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PayScale’s VIP Blog Roundup: How to Rebound From Burnout

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Feeling totally done with work today? Unfortunately, it’s probably not time to go home yet. Worse, maybe your problem isn’t just a “today” issue – burnout can sneak up on you, and knock out your productivity for quite some time. In this week’s roundup, we look at ways to prevent and overcome burnout, plus methods for dealing with academic isolation, and how to do just one thing that will make your boss love you forever.

burnout 

(Photo Credit: Skley/Flickr )

Dr. Marla Gottschalk at The Office Blend: How to Avoid Burnout

Do You Know What You're Worth?

“You might think that increased perseverance always pays off,” Dr. Gottschalk writes. “But in fact, this doesn’t always do the trick. In many cases, we need to change the game plan to make progress.”

Her five strategies for hitting the reset button will appeal to anyone who’s ever taken inspiration from a TED Talk or relied on the restorative powers of a good nap.

Anita Bruzzese at 45 Things: Doing This One Thing Will Make Your Boss Happy

Even the smartest workers fail to do something that would make their bosses love them forever. Bruzzese explains:

…I once attended a business conference populated by a whole bunch of high-tech brainiacs. It was like being in a roomful of Sheldon Coopers, only without the laugh track. When I asked one manager what it was like trying to direct all that brain power, he commented, “It’s like being a second-grade teacher.”

Huh?

He went on to explain that while these people were scary smart, they also lacked some common sense. For example, they never wrote anything down. As a result, he often had to repeat instructions again and again, and it created a huge headache for him. It was not unusual that silly mistakes – and often some big ones – were made by the team because someone forgot a detail that ended up causing problems down the road.

Not sure when to write it down? Use Bruzzese’s guidelines, here.

Danielle Rosvally at Dani Prose: Dealing With Isolation

If you’re in school, especially after a period of time outside the world of academia, you’re probably dealing with a bit of isolation. While your former co-workers and work friends continue to go about their business, collecting paychecks and spending them at happy hours, you’re pinching pennies and making deadlines.

Danielle Rosvally knows how you feel:

One of the big challenges that we grad students (particularly non-resident grad students caught somewhere between late dissertation writing and the job market) face is isolation. Going from a structured schedule that involves a highly-social job (teaching and or learning) to sitting at home alone with your research every day can be extremely challenging. If you’re not the type of person that deals well with large tasks to perform in unstructured time, then you’ll face even worse troubles at this stage of the game (and frankly it’s a miracle you got this far). I’m not going to say that I’ve solved the many problems of academic isolation, they are definitely demons I face every day, but I’m coping and I certainly put a lot of thought into how to cope with these issues. Here are a few of my better brainwaves for methods I use to help deal with academic isolation.

Tell Us What You Think

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Jen Hubley Luckwaldt
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