Study in Social and Health Care in Corona Times: How leadership influences the risk of burnout

A meaningful work that connects you with people and helps others – This is the most important reason why many people choose a career in the health and social care system, a vital element of solidarity in our modern society.

The Corona pandemic has now created a new visibility for these professions. Caregivers are more strongly valued as being important to the social system. At the beginning of the pandemic, people in many European countries expressed their gratitude to those who continued to provide important care, including, of course, medical, nursing, and social care professionals. The nice gestures such as regular applause from balconies and individual expressions of gratitude appeared, however,  for many social and health care workers as almost cynical. For too long, they have been deprived of adequate social and especially material compensation.

Burnout and stress – an interaction between personality and underlying conditions

The professionals of health and social services have an above-average level of psychological stress in their everyday life. The burnout syndrome can be seen as the final stage within the stress process and, with its massively debilitating symptoms, can lead to people becoming completely unable to work. The employees in the helping professions have a significantly higher risk of burnout. Furthermore, they also have an increased risk of generally developing mental illnesses. These caregiving professions have more depressive symptoms as indicated by higher prescription rates of antidepressants and also a trend to higher levels of substance abuse.

Psychological research reveals that certain personality traits put some people at a higher risk of burnout than others. Nevertheless, these studies fail to consider external factors, such as the workplace. Scientific research also shows that work-oriented prevention measures have a more stable and long-term positive impact on the mental health of employees than simply a person-oriented approach. Organizational culture therefore plays an important role in preventing burnout! Numerous studies have also shown that leadership style has an important impact on organizational culture.

Burnout – not an illness but a challenge for everyone

Nevertheless, the World Health Organization notes burnout’s increasingly important socio-political relevance and lists it as among the "factors that influence one' s health and lead to use of the health care system". For example, the German Federal Association of Company Health Insurance Funds reports that  disability related to burnout increased 18-fold in the years between 2004 and 2012.

Positive Leadership instead of sleeping pills!

In our study conducted at the beginning of the Corona pandemic, we considered the connection between Positive Leadership and the burnout symptoms of employees in the social and health care sector. In previous research, we could determine that the health and social sector clearly has below-average levels of Positive Leadership – which was (unfortunately) confirmed again by our current study. Almost 200 people from the health and social care sector took part in our survey that asked employees for a detailed description of their leader’s specific behavior and collected other relevant data to diagnose the extent of individual burnout risk.

We dived even “deeper" within the study. Since sleep quality serves as a relevant factor in maintaining health, we were also interested to what extent the leadership style relates to the perceived sleep quality. These are the results:

Being able to perceive positive emotions – an important component of health

Most of us know that in stressful times, we are less able to create space for positive emotions. Nevertheless, positive psychology shows how important these emotions are! Not only do they have psychological effects such as a generally increased sense of well-being or a better ability to concentrate, but they also have a demonstrable effect on other measurable factors such as our immune system. Stress is part of life, and so is the fact that we cannot always have positive emotions. However, stress becomes a problem when even accomplishments can no longer trigger positive emotions. The Australian researcher Peggy Kern conducted a study indicating that among the most effective factors to prevent burnout is to positively notice the achievement of goals ("Accomplishment" – the letter A in the PERMA model). Also, consciously acknowledging our successes makes it clear that we can positively affect our own lives. A burnout mindset loses this ability. People with burnout tend to feel like a powerless scrap of wood aimlessly floating down a river.

In our study, we therefore also analyzed the extent to which the Positive Leadership style influences how people feel about their achievements at work. The results speak for themselves:

What to do?

The detailed analysis of the study shows that the two areas "Relationships" and " Engagement" have a key function in leadership. This study clearly indicated that employees have very high expectations for the PERMA Lead factor "Relationships". More specifically, a leader should actively work to ensure that people within a team support each other, both by serving as an example and expecting team solidarity. Leaders have the mandate to establish  appreciative, trusting, and supportive interaction within the team. The appropriate measures can vary greatly from team to team and should ideally be discussed together with the team. For example, it can be beneficial to spend time together away from everyday work life and use team-building activities to strengthen the bonds between workers. Joint supervision within the team also helps create a sense of "us". Various studies empirically prove that team supervision and external training opportunities have a significant effect on preventing burnout among hospital employees.

Another factor that proved to be particularly relevant in the study was "Engagement". This means that leaders allow individuals to develop, recognize their strengths, and support them in a goal-oriented manner. The study shows that leaders generally pay less attention to this behavior, while employees have exceptionally high expectations for this type of leadership.

Engagement is the PERMA lead factor that is significantly negatively related to burnout – as our results show. This means that the factor with the lowest average score seemed to have the greatest predictive power – an inauspicious situation.

Effective leadership therefore means focusing intensively on the employees' strengths and, as far as possible, assigning tasks that correspond to their profile of personal strengths. Particularly in a work environment in which patients or clients always come first, employees should also feel  that their managers notice them. The study’s data suggest that the more strongly an organization engages with the staff, the less frequently burnout symptoms appear among employees. Managers that consciously and regularly focus on employees' strengths also have the positive effect of improving the employees’ general competences.

The next study after this study...

The results clearly show that PERMA-Lead as a Positive Leadership style also brings significant value to the system-relevant health and social care sector. And this added value will benefit not only the employees but also the organization.

But what about the patients? Our findings have caused us to be curious – and so we will soon be launching the next study to find out what influence the positive leadership style has on the well-being of the clients of caregivers. And we' re already looking forward to share the results with you in a future blog!