Cover photo: Pavlo Gonchar/SOPA Images/LightRocket/Getty
The past year and a half has been a challenge for everyone, with some people feeling more strained at their workplace than others. Whitney Wolfe Herd— founder and CEO of the dating app Bumble — granted a paid week off at the end of June to all 700 employees to help prevent burnout.
The week-long break was announced to the staff in April, following steadily increasing user numbers and a debut on the stock market. In the first few months of 2021, both Badoo and parent company Bumble experienced a 30% increase in paid subscriptions compared to last year. There’s no doubt that being stuck at home during quarantine had an effect on encouraging people to use dating apps.
In response to Bumble’s decision to give their staff a week of paid leave, Tariq Shaukat — the president of Bumble — said, “our teams were expressing Zoom fatigue, as well as actual burnout.”
Before this decision, the company already had a few measures to help prevent burnout, including something they call “Focus Fridays.” That is one Friday per month with no meetings, emails, or Slack messages to allow staff to have more time to themselves to focus on their work without distractions.
As it turns out, the paid week off for Bumble employees was a raving success. After receiving feedback from the staff, Bumble announced in their meeting on July 29 that they will offer two weeks of extra paid time off and unlimited vacation in 2022.
Bumble Founder and CEO Whitney Wolfe Herd. Getty/Vivien Killilea
The term “burnout” has been around for a while, but it has recently gained more momentum in the past few years and especially since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. The World Health Organization has even classified it as an occupational phenomenon and provided its own definition. According to WHO, “burnout” is defined as “a syndrome conceptualized as resulting from chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully managed.”.
WHO also provides three main symptoms of burnout:
• Feelings of energy depletion or exhaustion
• Increased mental distance from one’s job or negative emotions towards the job
• Reduced efficiency at work
Employee burnout has become a serious concern, and more research is coming out about burnout’s impact on an individual’s health.
According to recent statistics:
• 75% of workers reported that they experienced burnout, with 40% stating that they specifically experienced it during the pandemic.
• Burnt out employees are also much more likely to take sick days and more than twice as likely to search for a different job.
• More than 35% of employees reported that their organization isn’t doing anything to help combat burnout.
Another staggering statistic is that approximately 625 million people around the world suffer from depression and anxiety. All of those individuals may not be experiencing burnout, but burnout can be one main reason for deteriorating mental and physical health.
With these few statistics, it’s clear that it should become a priority as we advance to encourage breaks, general wellness, and open conversations with all employees to prevent burnout and create a healthier, happier work environment.
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