Imagine sitting in a team meeting and having to explain to your line manager why a project has fallen behind schedule. In the past, your heart would have beaten faster, you would have turned red and you would hardly have been able to think straight. But now? Now you calmly analyse your thoughts and realise: ‘I’ve mastered a challenge like this before.’ This awareness enables you to act more clearly and effectively.
Or a colleague criticises your work unexpectedly and without good reason. In the past, you might have reacted impulsively and defended yourself. Today, you take a deep breath, recognise the emotions that are welling up inside you and consciously choose a technique to resolve the situation calmly and objectively.
When a deadline looms and the pressure mounts, use your newly learnt coping strategies. You have realised that a walk during your lunch break can do wonders for your creativity and productivity, or that a short breathing space helps you to stay focused and calm.
Resilience coaching teaches methods and techniques that not only enable you to cope with daily workloads. It strengthens your mental resilience and gives you the tools to deal effectively with stress. One of the main benefits is the prevention of burnout, as you learn skills to recognise warning signs early on and counteract them with new behaviour.
What is burnout?
The term burnout has been around for decades, but the World Health Organisation (WHO) has only recently recognised it as one of the most pressing problems in the global workplace. According to the WHO, burnout is a syndrome caused by chronic stress in the workplace that is not successfully managed.
Symptoms of burnout
People on the way to burnout or already affected by it report a variety of physical, emotional and behavioural symptoms. These are also recognisable to colleagues and superiors. These include:
Physical symptoms:
Chronic tiredness and exhaustion
Sleep disorders and frequent headaches
Emotional symptoms:
Feeling overwhelmed and helpless
Loss of interest in work
Cynicism and negative attitude towards work
Behavioural symptoms:
Withdrawal from co-workers and social activities
Decreased performance
Increase in errors
Causes of burnout in the workplace
The causes of burnout are varied and complex. Some of the most common reasons cited by clients are
Constant accessibility: modern technology allows us to work anytime, anywhere. However, this also leads to constant availability, which prevents real relaxation.
Unrealistic work targets: Many companies set high, often unrealistic targets and expect them to be met despite limited resources. Failure to fulfil them leads to ongoing pressure and stress.
Micro-stress: Subtle teasing and social tensions in the workplace add up and cause considerable stress.
Lack of recognition: A lack of appreciation and emotional guidance leads to frustration and ultimately to burnout.
Lack of control: A feeling of helplessness and loss of control over one’s own work situation leads to a feeling of dependency. Micromanagement by superiors also contributes to burnout.
Resilience coaching as a preventative measure
As mentioned above, burnout is a syndrome caused by chronic stress in the workplace that is not successfully managed. The emphasis is on the inadequate management of stress.
This is where resilience coaching comes in. It is an effective way to prevent burnout and strengthen your mental health. In resilience coaching, you learn new skills and strengthen existing ones in order to cope better with the challenges of daily life. Based on cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT), coaching helps you to get to know your thoughts and emotions better and adapt your behaviour in stressful situations.
How does resilience coaching support you?
Resilience coaching offers numerous benefits that help you to cope better with daily challenges at work and effectively avoid burnout:
1. strengthening your mental resilience: resilience coaching supports you in strengthening your mental resilience. You learn how to deal better with stress and pressure by mobilising your inner resources and improving your emotional stability.
2. improved self-awareness: Through coaching, in which the topic of mindfulness also plays an important role, you will develop a deeper understanding of your own thought and behaviour patterns. This enables you to recognise stress-triggering factors at an early stage and counteract them in a targeted manner.
3. effective stress management: you will learn stress management techniques that will help you to remain calm and focussed in stressful situations. Breathing exercises, mindfulness and other relaxation techniques will become part of your daily repertoire.
4. increased problem-solving skills: Resilience coaching enhances your ability to approach problems constructively. You develop strategies to view challenges not as insurmountable hurdles, but as solvable tasks.
5. better communication skills: You will learn how to communicate clearly and effectively in stressful situations. This helps to avoid misunderstandings and resolve conflicts constructively.
6. promotion of self-care: The coaching emphasises the importance of self-care and shows you ways in which you can regularly look after your own well-being. This includes both physical and psychological aspects.
7. long-term prevention of burnout: By regularly applying the techniques and strategies learnt, you can prevent burnout in the long term. You will develop a sustainable resilience that will help you to deal with professional challenges in a healthy and balanced way in the future.
What does resilience coaching involve?*
The coaching includes training in five skills:
Re-charge: draw new energy for everyday life. You will learn how to replenish your energy reserves through targeted breaks and recovery phases.
Facing Fears: Develop strategies for better coping with fears. You will actively deal with your fears and develop techniques to overcome them.
TEB cycle: Understanding and influencing the cycle of thoughts, emotions and behaviour. You will recognise the interactions between your thoughts, feelings and actions and learn how to influence them positively.
Solving Problems: Develop new approaches to solving problems. You will learn creative and effective methods to overcome challenges in everyday working life.
Exploring Thoughts: Getting to know your thought patterns in more detail in order to change them positively. You will take a close look at your thought processes and develop new, constructive perspectives.
In addition to these aspects, resilience coaching also deals with the question of how you can enjoy your job more. All of this helps you to improve your quality of life and develop the mental strength to cope better with the demands of work and everyday life and to have more fun.
After resilience coaching, you will:
Have built up your cognitive flexibility and mental strength.
Be able to recognise and influence the effects of thoughts, emotion and behaviour patterns on yourself.
Apply suitable techniques for coping with stressful situations.
Manage emotional stress situations better.
Burnout is a serious problem that can severely impair both quality of life and professional performance. Resilience coaching helps you to cope better with daily stress at work. It helps you to discover new joy and interest in your work, which in turn leads to more confidence and serenity. Through resilience coaching, you learn to strengthen your skills, build up your mental resilience and face the challenges of everyday working life with more calm and joy.
*Based on Harvard Medical School training