How to avoid start-up failure: Boredom and Burnout

I think people are unprepared for how hard and awful it is going to be to start a company. I certainly was.” Former Zenefits CEO Parker Conrad

Burnout and Boredom ranked number 12 on CB Insights list of causes of failure. Five percent of the 110 failed Tech Companies they surveyed cited this as a cause of their failure.

But the evils of boredom and burnout are more widespread than just a cause of failure. Boredom and burnout will result in stagnation and a lack of enthusiasm in companies that continue to exist but fail to meet their full potential.

And if you are bored, it is almost certain your employees are as well.

“If you do what you love, you will never work a day in your life” This quote is attributed to Marc Anthony, an American singer/songwriter. It is a dangerous misconception. According to the Mayo Clinic, two burnout risks are:

1. You identify so strongly with your work that you lack balance between your work life and your personal life. And/or
2. You work in a caring profession.

You can see how the first point, identifying so strongly with your work, can easily apply to entrepreneurs. And if you have launched a business in the caring sector the risk is even greater.

Mike Legatt, CEO and Founder at ResilientGrid, Inc.

As a neuropsychologist turned startup founder, Mike Legatt spent time early in his career focusing on what happens in the brain when people are excessively stressed, scared, distracted, exhausted, and despondent. He’s watched these feelings play out in others throughout his career and observed how burnout has affected his own health and work performance. To avoid burnout, Legatt believes that holding on to a sense of purpose is the most important thing. “No one ever suggested that entrepreneurship would be easy or fun all the time, but I find that keeping in mind the purpose of what I’m trying to do (and the lives it can save, etc.) makes it easier to forge ahead,” he says.

In addition to focusing on his purpose, Legatt takes time for activities he loves and surrounds himself with family, friends, colleagues, and mentors. He used his participation in the Ameren Accelerator, a St. Louis-based accelerator program that works with energy-focused startups, as an example of his approach in action: “It’s valuable to be a part of a large team of people — mentors, entrepreneurs, and coaches, all working to encourage and support each other. There’s a lot of inspiration, collaboration, and creativity in this space; the perfect medicine to keep burnout away.”

What causes Entrepreneurs to burn out? In their 2018 article of the same name, published in the Harvard Business Review Eva de Mol, Jeff Pollack and Violet T Ho provided some answers to this question. Their research focused on entrepreneurs so is particularly relevant. They set out a study to find out what factors lead to greater burnout among entrepreneurs. They wanted to see if three factors make entrepreneurs more susceptible to burnout These were:

• Job passion. A strong inclination towards work that one liked and found important.
• Job fit. How well a person thought their current job matched their ideal job
• Destiny beliefs which they describe as a belief that a successful entrepreneur career is what is meant to be.

They planned to measure harmonious passion, a person who is motivated by the job because it brings them satisfaction and is an important part of who they are; and obsessive passion which means the job is important because of the status, money, or other awards it brings.

The team also wanted to contrast folks who had a flexible mindset and believed an entrepreneurial career can be developed over time versus those who had a fixed mindset – the people who believed that a career step is either right or wrong and entrepreneurial success is either meant to be or not.

What they found is entrepreneurs with a high obsessive passion score and a fixed mindset were more likely to burn out. They found work was emotionally draining and that working all day required a great deal of effort. For some entrepreneurs, their burnout caused a constant level of stress and anxiety.

Harmonious Passion vs Obsessive Passion as causes of burnout.

Entrepreneurs who demonstrated harmonious passion report that they we able to bring high levels of concentration to their work. Although they were totally focused on their work they allowed themselves to take breaks and gave themselves more flexibility. They were able to balance their jobs with other activities without feeling guilty.

Compare this with the obsessively passionate entrepreneur, those folks who were focused on social acceptance, status, money, etc. They had a high level of job fit, that is that their current job closely matched their ideal job. But they found it hard to focus because they worried about the roles and responsibilities that they were neglecting. They said they could not live without their work and had a strong desire to work 24/7.

Develop a flexible mindset. Not too surprisingly a fixed mindset, those people who saw a career step as being either right or wrong led to an increased risk of burnout. The same was true for those who viewed their feelings of job fit so firmly that it influenced their feelings of passion.

To read the full article please follow the link below:

https://hbr.org/2018/04/what-makes-entrepreneurs-burn-out

There is more that you can do to avoid burnout by recognizing areas where you are vulnerable.

Do not name your business after yourself. This too closely attaches your ego to your business. Imagine how you will feel if My Name Inc closes its doors.

Learn how to delegate. I know this can be a real challenge. You feel you cannot trust anyone to do the work as well as you can. Delegation takes time, you tell yourself that it will take longer to teach someone to do the work than to do it yourself. But unless you find the time and courage to delegate you will be doing less productive work with time that could be much better spent on higher-value activities. Keep in mind the phase that you should be focusing on the work that only you can do and allow others to do the rest.

There is another downside to being a workaholic, it can tempt you to accept inefficiencies in your work. If you permit your workday to expand to get everything done you will never get around to fixing those activities that are taking too long or maybe should not be done at all. Set reasonable working hours for yourself and take stock if you cannot get all you need to get done in that amount of time. Outsource some activities, hire a virtual personal assistant, and use Fiverr to get your accounts done. Hire a part-time CFO to do your business planning, and cash flow management.

Hire good people and pay them what they are worth. In one of the case studies we will review later in this season a company was struggling with its logistic functions. They knew they needed a capable and experienced logistics manager. They found one but his salary requirements were twice their budget, so they passed on that candidate. They hired a less experienced and less expensive employee with disastrous results.

Make sure you get into the right business. Getting into a business that is not a good fit for you is almost certainly going to lead to burnout. Opening that restaurant or bar may seem attractive, but if you have no experience in food and beverage, there will be a steep learning curve and mistakes along the way. If you have a great idea for a new approach to an existing industry and you lack experience in that field, hire someone who has.

Know when to call it quits. Even when the writing is on the wall, many entrepreneurs try valiantly but in vain to keep their businesses alive. Much better to plan a graceful exit and start afresh.

Take some time to assess whether you and, if appropriate your co-founders, are at risk of burnout, boreout, or just plain bored. If you see signs, do something about it. It is hard to change your personality but if you know the risks you will be better placed to reduce the impact. Forewarned is forearmed.