Burnout

[Kirby]

So I don't know if anybody's noticed, but I've been on the forum slightly less in the past few days. I still probably checked the forum everyday, but I still think the frequency was slightly less...

Anyway, I wanted to see what people thought about a situation I'm having at my job. About 9 months ago, I changed jobs for some personal reasons - I'm a software engineer, by the way. When I started out, for the first couple of months, I think that I was running at 100% effort. I think I surprised some people, and did a very good job at work.

After awhile, the feeling of having a new job wore off a little bit, and I feel like I got a little bit "burnt out". I started getting a little pessimistic about my job, and I think the quality of what I produced at work went down a little bit.

Well, it's been a few more months now, and I want to get back into working in "100% mode". What concerns me is getting burnt out again. Also, during the time I would say that I was "burnt out", I produced some software that I'm not proud of. I mean, it works, but I think I could have done a much better job. I don't like doing that kind of work.

My wife suggested trying to work in "80% mode" so that I would be less likely to get burnt out. But it's hard for me to think this way. I feel like I have an on/off switch. When the switch is on, I run full sprint ahead at trying to get something done. But when the switch is off, I don't perform nearly as well. It's hard for me to keep the switch on all the time, though.

Has anybody had experience with this type of behavior? How can I operate at 100% 100% of the time?

I guess this type of thought could also relate to go, but I put it in the off topic section, because my concern stems from my experiences at work.

[ez4u]

I believe that first of all you need to consider whether 100% really describes your initial period. Starting a new job should be quite exciting (hopefully!). As a result though you may have been operating in '120%' mode without really thinking about it. Coming down off the high of the 'honeymoon period' is not at all unusual. Now that you know the company better, can you imagine a stable state that will carry you through the next say five years doing work that you are proud of yet providing the time necessary to take care of and enjoy you family as well? If the effort necessary to create the work you imagine leaves you without enough time for family (not to mention the riff raff at L19) then perhaps you are indeed stuck in some form of 100+% mode. Balance is everything. Think about it, talk to you wife about it, and if you like, come back anytime for more brainless drivel!

[snorri]

If you can even occassionally do something you are proud of, you're still doing better than 90% of the people in that industry. I have vast periods of my life (years) where I look back and think I didn't accomplish much. But I don't think the problem is not working hard enough. The problem was sticking with dead-end situations with false optimism for too long.

You're not getting manic when you are in this "100% mode" are you?

In the end, you may find it's wiser to listen to you wife. If all works out, she'll be with you longer than any job will.

[Kirby]

...you may have been operating in '120%' mode without really thinking about it. ...

My first thought was, "How is 100% possible, when 100% represents the maximum achievable effort?", but then in response to this thought, I can consider, "120% of what?". Perhaps the basis for which I compute the percentage mode does not need to be "maximum achievable effort", but something more constrained than that.

Thanks for this thought. It gives me something to ponder.

[Kirby]

...

You're not getting manic when you are in this "100% mode" are you?

How can you ascertain this?

...
In the end, you may find it's wiser to listen to you wife. If all works out, she'll be with you longer than any job will.

Yes, I agree.

[crux]

Has anybody had experience with this type of behavior? How can I operate at 100% 100% of the time?

You can't.

What works for me is to put in a lot of effort until I notice I'm fraying around the edges, then take two weeks of vacation to recharge. Of course, working in Germany and having 30 vacation days/year helps with this (it's my belief that for mental work like computer programming, something like 40 days vacation would lead to optimal productivity, counted over the whole year, but you'll never convince employers of this).

[ez4u]

...

...

...
In the end, you may find it's wiser to listen to you wife. If all works out, she'll be with you longer than any job will.

Yes, I agree.

Only true if you get the balance right! In a situation like this be really concerned about the possibility that the she might decide that it's not worth the effort to outlast the job!

[jts]

Perhaps the basis for which I compute the percentage mode does not need to be "maximum achievable effort", but something more constrained than that.

Think of your body as a bank. If you were a plowman, you might be depositing 3000 kcalories of food in your body every day, and withdrawing 3000 kcalories of work. That would be 100% effort (along that budget constraint). If something came up and you missed your lunch, you'd be running a huge energy deficit. If you were tending power looms in a dark satanic mill, you would be starting out with ten fingers, and over the course of your career you would run a small but unavoidable finger-deficit. Muscles, tendons, nerves, sleep, knowledge, fingers (and, as ez4u adds, social connections) -- all of these things can (to some extent) be banked up, and they can be expended and depleted. The maximum attainable level of work in the short-term (your 100%) ends up being less than the maximum attainable level of work in the long-term (ez4u's 100%).

[snorri]

...

You're not getting manic when you are in this "100% mode" are you?

How can you ascertain this?

The clinical defnition looks something like this, but of course you shouldn't self-diagnose:


To be classed as a manic episode, while the disturbed mood is present at least three (or four if only irritability is present) of the following must have been consistently prominent: grand or extravagant style, or expanded self-esteem; reduced need of sleep (e.g. three hours may be sufficient); talks more often and feels the urge to talk longer; ideas flit through the mind in quick succession, or thoughts race and preoccupy the person; over indulgence in enjoyable behaviors with high risk of a negative outcome (e.g., extravagant shopping, sexual adventures or improbable commercial schemes)

The things I've seen people do are: start lots of ambitious projects simultaneously, brag a lot, over-sexualize, spend too much, etc. The main reason why people have a hard time judging this for themselves is that someone who is experiencing this feels absolutely awesome while it is happening. They really feel productive, and sometimes actually are, but there's a wrecklessness about it that they tend not to notice until much later. If you notice people saying to you things like: "But - and I am only saying this because I care - there are a lot of decaffeinated brands on the market today that are just as tasty as the real thing," then that might be a sign.

I'm only a little worried because sometimes you show up here demonstrating the other side of this, which is seriously low self-esteem. I've had my own life ripped apart by depressive episodes and my mother is bipolar so I'm a little sensitive to it. But hey, I'm not your doctor. It's your life. I'm just saying that feeling like 100% may not always be a feeling you can trust.

[Kirby]

Has anybody had experience with this type of behavior? How can I operate at 100% 100% of the time?

You can't.

What works for me is to put in a lot of effort until I notice I'm fraying around the edges, then take two weeks of vacation to recharge. Of course, working in Germany and having 30 vacation days/year helps with this (it's my belief that for mental work like computer programming, something like 40 days vacation would lead to optimal productivity, counted over the whole year, but you'll never convince employers of this).

This advice makes a lot of sense, and seems quite doable to me. It's hard for me to consistently operate "partially doing my best", so it would make sense to try my hardest for as long as possible, then take a break, then go at it again. It seems quite feasible to do this. Thanks for the advice.

Now, if I can only get that 40 days of vacation...

[Kirby]

...

Only true if you get the balance right! In a situation like this be really concerned about the possibility that the she might decide that it's not worth the effort to outlast the job!

I'm not quite sure what you're getting at. I don't distrust my wife, if that's what you're suggesting.

In regard to balance, I think that it's a good idea, but somewhat difficult. If I want to "do my best" at something, in a simplistic way of thinking, I think of it as an optimization problem. How can I maximize what I do in a particular area of life? So in this sense, it seems difficult to really "balance", because optimization, by definition, would be going to the extreme.

But when I think of your earlier quote about giving 120%... Then it makes me think of the problem not as one of optimizing a particular area of life, but rather optimizing a number of areas of life. In this sense, given an optimal solution to the problem of life, looking at any one particular subarea of life may not appear to be optimized locally. But it does make sense that this is consistent with the idea of optimizing life in general.

In other words, maybe what I feel to be 100% effort at my job is really 120% optimization in regard to life in general. Maybe it's not good to give that 120%, and work only deserves a subset of what I feel it should, sometimes.

The problem then becomes one of looking at my life from the big picture, not looking at a subsection and trying to optimize it, but trying to find balance and an optimal solution to life on a large scale. I don't know if I'm good at that. But I guess approaching the problem starts with prioritizing what's important in life. Maybe I should find out how important work is to me, and try to give an appropriate amount of effort for the value that I put on it... It could also be related to the go board. Giving "120%" in a local area of the board may not be best for the overall global situation. Maybe a certain local area only needs 80%, whereas this ties into giving 100% globally... I guess.

I guess that's what is meant by balance...(?) That's how I understand it right now.

[Kirby]

Think of your body as a bank. If you were a plowman, you might be depositing 3000 kcalories of food in your body every day, and withdrawing 3000 kcalories of work...

Good analogy.

I have tried giving you advise, but do you listen?
Obey your wife!

...

Thanks for the tip.

[Kirby]

...
I'm only a little worried because sometimes you show up here demonstrating the other side of this, which is seriously low self-esteem. I've had my own life ripped apart by depressive episodes and my mother is bipolar so I'm a little sensitive to it. But hey, I'm not your doctor. It's your life. I'm just saying that feeling like 100% may not always be a feeling you can trust.

Thanks for the explanation, snorri. It's interesting that you mention that you feel I have low self-esteem, because I haven't felt this myself. However, just yesterday one of my coworkers said that I made "overly self-deprecating" comments about myself. Maybe I should see a doctor sometime. Or, maybe it's nothing to worry about.

Anyway, I do feel guilty sometimes when I feel I haven't done my best at something. And I suppose that does happen often, since I often feel that I haven't given "100%" in a particular subsection of life.

It might be the case that it all comes down to what ez4u keeps reiterating: balance. It's something that I don't quite get, I think, but it seems important.

[rubin427]

I've observed that usually there is a relationship between the schedule and the overall quality of the product. Super aggressive release schedules rarely foster the kind of top notch quality a person can really take pride in.

Trying to understand market forces is a little deeper issue. Sometimes the "80% product today" is a big winner over the "99% product one month from now". So, if we're being perfectly rational, sometimes quality isn't the most important metric.

...Just to come at this from a different angle.

[xed_over]

My wife suggested trying to work in "80% mode" so that I would be less likely to get burnt out. But it's hard for me to think this way. I feel like I have an on/off switch. When the switch is on, I run full sprint ahead at trying to get something done. But when the switch is off, I don't perform nearly as well. It's hard for me to keep the switch on all the time, though.

have you ever run a marathon race? you can not sprint throughout the entire race, or you'll never finish. you have to pace yourself

not sprinting throughout the race does not meam you are not giving it your "all". it just means your looking at the bigger picture -- the end goal, the long haul.

have you never read "The Tortoise and the Hare"?