00:12Tiene más de 30 años de experiencia en el estudio de la salud emocional. Su trabajo se ha enfocado
00:19en desarrollar estrategias para fortalecer el bienestar, la productividad y las relaciones
00:25dentro de las organizaciones. También asesora a empresas y gobiernos en temas de salud mental
00:32y bienestar laboral. El psicólogo clínico y escritor Guy Winch en Milenio Negocios.
00:45Bienvenidos a Milenio Negocios, este programa para entender mejor la economía y las finanzas,
00:50pero hoy vamos a hablar de algo que sucede en el mundo corporativo en México,
00:55que es el burnout, este cansancio, agotamiento pleno que sufrimos la mayoría de los trabajadores.
01:01Y para eso tengo un invitado súper especial, Guy Winch, psicólogo y autor de varios libros,
01:08pero hoy que estuve leyendo estas 10 días, me tardé, pero se los recomiendo muchísimo,
01:13cómo liberarte, o sea, cómo no todo es urgente y cómo liberarte cuando el trabajo se apodera de tu vida.
01:21Se los vuelvo a poner en la pantalla para que lo vean, pero se los recomiendo mucho.
01:24So, thanks for being here.
01:27Let's begin with the data.
01:296 out of 10 workers have burnout symptoms in the world.
01:33Why is this a big deal in terms of physical and mental health?
01:38What is happening to us that we're not accepting or addressing?
01:42And why should we, as human beings, as workers that we are, pay much more attention to what we do
01:52at work and how this stresses our everyday lives?
01:56So, since the pandemic, the rates of stress and burnout all over the world in the workplace are at high,
02:06all-time highs.
02:07And that happened because when we were working from home, some people did it for a few months, some people
02:12for a few years, some people still do it.
02:14But the psychological boundary between work and home got erased and our employers now consider our home to be a
02:24second office and worse, we consider our home to be a second office.
02:29And since then, you see, work stress has escaped the office and is now following us home and we are
02:36bringing it home.
02:37And so, the stress of the workday keeps going all day.
02:42And that's why burnout is at an all-time high.
02:45And when you are burnt out, you are numb.
02:48You are not functioning well.
02:51It is predisposing you to get sick, to have cardiovascular disease, to be miserable.
02:57And you are much less productive.
02:59You're much less engaged.
03:00You're not worth as much as an employee to yourself or to your family or to your employer.
03:05So, you can even be less ethical, right, in your decisions.
03:08That happens regardless of burnout because that happens because when we are in a work culture that's not ethical, it
03:16gets normalized.
03:16Well, everyone's doing it.
03:18Or if I don't do that little bit of cheating, then I won't be able to stay ahead or keep
03:22up with my peers.
03:23And so, when we are in a culture that's unethical, it starts to slip.
03:29Now, your book is divided into chapters named after the days of the week.
03:32It starts Sunday.
03:34It ends on Saturday.
03:36What does that structure reveal about how work has actually invaded our lives, which is what you were just talking
03:44about?
03:44Yeah, I structured it.
03:45I start with Sunday evening because Sunday evening we all get anxious because the work week is coming.
03:50And so, we start to get anxious.
03:52There are different challenges that we face on different work days as the week progresses.
03:57So, I wanted to take the reader through the work week so we can address all the different challenges that
04:03come up.
04:04Some are similar, but some days have unique challenges.
04:08But what you see is that work has escaped into the home and it is impacting us at home.
04:15It is impacting our leisure.
04:16It is impacting our thoughts, our relationships.
04:18It is impacting our families much more than we realize.
04:23And it is really coming into every area of our life.
04:26It is creeping up.
04:27You argue that the line between work and home has never been blurrier.
04:31For a Mexican audience, I have to say that we wear as a badge of honor the hours that we
04:40spend at the office and how we are the last to leave the office because we worked hardest.
04:46What's the clearest sign someone has crossed from dedication to exaggeration and to putting in danger our physical and mental
05:00health?
05:00There are two things.
05:02Number one, I understand that it makes you feel proud that you are dedicating.
05:05The question and what we don't realize is what are you sacrificing in order to do that?
05:11What parts of your identity are not getting expressed?
05:14What parts of your family life are you checked out of or no longer participating in?
05:19What friends do you no longer see?
05:21What passions do you no longer pursue?
05:23What health sacrifices do you give up?
05:26Why should they care about what is going on with our lives?
05:30And can they be an example of starting to put this line again in between work and our personal lives?
05:40Look, the good news for C-Suite people is that the research is very, very clear in many domains that
05:46the happier your employee is, the more they feel cared for, the more engaged they are, the more loyal they
05:54are, the more productive they are.
05:56It is a win-win.
05:58If you are stressing out your employees, they're not going to be as productive.
06:01By the end of their day, their thinking, their creativity, their decision-making, their focus, their attention is all going
06:07to decline, as is yours.
06:09That's why it's not about working harder, but working smarter, taking the right breaks when you can, making sure you
06:16use evenings to recover from the workday.
06:20And you might not feel like you need to recover, but your brain does.
06:24You know, your brain's overheated at that point.
06:26It needs the recovery.
06:28You mentioned, I think it's a chapter, on the chapter that's named Saturday, if I am correct, you start talking
06:36about how vacation doesn't really mean the same thing for everyone,
06:41and that sometimes a vacation, which is something we all need, will not be able to take away that stress
06:46off, because you cannot disconnect from work.
06:50And so, this, and I want to put two questions together, maybe.
06:55This also leads to what we were just talking about, but the C-suites, whose work balance efforts, because there
07:01are a lot of efforts,
07:03you know, trying to have a better work balance in the office, are not working.
07:07And so, we need a vacation, but we don't disconnect.
07:10But then we also have maybe mental care facilities at work that we're not, that they're not beneficial, because somehow,
07:18it's not working for us.
07:20Right.
07:21So, where is that balance?
07:22What can people start doing, in general, to begin this journey, as you put it clearly in the book,
07:30of taking control of your own stress, and putting barriers and boundaries to how you bring it home?
07:39So, here's the goal.
07:40If you are working, and C-suite work really hard, the fantasy of entry-level employees is that the higher
07:46you rise in a company,
07:47the less hard you have to work.
07:49It is the opposite.
07:50It's truly the opposite.
07:51The higher you rise, the harder you're working.
07:53The more stressed out you are, the more burnout you have.
07:56And so, it's really important to understand that when you're working really hard, your body is in fight or flight.
08:02Your brain is activated.
08:04It's on the ready.
08:05It needs a break from that.
08:07That's why burnout happens.
08:08That's why illness happens.
08:09We're not designed to be that activated, to be in fight or flight all the time.
08:14Your task in the evenings, and especially on vacation, is to not be in activation, to not be in fight
08:21or flight.
08:21If you're checking your emails every 30 minutes, you are.
08:24And so, if you understand the goal is to be relaxed, is to have, be present in whatever you're doing,
08:31that's a task.
08:32That's a goal.
08:33It's hard.
08:34But you need to create that as your goal.
08:37It doesn't just happen.
08:39To have it.
08:40You have to have intentionality.
08:42You have to curate your vacations.
08:44You know the biggest mistake C-Suite people make and other managers make on vacations?
08:48They say, well, I'm taking a family vacation.
08:51We're going to go to a place that's going to be great for the kids.
08:53And I'm like, the kids are not burnt out.
08:57You're the one that's burnt out.
08:58What can they do?
08:59The first thing they need to do is to create a transition ritual between the end of the workday, whatever
09:07hour it is, and when they're starting their evening, their family life, their personal life, whatever that is.
09:13Train your brain to come down, to lower the gear from five to four to three to two to one.
09:20And the way you do that is you use music to put yourself in a different mood.
09:24Change clothes.
09:26Some people say, I work from home.
09:27I'm in jeans and a T-shirt.
09:28I'm like, fine.
09:29Have jeans and T-shirt your brain associates with work, and then change into the jeans and T-shirt your
09:34brain associates with being home.
09:37Use lighting.
09:38Use, you know, aromatherapy.
09:41Teach your brain that when you start listening to this music and changing clothes and doing those things,
09:46it's because you are shifting now into a very different mindset of now I'm home, now I'm not activated, now
09:53my priorities are different.
09:55And do that every day as a signal.
09:58It can be a five-minute ritual.
09:59But as a signal to exhale and then to start bringing in your personal life and to start doing the
10:07things that the work is supposed to be for in the first place.
10:10And stop answering emails or checking your phone.
10:13Stop doing that.
10:13It's okay to be, you know, I say to people, like, you can say to your, you know, the CEO,
10:18the board, whatever it is,
10:20I'm so sorry I couldn't respond until the morning.
10:22I went to bed.
10:23I slept.
10:24You're allowed to go to bed.
10:27There's one more thing.
10:30Because I am very passionate about personal finance and the stress that money usually brings and puts into the table.
10:37And this is something that shows up in your book in several of your patients.
10:41Is there a tip, a recommendation that you can give people to start realizing how that also adds stress, how
10:51that personal finance uncomfortability is not helping us and how we should also start disconnecting from that planning better and
11:05then sort of trying to taking away the stress put into money?
11:09Yes, people feel like I need to be number one.
11:12In five years, I need to reach this financial goal.
11:15Now, if you had an option to be number one and reach that goal in five years, to be burnt
11:20out, to be miserable, to be divorced, to not have, you know, a good relationship with your kids and to
11:25have a terrible personal life,
11:26or maybe you could be number two or number three and reach that same goal in seven years, but have
11:33a personal life, have a better marriage, have a better relationship with your kids and be actually physically and mentally
11:39healthier, I think people should choose the latter.
11:42There's this race mentality that we get into that I have to be the best.
11:47And my question is, at what price?
11:49And I'm not saying be the worst, but second best, third best, with a life, is maybe worth it.
11:56I love that because it's the same as work, but with money.
12:00Yes.
12:01Thank you so much for being here.
12:03Gracias también a la audiencia por habernos acompañado.
12:06Nos vemos en la siguiente edición de Milenio Negocios.
12:29¡Gracias!
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