January!
The festive period and all it’s highlights, and usually a fair sprinkling of low points, is behind us.
And yes, whilst it can be stressful – what with all the decorating of your house, sending Christmas cards, organising presents and arranging to meet everyone without upsetting anyone – it’s usually not a boring or uneventful time of the year.
Fast forward a couple of weeks and January can feel like one big monotonous slug. Especially when Corona restrictions in the Netherlands keeps most of us working from home.
We struggle to get ourselves back into work mode. We check our emails half heartedly and sit disengaged in front of our computers.
Will 2022 bring the same old stuff as 2021?
Does this sound like you?
Then you might be suffering from boreout.
Ruth Stock-Homburg defines boreout as a negative psychological state with low work-related arousal.
Boreout has been studied in terms of its key dimensions and in their practitioners book, Werder and Rothlin suggest the following elements: boredom, lack of challenge, and lack of interest.
HR Zone shares that ”workers affected by boreout will typically work-avoidance strategies designed to make them seem busy and therefore ‘in demand’ within the organisation, so that management do not give them any extra work. Employees may stretch their work so that small tasks take much longer than necessary, or adopt pseudo-commitment strategies arriving early and leaving late to give the impression of commitment.”
Seemingly busy and in demand
Yet disengaged and demotivated.
We spend so much time at work in our lives any day we feel like that is a day too much and yet if you recognize the feeling you’re not alone. The boreout theory suggests ”boredom, a lack of meaningful tasks and subsequent lack of mental stimulation is a common problem affecting modern workers, particularly those in office environments where repetitive tasks may be regular occurrences”.
Boreout – usually a slow decline for professional women
When working with women in our coaching and training programmes we keep hearing a similar story. Of course none of us start out bored. We all chose organisations and roles we believe will be engaging and fulfilling.
The problem is that many of us, in the absence of a clear understanding of our talent, our intrinsic motivation and how to create a foundation and environment that allows us to flourish, end up lacking energy, motivation and the fulfilment from making a meaningful contribution at work in the long run.
Don’t suffer any longer
Book your Strategic Career Evaluation Call with us now and turn 2022 into the year you own who you’re meant to be!
With you all the way,
Manuela Damant
Visionary Collective Leader at Azkua
At Azkua we are on a mission to turn businesses and organisations into a force for good. And we believe that it is professional women who will be at the forefront of this transformation. Purpose driven, caring, grounded and influential women like YOU!