m trying to be more intentional about it, but I often think I am busy when I’m doing but our value, especially in knowledge work, our value also comes from thinking and having conversations and lessons learned and reflection. Why is it that that doesn’t count at work, if people see us sitting at our desk doodling when we’re deep in thought and conceptualizing big ideas, which is clearly very valuable. Why does that not count?
Jess Stuart 09:09
Yeah, yeah. And that’s the danger, right? That’s the danger of being so attached to busy and doing and seeing that as a marker of our success, particularly for leaders. Because such a massive part of our role is creating the space to think is to be able to plan ahead is to have that strategic space in our brain, but also the space for innovation and creativity. And a busy brain simply cannot find the space to innovate, to create, to think strategically. And I like to take myself off for a day during the week to either go kayaking, or I love the sauna, especially in winter because it’s a dark, warm, quiet place. And ironically, although it looks like I’m doing nothing, I have my best ideas when I’m doing that stuff. And in terms of my week, it’s probably the most important productive time because of what comes out of that. And yet anybody looking from the outside would say, well, it looks to me like you’re having a day off, and you’re not actually doing anything productive at all. And I think as leaders, when we pressure ourselves to just be doing all the time, we miss that opportunity to create the conditions for us to have our best ideas. And of course, that’s the massive part of our role to create this strategic thinking space and to be able to innovate.
Lindsay Recknell 10:20
And how do we model that behavior out loud for our colleagues, for our team members? Because I would, so having those big ideas for leaders is super important, strategically, tactically. But I think it’s also really important for the folks on the frontline of the people doing the work every day, the hands on keyboard, the, you know, hands on machinery, that kind of thing. How do we also encourage them and reduce the stigma around big idea generation from activities where you just get to be?
Jess Stuart 10:57
Yeah, and this is the tough one, right? Because it’s a cultural shift. And it’s a cultural shift that we’ve spent decades, forming in the other direction by glorifying busy and attaching to this doing mentality. And you’re right, as leaders, we have to role model this. But it can be really difficult in a world where doing and busy is the way to be to actually say, well, we need to do things differently. And this is why and to role model that. And it’s about creating space, and you’re right, it applies to everybody. And for me, I often talk about the concept of slowing down to speed up. And when it’s done in a productivity terms, as opposed to take time out your brain will be better for it. Because that doesn’t really fit with our busy corporate lives. When we look at how do we be our best and improve our effectiveness, it kind of sits a lot more easily. So this concept of slowing down to speed up is when we take time out. And we slow down, we have some thinking space, we take our lunch breaks, we go on vacation, we take a walk around the block between meetings, what we find is when we come back to our work, we’re way more effective, our brains are functioning better. So we make less mistakes, we solve problems quicker, we make decisions with more ease, our relationships are better because we can respond rather than react. And all of those things mean that when we come back to our to do list what’s on it doesn’t take as long because we’ve slowed down in order to speed up. And I think initially that sounds counterintuitive. But I love this analogy that over here in New Zealand, obviously we’re obsessed by the All Blacks by rugby, and the mental skills coach for the All Blacks Gilbert and Oka he’s called, he has this beautiful analogy about waves. So for anyone that serves or spends any time by the ocean, we know that waves come in sets. And when you’re on the peak of the wave, that’s when you should be performing at your best. But you can’t be on the peak of the wave all the time. And I’m a surfer here in New Zealand, and it’s exhausting. If you’re constantly catching waves, you need those troughs in between to gather your energy. And of course, for the All Blacks from competitive sporting analogy, it’s about rest days, after we’ve had game day and we’ve performed we need a rest day we cannot be at the peak of the wave all the time. And that’s this concept of slowing down to speed up it’s making the most of the troughs and the still water between the waves so that when the wave comes, we can hit our peak, we can work hard we can do what’s needed.
Lindsay Recknell 13:21
Also the All Blacks have a mental skills coach, that’s amazing. Like why don’t we have mental skills coaches in corporate?
Jess Stuart 13:31
Oh, there we go. There’s a neat, I think you’re so right. It’s just as important as our physical game, particularly in the sporting world.
Lindsay Recknell 13:38
Yes, it’s like it is I mean, talent will only get you so far. I’m training to run a marathon and I think my fitness level is there. But the mental block that is going to get me to run five and a half hours is the only thing that matters at this point. And I think we underestimate that. And is it because of the stigma around it? I mean, a mental skills coach in athletics feels, if not normal, definitely accepted. Right? It’s been around for much, much longer. We there’s so much evidence to support its value. We are emotionally tied to our athletes. Like why can’t we get more of this in our workplace? Is it just having more conversations like you and I are having, you know, how, how can we do this?
Jess Stuart 14:32
Yeah, I think the work that you’re doing and others, like you really helped shine a light in this space. And we’re starting to see a shift now. But I think for too long, our mental health or mental skills at work has kind of become the ambulance at the bottom of the cliff. It’s the thing you pay attention to when you’re burned out, for example, as opposed to beforehand before you burn out. And so for me, I think a lot of this also links into resilience that we talk a lot about In the workplace, and it’s all very well, as you mentioned, you know, you can have the talent, you can have the fitness, you can have the skills to do your job, or to run a marathon. But if you’ve not got the energy to deliver on those skills, then you’re never going to hit the heights that you’re capable of. And I think that’s so true, where peak performance is concerned, we’re capable of brilliants. But a lot of us don’t have the energy to deliver on it, particularly not in this current climate post pandemic. And it’s interesting, because I used a light bulb on the front of the book to illustrate that exact point. brilliance is like when we shine. And yet we know when we leave a light bulb on too long, it runs out, it burns out. And so there’s this innate kind of power of energy that has to come from somewhere to help us burn bright.
Lindsay Recknell 15:48
love that analogy of the light bulb, it makes me think about like, just the logic of you turn off the light. So the light bulb lasts longer. When do we have it on all the time? It’s got a, it’s got a much shorter working life. And why isn’t that the same of of how we respond as humans, you need to turn off the lights for a bit so that you can last for much, much longer at your doing the things that you’re meant to do, which in this case is shine light in the hallway, you know, awesome analogy. I love that a lot. Um, let’s go back to imposter syndrome for a minute. So what, what is impostor syndrome? What does it even mean?
Jess Stuart 16:29
So it’s an incredibly common, it’s the domain of high achievers. And according to the International Journal of Behavioral Science, it affects 70% of us. And it’s this inability to internalize our success. So you’ll often find that we are explaining away our achievements, or downplaying our strengths. But it’s also this persistent fear of being exposed as a fraud. And of course, that’s where the imposter term comes from. And so it feels like one of these days, they’re going to find out, I’m not as good as they think, or I shouldn’t have been appointed to this job. I don’t know if I’m ready yet. So it’s this self doubt inner critic, if you like, that clouds our judgment, and gives us a different slant on our capabilities to what is the actual reality?
Lindsay Recknell 17:18
That sounds totally common like that. I can see how it affects 70% of us. I don’t know that there’s anybody listening that hasn’t had that thought of? Did they put me in the wrong place? Am I really as good as they think I am? That yeah, that feels very, very normal to me. Okay, cool. So if we feel like we’re in that place, and it’s normal? How do we, under normalize it? How do we get to a place of brilliance instead of feeling lesser than all the time? And why does that matter?
Jess Stuart 17:56
And it’s interesting, because I think generally put in and this is particularly prevalent in new roles or promotions. And of course, when we stretch ourselves, there is always a learning gap, there’s always this development opportunity. But at the same time, we want to prove our credibility by hitting the ground running. So we can put a lot of pressure on ourselves to know all the answers to hit the ground running, or even when we’re looking at a new job, we can think well, you know, I need to have all of the skills and experience they list on the position description to apply. And of course, if that was the case, we’d be bored within five minutes. So there’s this delicate balance between getting out of our comfort zone and learning and growing, whilst also facing this fear of failure, this comparison to others that are already doing that, and feeling not good enough, and our own self doubt. And so it’s almost a perfect storm when that stuff kind of comes together in our working lives. And to offset it. The the easiest way is to talk about it, because we normalize it like with anything. And then after that, we need to start getting better at celebrating our achievements and leveraging our strengths. I think for many of us, we’ve been conditioned in our cultures, to be quite modest, and humble and not kind of boast about our achievements. And yet, we also have this negativity bias at play in our brain that tends to focus on the things we haven’t done and all the things that have gone wrong. So we have this mindset. Often, that doesn’t see the reality, I call it a clouded lens that we look through. So a lens that’s clouded by ourselves doubt that we’ll see all of the things that other people do better than us. And all of the things we wished we’d have done that we haven’t done yet. And then of course, when we ask ourselves the question, Are you as good as people think? Our brains look for evidence and are like, Well, no, because we’ve clouded we’re clouded by this negativity bias, yet if we celebrate our successes, even just privately by ourselves, if we know our strengths and leverage them, and value them, then of course we’re evening out that bias in the brain and we’re providing a portfolio I do have evidence so that when we ask that question, am I as good as people think we’ve got a more accurate distribution of what are the facts
Lindsay Recknell 20:09
and more conscious awareness of some of those things too, because sometimes I find that I can’t think of things that are good, because I’m totally clouded by all the negative, the input, like the impact of the negativity is much, much stronger than the positive stuff, because they haven’t celebrated it. Then I also suspect that if we asked that question that you said, so am I as good as people think I am? If we ask that question of someone else, like somebody we trust or somebody, you know, that’s a mentor or something, and they I suspect, they would have a much different answer.
Jess Stuart 20:46
Yeah, yeah, we have a lot of blind spots where our own capabilities are concerned a lot of the time because sometimes because of this modesty, we also find that other people’s opinions tend to carry more weight than our own. So when we ask those that know, as well, what do you think my strengths are? It tends to carry more weight than what we think and of course, it’s a really good opportunity to check in is what I think my strengths are, are the same as what others believe? Or are there some blind spots are there some things I’m missing, and it’s an exercise I often get people to do in my workshops be and it’s so impactful, because all of a sudden, they’ve validated their skill set, or they’ve shone a light on a skill set that four other people have told them that they they value in them that they didn’t even realize they had,
Lindsay Recknell 21:30
I was just going to ask you, is there like an activity that you recommend people to do to bring some of this awareness? Because the fear would get in the way? From asking those questions, I would think, yeah, there’s
Jess Stuart 21:43
there’s two, and that’s one of them there. They ask ask you, those who know you well, who you live with work with your friends, what they value, or what are my strengths. And I always say to people that have been on my courses. This is your homework. So you can tell people, it’s not just that you’re seeking compliments. You’re doing homework and your dharma course and you’ve been asked this question, and then it feels a little bit easier to do. And the second thing is to either reflect or journal, depending on what your preference is, every at the end of every week, what are three things that have gone? Well, this week, what are my top three successes of the week, because each time we do that, we’re training the brain to look for the positives. We’re offsetting that negativity bias. And of course, the more often we do that, like training a muscle, the stronger it gets, the easier it becomes. So being able to sit on a Friday afternoon and reflect or journal, your strengths and what’s gone well, this week, I think it’s really valuable to
Lindsay Recknell 22:36
well, and there’s scientific evidence to support the beauty of that process and how it works in the brain as well, like positive psychology and the science of hope, which I talked about a lot is, you know, the evidence is there to support the power of doing that not only from a psychological perspective, but a neurobiological perspective as well. Definitely. One of the things I was thinking about as you’re speaking, the actually two things. So one being, how, like, if you are a leader in an organization, and you’re recognizing maybe the signs of impostor syndrome in a junior colleague, somebody’s not, you know, starting at the beginning of their career, or, you know, not very experienced yet, do you have some advice on how a leader could guide that person, so that maybe they don’t make the same mistakes that that leader might have made?
Jess Stuart 23:29
Yeah, I think one of the first things and I find this really powerful when leaders talk about their own experience in this space, not only does it normalize it, because I think a lot of the fear, and this is why we don’t talk about it much at work. And a lot of the fear, particularly for our junior colleagues is that if I admit to my new boss, that I am not as good as they think, or I shouldn’t be in this role, because I don’t know if I can do it, then that’s pretty career limiting. So we don’t say it until we get given the permission, or it’s normalized. And when particularly when senior leaders share their stories. So when I go into organizations and deliver these workshops, I always get one of the leaders to share their own journey. And it’s so powerful, because everybody in the room is like, oh, but you’re really good at your job. And you’ve experienced these feelings. That means that I now see myself in your shoes, I can progress in my career, even though I’ve got these feelings, or they think, wow, I thought there was something wrong with me. And now it’s normalized, because I know it’s not just me, other people get this. And I think there’s so much power in that. And then of course, once you’ve shared your story, you can share strategies you’ve used or strategies that are out there. There’s a really good Ted animation on impostor syndrome. That explains the research behind it. It’s only four minutes long, and I often say to leaders, that’s a good conversation starter to share that at team meetings and say, Does this resonate with anybody? Here’s my story.
Lindsay Recknell 24:54
No, definitely gonna find that TED Talk and link to it in the show notes of this episode. I feel like that would be super, super valuable. And the conversation starter is super valuable, just to give people a way to open the door to these conversations, because often we just don’t know how to start. So we won’t start at all. And I think that that is super detrimental. And is is so negative to normalizing this kind of this kind of conversation at work. Totally. The other thing I was thinking about when sort of doing that, I don’t know is this drinks inventory? When you’re asking others, what they see as your strengths? A question that came up a few months ago that I’ve thought a lot about along this line is to ask somebody, what they believe my top values are. Because often, I think I have what my values are my strengths are, but maybe my behavior is not showing up in that way. And so it’s interesting to see what other people think my values are, and whether they’re aligned, because all they’re seeing is what I’m saying out loud, and but my behavior and just that awareness piece, I wonder if it like, is that a way to help with impostor syndrome and this kind of self awareness, growth opportunity?
Jess Stuart 26:26
Yeah, definitely, I think asking other people is a great way of being able to compare what we think so either validate that, yes, what we think is correct, or shine some awareness on the corners, maybe that of ourselves that we are not so aware of. And of course, that works both ways. With 360 feedback, we can, we can get caught light shone on all kinds of corners in that respect. But I think it’s a really good exercise of validating some of those strengths, I think, as well, and making sure that we are aware, and seeing how they manifest because I think often with strengths, we feel that, um, this person at work, and I’m this person at home, and my friends see different strengths in me than my work colleagues potentially. And yet, we’re all one person, we are the human that goes to work and the human that comes home from work to be with our family. And whilst our strengths might show up differently, you know, whether you’re organizing your two year olds birthday party or the senior leadership team off site, your organization skills will show through just in different ways, and equally with empathy. Your empathy at work might look different to your empathy with your friends on a Friday night, but it’s the same skill that you’re using. And I think the danger with strengths is because we find them easy, because we’re good at them. We tend to undervalue them or underwrite them. And we think, Well, if it’s so easy, surely everyone can do it. And therefore it’s nothing special. And of course, that exacerbates that impostor syndrome, then because we’ve got, no, we’re comparing to others, and looking at all the things that they can do that we can’t. And yet we’re devaluing our own strengths, thinking, Well, surely everyone does that. So it’s not special. So then we feel like we’ve got this empty vessel where capability is concerned, which, of course, is not the case, it’s just that we are finding this stuff really easy, because we’re good at it. And yet others are over there, looking at us comparing themselves to us in that same space, and feeling like they wish there could be more like as in that,
Lindsay Recknell 28:22
again, with that self awareness piece that Yeah. Until somebody says it out loud. It feels like common sense then, but until somebody says it out loud, it’s not something that maybe we consciously think about all the time. Why does this work? Why does this self awareness training? Why does this education? Why does it matter in the workplace? Like, what good? Is it to the productivity and the bottom line of a company?
Jess Stuart 28:52
Yeah, it’s interesting, because I think over the journey, we have struggled with this stuff, because it’s really difficult to make it tangible in terms of the bottom line, you know, in terms of our return on investment for organizations, anything to do with people. So whether it’s wellness, whether it’s mental skills, whether it’s impostor syndrome, it’s really difficult to put a tangible number on, this is why it’s good for business. And yet, we know that when we invest in our people, when they’re happy, healthy, and at their best, we know that they’re more productive, we know that they’re less likely to leave, we know that there’s less sickness absence. So in terms of the impact for the bottom line, not just do we retain our more talented people, but we get the best out of them as well. And when I say get the best out of them, it’s the best for them as well as the business and I think that’s the sweet spot in this. It’s not how do we ring people dry and get the most hours out of them? Because that will help our bottom line? How do we make them happy and healthy so that they give their best and still have enough left to go home and therefore we get more from them because they stick around longer? And they’re more willing to go the extra mile because we have to Get them well. And so I think as far as personal growth goes and helping our brilliance, we have a duty as organizations to, to really help people burn bright rather than burnout. And that, of course, is with their mental skills is with their growth and development is with their wellness. What’s good for our organization are what’s good for our individuals, is good for our organizations, because our organizations are just collections of individuals. Oh, I love it.
Lindsay Recknell 30:27
I love it. I love that burnout, no to burn bright instead of to burnout. Brilliant, brilliant. Jess this has been such an incredible conversation, I have learned a ton. And I feel like it is just scratching the surface. So when people want to learn more from you and hear more of your big ideas, what’s the best way that they can get a hold of you.
Jess Stuart 30:48
So I’m on LinkedIn and post quite often there with blogs and videos and things that might be useful. And my website is probably the best place to go to learn about the courses and the books. And that’s jessstuart.co.nz it because I’m in New Zealand.
Lindsay Recknell 31:02
Amazing. And we will definitely link to all of those places, as well as your book, in the show notes will your latest book for sure. And I know that we can get your other books everywhere. Thank you again, for being so generous with your time to be here with us. It’s been a real, real pleasure to have you here.
Jess Stuart 31:18
It’s a pleasure. Thanks for having me.
Lindsay Recknell 31:20
Take care, pursuit of brilliance. Isn’t that just the most gorgeous concept to think about? I think that’s the thing that stuck with me the most after chatting with Jess, she left me with such a feeling of hopefulness that burnout doesn’t have to be our forever state. And we get to pursue that which is important to us, where we can truly add value to our lives, our communities and our organizations. Stopping that slide into burnout is a topic near and dear to my heart. As I know you all know about me.
At the beginning of the show, I mentioned the free training, you can try it with your teams all about stopping the slide into burnout, that feeling of overwhelm and endless stress so many of us are experiencing right now. To complement those materials which you can download for free from my website at https://www.languageofmentalhealth.com/tryout. I’ve also created a 60 minute live virtual or in person workshop, titled from burnout to hope, which has been transformational for so many organizations. You and your team will lead this workshop understanding how to identify the signs of burnout in yourselves and others how to put into action the evidence based strategies and tactics to reverse feelings of overwhelm and languishing and activate the hope circuit in your brain for a future even better than today. It’s helpful, practical and transformative, and I’d love to bring it to your organization. On our website you’ll find more information about this workshop as well as the mental health and minutes digital subscription, a done for your package of presentations and other content designed to help you make meaningful connections with your people to increase your knowledge and education about mental health related topics and to normalize these kinds of conversations in your workplace. The thing we do best at mental health in minutes is open the door to conversations about mental health at work. And episodes like this give us real things we can try to truly make a difference. Being a people leader is especially hard right now, you might feel like you’re managing both up and down the corporate ladder. And if the thought of figuring out how to best support your people and yourself feels overwhelming and impossibly hard, let’s talk. We’re here to do the heavy lifting with resources and materials, along with the training and facilitation leaving you to do what you do best engaging with and supporting your people. We have many ways to support you from full service hands on to guidance and support from afar. So let’s chat about what works best for you and your people. As always, I’m here if you need me.
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
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