This article proposes a pioneering combination of elements: a combination of two important psychometric instruments and dimensions, the consecrate Maslach Burnout Inventory and the innovative Burnout Assessment Tool dialoguing between the concepts and capturing how this phenomenon is faced in the group of organizational leaders; the lenses chosen was the consecrate Conservation of Resources Theory; focused on individuals' dynamics between resource gains and losses during their routines using a qualitative approach
The research problem was “How resources in their different categories and levels could influence leaders' burnout?” This research aimed to analyze the dynamic between resource gains and losses during the leaders’ routines, examining the types of resources at their disposal, daily utilization, and how these resources contribute to coping with chronic stress, utilizing the Conservation of Resources Theory (COR) to comprehend the impact of various resource types and levels on the process of managing chronic stress, thereby preventing professional burnout.
With an extensive methodological review covering the seminal papers and authors to the most recent content about burnout, the research combined two important psychometric instruments and dimensions, the consecrate Maslach Burnout Inventory and the innovative Burnout Assessment Tool, dialoguing between the concepts and capturing how this phenomenon is faced in the group of organizational leaders through the lenses of the Conversation of Resources Theory, a complementary content about different type of resources and their importance have been considered to evidence the findings.
We carried out a qualitative investigation using interviews, documents, and audiovisual material as sources. Based on this research design, we did 20 in-depth interviews and analyzed more than 702 comments in 20 posts and 20 videos published on social media. The interviews are the main source of evidence for this study, and the other sources were used to strengthen our categories of analysis. We selected the Burnout Assessment Tool (BAT) as our first participant screening filter and it was used to design the semi-structured interview guide for in-depth interviews.
Entertainment, a routine of physical activities and hobbies has been identified as decompression and fun resources helping individuals generate more energy; emotional support from family, social activities with friends and others, and psychotherapy have been identified as social and emotional support, strengthening emotional aspects; the practice of spirituality and solitude, cognitive and emotional favorable repertoire and search of knowledge and new tools have been considered as intellectual, emotional and spiritual resources helping individuals to strengthen their personal characteristics.
(i) Decompression and fun resources help individuals to reframe their own fatigue, minimizing the impact on the extent of exhaustion and lack of energy; (ii) Social and emotional support resources help individuals generate emotional connection, strengthening emotional aspects and minimizing the impacts of the dimension of emotional distance and cynicism; (iii) Intellectual, emotional and spiritual resources help individuals to strengthen their personal characteristics and increase their personal resources to minimize the impact on inefficacy dimension and cognitive and emotional impairment.
Hobfoll, S. E., Halbesleben, J., Neveu, J. P., & Westman, M. (2018). Conservation of Resources in the Organizational Context: The Reality of Resources and Their Consequences. Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior, 5(1), 103–128. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-orgpsych-032117-104640
Maslach, C., & Leiter, M. P. (2016). Burnout. Stress: Concepts, Cognition, Emotion, and Behavior, 351–357. doi:10.1016/b978-0-12-800951-2.00044-3
Schaufeli, W.B., De Witte, H. & Desart, S. (2020b). Manual Burnout Assessment Tool (BAT) – Version 2.0. KU