Lack of Organizational Respect Fuels Employee Burnout

MASTERING MANAGEMENTLack of Organizational Respect 
Fuels Employee Burnout PHILADELPHIA (Nov. 26, 2006) - Lakshmi Ramarajan, a doctoral student at the Wharton School of Business, has co-authored a research paper with Dr. Sigal Barsade titled, "What Makes the Job Tough? The Influence of Organizational Respect on Burnout in Human Services."  "Can the values of the company - including whether you treat employees with respect or with disrespect - influence how people do their work and whether or not they will feel burned out?" the authors ask. Ramarajan says that high employee turnover rates are more often a result of disrespect from management than any other factor. As she puts it, "It is often not the job that burns you out, but the organization." Respect is more than a word "One of the biggest complaints employees have is they are not sufficiently recognized by their organizations for the work that they do," Barsade says. "Respect is a component of recognition. When employees don't feel that the organization respects and values them, they tend to experience higher levels of burnout." Respect is 
a way in which employees get entrenched into the workplace and feel that what they do is meaningful.

"Employees can be passionate about their jobs, but feel disrespected by their organization's managers," says Ramarajan, such as when employees are belittled and patronized, or often publicly chastised for challenging the status quo. 

The researchers note that organizations and managers often conceptualize job demands or inadequacies in individual workers as the primary causes of burnout, rather than looking at the organization as the culprit. Complaints about the negative work environment are then often met with inertia or rejected out of hand. Within this environment, though, eventually employees will just leave.

Is culture the culprit? A company's culture - which, for the purposes of the study, is defined as "the unwritten norms and values surrounding how employees are valued as individuals" - plays an important role in employee burnout, the researchers say.  "We know that employees start identifying with an organization as soon as they join it," says Ramarajan. "The more they feel respected as a member of the group, the more likely they are to have that sense of identification. Respect is a way in which employees get entrenched into the workplace and feel that what they do is meaningful."  "Individuals who feel respected by their organizations are more likely to expend effort on behalf of the organization, and are thus less likely to experience burnout," add the researchers.The extent to which others, not just the self, are treated can influence an individual's own perceptions of respect.

Ramarajan and Barsade say that the respect with which an organization treats its employees "is a pervasive organizational-level phenomenon that employees can recognize and agree upon." In addition, respect can be a powerful signal to individuals regarding their standing not only as employees, but as people. As information comes from a variety of sources, one's perceptions of respect and disrespect are not only based on how one views his or her own treatment, but also by how others are treated, the researchers say.

"For example, when team members see someone else on the team being treated unfairly, they alter their own perceptions of the fairness of the team. Likewise, the extent to which others, not just the self, are treated can influence an individual's own perceptions of respect."

The authors add that identifying one early aspect of burnout is especially crucial: the phenomenon of service workers mentally "turning over" and withdrawing, but remaining physically present on the job. 

"In our study, we found that being a longer-tenured employee was significantly correlated with higher burnout," they note. From a managerial perspective, "withdrawal" behaviors are perhaps more important than turnover. They argue that employees who have withdrawn, if interacting with the public, can impact organizations in negative ways long before the business picks up on the problem.

Walking the talk It is not just the demands of the job or the personality of the employee that drive burnout in human services jobs, but also the organizational environment. "Then there is a point of entry for human resource management," say the researchers. "Good versus poor management, in the form of organizational respect, may therefore have a clear and critical role in stemming burnout in human service organizations." For example, Barsade suggests that human resources departments make it clear they respect and value the work employees do, as well as recognize the difficulty of that work: "Employees understand that internally, their work is very significant to how well the organization achieves its goals."  Companies, such as Mary Kay Inc., are based on the idea of rewarding people to success, Ramarajan says. "Mary Kay rewards for everything. It uses respect as a powerful motivator for its sales force of independent contractors."  Employers also can highlight to their employees how important their work is to society as a whole, Barsade adds. In addition, managers can at least compliment employees, hold awards dinners and other morale boosters, just so long as these shows of respect are sincere. This doesn't mean, of course, that managers can't look at employees' performance or can't disagree with suggestions and demands that employees might put forward. "It just means that everything is done with an attitude of respect," says Ramarajan. "This approach won't just make employees feel better. It will help them stay with the organization and do a better job. So it's not just about keeping your employees happy, but actually doing the job the organization exists to do."(Source: Knowledge at Wharton)