You have a retention problem. That may be the first sign that your employees are overworked. Overworking is a common complaint and it leads to burnout in workers—and since COVID, we’ve seen a lot of this. If you are an employer worried that you’re working your employees too are, you might be. But here are some signs that it’s time to make some changes—fast.
#1 Production is Dropping
Overworked, burnt-out employees may be busy, but they’re spinning their wheels from a production standpoint. That’s because chronically tired employees simply aren’t as engaged or as productive as those that are fresh. If you’re noticing production numbers declining, you may have an overworked team.
#2 People are Calling Off
Increasing employee absenteeism is a big sign that something is wrong. Many times, it has nothing to do with illness. Stress can make your employees sick. Other workers may try to find time to rest in the only way available to them—calling off.
#3 Employees are More Emotional
When there is nothing left in your gas tank, it’s harder to control your anger, frustration, or even giddiness. You may see increasing conflict on teams as emotions rise to the forefront and break apart the cohesion that used to bind people together.
#4 Customers are Complaining
Not only do you hear employees complaining that they need a vacation or that they live at work, your customers have gotten into the act. If you’ve started hearing from your customers that they were treated impolitely by your staff the issue may be that you are burning employees out and their frustration is showing. This in the long run could lose you customers. It’s easier just to blame the employee for not handling the customer well. The reality though is that there’s a bigger picture related to overworking your teams that you really should consider.
#5 People are Quitting
Retention is a larger than normal issue for employers right now. We’re in the midst of the Great Resignation, where workers are generally fed up with their current positions and searching for greener pastures. If you start losing workers, ask yourself why. It may be pay but it may also be the heavy volume of work that your employees are constantly saddled with that they’re running from.
How To Turn Things Around
You can turn things around. If you don’t offer your employees time off, now it the time to consider it. If you already offer vacations time, start by analyzing how much vacation time is actually being used. Americans routinely leave 768 million days of paid vacation unused each year and 55% of us say that we are doing this routinely. Sometimes your employees are afraid to take vacation because of the impact on their peers and the reality that if they aren’t there, the work will pile up. You can fix this by working with Stellar Staffing to bring in fresh employees to give your struggling teams a break. Call on us to help take better care of your most valuable resources—your human resources.
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