Jory MacKay on July 23, 2024 7 warning signs that you (and your team) are overworked
In an ideal world, everyone would be able to do great work, get rewarded fairly, and have a realistic workload. Unfortunately, that’s not the reality most of us live in.
With the harsh economic conditions of the past few years, companies have been forced to do more with less — leaving employees exhausted, frustrated, and overworked. It’s no wonder that a recent study found that 53% of people regularly feel overworked, leading them to suffer stress-related consequences.
When you and your team get overworked, your productivity — along with your mental and physical health — decline. In the worst case scenarios, overwork can cause teams to collapse, projects to fail, and individuals to go looking for better work environments.
If you or your team is feeling overworked, it’s not something you can overlook any longer.
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In this guide, we’ll explain what it really means to be overworked, the warning signs to look out for in yourself and your teammates, and what you can do today to get back on track and feel motivated, valued, and productive.
What does it mean to be “overworked”?
When you feel overworked, it means that you’ve been operating above your capacity for a sustained period of time.
Being overworked is different from being stressed. Where stress comes from short periods of high pressure — such as a big project launch or a demanding meeting — being overworked is a longer-term issue, built up over weeks, months, or even years.
We’ve all heard the saying “don’t take your work home with you,” but when it comes to overwork, that’s easier said than done.
While many people exclusively link overwork to high-intensity jobs or unrealistic expectations, individuals can become overworked for any number of reasons: bad company culture, a gradual build-up of work, long hours, stressful tasks, a poor work-life balance, and a lack of breaks or holidays.
While being overworked isn’t new, the number of employees suffering from overwork and burnout is rising. But why is that?
Here are some of the main reasons why people are feeling more overworked than ever:
- A tough economy = a tough culture. In times of economic hardship, companies cut back on non-essential spending, meaning culture-rich relationship-building workshops, overseas trips, and team meetings are canceled. And when 80% of people value company community spirit, this lowers mood and creates the perfect environment for overwork to spread.
- Companies are playing with fewer resources. Startup funding dropped 16% in the past year alone, meaning many companies that once were driven by growth at all costs are now trying to do more with less. That pressure of fewer resources is felt the most by team members who are forced to pick up the slack and hit their goals without the support they’ve become accustomed to.
- Teams aren’t replacing employees who leave. With money and resources tight, team members are leaving, and not being replaced. When critical roles aren’t replaced, it leaves those left behind to take on even more work, placing greater strain on a smaller team.
- It’s harder to set remote work boundaries. While many people love remote working, for some, it’s difficult to maintain a work-life balance. In a recent workplace survey, 22% reported not being able to unplug as their biggest remote work challenge. Those who lose that balance between work and fun find it’s not long until their glass is too full and they need to take time away.
- Competition is putting more pressure on teams to perform. Companies need to push harder to reach their goals. But, with no money to invest in technological advances, companies push their employees harder to try and stay ahead of their competition. Couple this with smaller teams and a worsening culture, and it’s a workplace recipe for disaster.
The bottom line: Everything from strategic to economic and interpersonal issues can cause overwork to take over. And if you’re not careful, the consequences can be dire.
What happens when you’re overworked? 5 consequences
It’s not just enough to understand why we feel overworked. As a team leader or anyone who wants to feel like they’re doing your best work, you need to know what the consequences are of being overworked (and how to avoid them).
Let’s start with the negative consequences that feeling overworked has on teams and individuals:
- High stress levels. Overwork naturally leads to stress. And while your mind and body can handle stress in small doses, sustained mental pressure leads to burnout. In the short term, stress also leads to poor decision-making, putting you and your team at risk of making a costly mistake.
- Exhaustion and fatigue. In life, we need a healthy balance of work and rest, and if you’re overworked, proper rest takes a back seat. A tired team is unproductive, makes silly mistakes, and loses the creativity to solve complex problems. On top of that, exhaustion and fatigue are a gateway to more serious health conditions that could lead to extended time out of the business.
- Missed deadlines and milestones. Overwork and an out-of-control to-do list go hand in hand. If it all gets too much, as a team leader, your team will underperform, piling more pressure on you and your colleagues to try and catch up. Unfortunately, it’s a spiral effect that only sends you on a downward trajectory.
- Poor work quality. Similarly, when you’ve got a lot on your plate, you focus on getting things done as quickly as possible. Unfortunately, you can’t have it all - so increasing speed often leads to decreasing quality. If your team’s quality drops too far, it won’t be long until you get a bad reputation or put other teams’ work at risk, too.
- Decreased morale. When people are overworked, they get stressed, and when they get stressed, they become negative. Negativity breeds more negativity, meaning overwork can quickly lower the entire team’s morale. Poor morale leads employees to be less engaged and productive, ultimately increasing their chances of quitting.
7 warning signs that you (or your team) are overworked — and what to do
Spotting the early warning signs of overwork isn’t always easy, especially in ourselves. As our workdays get busier, many people get stuck spinning on the hamster wheel and are unable to step back and reflect on just how dangerous the situation has become.
Here are seven of the most common warning signs of overwork, and how you can spot them in yourself and your team:
1. Lack of passion and motivation
Most of us have a natural level of passion and motivation for the work we do. Sure, there are some Mondays you just aren’t feeling it, but on the whole, we can motivate ourselves to get our job done. When you’re overworked, motivation is the first thing to go, leaving you feeling dejected, disengaged, and unconnected.
Warning signs to look out for:
- Lack of enthusiasm to get the daily tasks done.
- You don’t feel like celebrating the wins, even when you should.
- You stop enjoying a job you once loved.
Actions to take:
- For yourself: Keep a mental note of your mood every morning to see if it’s a one-off slump or a recurring pattern. If it’s the latter, take some time to reflect on why you feel like this and whether your workload is too much.
- For your team: If you notice someone’s enthusiasm for their role change, look for opportunities to re-align work with their core passions — be that working on a specific technology, mentoring others, or organizing team events. If it’s a more widespread issue, implementing team rituals can help the team align, bond, and look for creative solutions to reduce workload.
2. You’re taking on the work of more than one person
In a great team, everyone pulls their weight. Whether it’s sharing the workload, covering for each other, or simply being there for moral support, the best teams thrive when everyone pulls together. If you feel like you’re left with the lion’s share, there’s a chance you’re at risk of overwork.
Warning signs to look out for:
- You’re regularly working more hours than the rest of your team members.
- Your attitude towards the team, the company, and the work differs from others.
- You find yourself regularly feeling frustrated with your teammates.
Actions to take:
- For yourself: Have an informal chat with others in the team to find out how they’re managing their workloads. This might identify if you’re taking on more than others and allows you to begin the conversation of how to share things more equally.
- For your team: Make sure everyone has a high-level view of what work needs to be done. Tools such as Planio provide an easy way to create, assign, and track tasks for every team member. From there, built-in reports give you complete oversight of the team’s workload, including what’s planned, what’s in flight, and what’s overdue. Use these insights to spot signs of overwork and re-assign tasks to other team members accordingly.
3. You get distracted easily
Procrastination is normal human behavior — but it’s only healthy in moderation. When we’re feeling overworked, our brains reach their maximum capacity, and we subconsciously look for ways to switch off. You may be overworked if you find yourself unable to focus and spending big chunks of work time on social media, chatting with colleagues, or scrolling the news.
Warning signs to look out for:
- You cannot hold your focus for more than 5 to 10 minutes at a time.
- You’re missing deadlines and forgetting to complete everyday tasks.
- Your phone’s screen time has increased.
Actions to take:
- For yourself: Put checks in place to monitor your productivity time, including reviewing your screen time, the number of emails/IM messages sent, or the number of tasks on your to-do list. If that data flags that you’re frequently distracted, you may be suffering from mental overload.
- For your team: When working in the office, it’s easy to see when someone is distracted on their phone or spends more time chatting to others. In a remote world, it’s slightly more tricky, but look out for signs such as ‘Away’ statuses or less email chatter. While you don’t want to micromanage, there are indicators that something may be wrong, and some re-training on work from home productivity may be required.
An overworked team is unproductive, makes silly mistakes, and loses the creativity to solve complex problems.
4. You’re always tired and lack energy
No matter how strong and resilient we think we are, our bodies need rest to keep firing. Perhaps the most common sign of overwork is tiredness, as our work and life fall out of balance and we have trouble switching off and resting.
Warning signs to look out for:
- You’re working late hours and de-prioritizing hobbies or family time.
- You have trouble getting to sleep, or you’re waking up in the night.
- You’re feeling tired by lunchtime every day.
Actions to take:
- For yourself: Many of us have smartwatches that monitor our stress levels and sleeping hours. Tune in to the data to ensure you’re hitting your daily recommended targets. If you’re not, it may be time to re-address your workload and regain balance.
- For your team: Tiredness often leads to other symptoms such as low mood, irritability, and a reduced sense of humor. If you notice any of these signs in your colleagues, there’s something wrong, and it could be the workload!
5. Your personal relationships are suffering
We’ve all heard the saying “don’t take your work home with you,” but when it comes to overwork, that’s easier said than done. Unfortunately, when we’re stressed, we unconsciously take it out on the people we love. If your personal relationships are taking a turn, your workload may be the underlying cause.
Warning signs to look out for:
- You’re spending less time with friends and family.
- You’re having more arguments with your partner.
- You’re missing events such as birthdays, anniversaries, and weddings.
Actions to take:
- For yourself: Take time to listen to those around you and ask if they’ve noticed changes in your mood, priorities, and availability. Oftentimes, you may not see changes yourself, but an outside perspective can help you shed light on early warning signs of overwork.
- For your team: As you engage with your team, look for signs that personal life patterns may have changed. Is the social butterfly staying home more on weekends? Do people talk about their friends and family less than they did before? If you notice something’s off, it’s time to start the conversation about their work/life balance.
6. You’re getting sick more often
When our bodies suffer long-term stress, they become weaker, unable to fight off the day-to-day challenges of everyday life. A common sign of overwork is a deterioration of your health, whether that’s picking up more coughs and colds, flare-ups of long-term illnesses, or even developing new mental health conditions.
Warning signs to look out for:
- You’re getting sick more often than you usually would.
- When you do get sick, it takes you a long time to recover.
- If you play sports, you start getting more injuries than usual.
Actions to take:
- For yourself: It’s time to listen to your body. You know what’s normal for you, and if things change, there must be a reason. While it’s easy to put it down to ‘what’s going around’ or ‘just feeling under the weather’ there’s a chance that your mental overload and lack of sleep are impacting your immune system.
- For your team: Keep an eye out for health trends within the team. Whether it’s team members taking more sick days or regular complaints of feeling unwell, if you notice trends in the group there may be a systematic employee overload issue to watch out for.
7. You or your team’s productivity is dropping
When we’re overworked, our ability to get stuff done decreases drastically. Whether that’s because of mental overload, getting distracted, or ill-health, we simply can’t work at the optimum level for success when we’re overworked. Over time, this means your productivity drops and your work quality suffers.
Warning signs to look out for:
- You’re missing regular deadlines that you’ve previously met.
- You constantly feel stuck in the mud, unable to move forward.
- You’re not receiving the praise and recognition you usually would.
Actions to take:
- For yourself: If your to-do list is growing, you’re spending more time apologizing, and you’re constantly having to re-arrange, there’s a good chance you’re overworked. Focus on your daily routines and put steps in place to logically tackle the right tasks at the right time. If you’re still struggling to cope, you must trim your workload.
- For your team: Many teams track key milestones, KPIs, and north star metrics to measure and guide team effectiveness. Tools like Planio help you do this, with tasks, project plans, and time tracking coming together to show you how your team performs over time. If the numbers in your agile charts are starting to slump, it may be that your team is trying to do too much, and cutting back could be the best approach.
How to talk to your boss or manager about being overworked
If you’ve spotted a sign of overwork in your own life, taking the first step and talking to your manager can be a tricky hurdle to overcome. In many businesses, complaining about workload is taboo, with people worrying about the impact on their long-term career aspirations.
To help with this tricky conversation, let’s finish with three tips to help you start the difficult conversation:
- Back up your experience with data. If you’re worried about negative opinions, the best thing to do is back your arguments up with data. Whether it’s reviewing past to-do lists, analyzing your project deliveries, or even logging your work hours, coming to the conversation with objective data takes the emotion away and makes the conversation easier to navigate.
- Come with solutions, not just problems. Managers are busy people, and while they’ll want to help and support, overwork is also a problem for them. To help both you and your manager out, come to the conversation with solutions to solve your workload problem. Whether it’s a way to spread the load, projects to de-prioritize, or just a way to get a better work/life balance, coming to the meeting with solutions will show a proactive spirit.
- Have a proper one on one meeting. Overwork is a serious issue that deserves a serious discussion. When it comes to planning the conversation, do it in a formal one to one meeting where you both have the time and focus to discuss it properly. To help you maximize the discussion, we’d recommend reading our Guide to Mastering One-On-One Meetings.
It’s time to beat overwork and focus on you
Overworking is a systemic problem affecting over 50% of us every day. And with tricky business conditions forecast to continue, overwork isn’t going away anytime soon.
The key to coping with an increased workload is understanding the signs and symptoms of overwork before it’s too late. Whether it’s a drop in your mental health, strained personal relationships, or simply struggling to concentrate, there are signs to look out for in yourself and others to get ahead of overwork, fatigue, and burnout.
If you’re a team leader, tools like Planio can help you out here, too. Not only does Planio make everyone’s day-to-day life easier, but it’s great for managing and monitoring workload across a busy team.
Whether it’s time tracking, task management, or KPI reporting, Planio has features to help you keep your finger on the pulse and spot overwork signs before they become a major issue!
Try Planio with your own team, free for 30 days (no credit card required!)
