The Broad Experience · The Broad Experience

Episode 188: You vs. Burnout

February 7, 2022·24 min·2 clips

Jennifer Moss explains why yoga apps and extra vacation days fail to fix burnout — and what actually works.

Ashley is wary of burnout again. Pandemic work has made the problem feel almost universal, especially for people who cannot turn off when home becomes the office. The usual advice feels flimsy. Rain sounds, yoga, wellness technology, and extra days off may show up in benefits packages, but they do not fix systemic discrimination, 70-hour work weeks, or the same workload waiting on Monday. Jennifer Moss names that gap clearly. Employers may talk about burnout, yet many workers still feel that talk has not become action. A poll makes the point sharper: about 45% of respondents said their employers discussed burnout without doing anything about it, while roughly 22% saw nothing happening at all. That leaves a small slice of people seeing real change. For Moss, the problem is not only whether leaders care. It is whether they know what to do next. Extra time off can feel hollow. A single day in October, or a week away to recover, does not help much if the same pressure is waiting afterward. Ashley brings in posted responses, including someone whose company seemed sincere but offered only a narrow gesture. The manager's role gets quieter attention too. One guest pushes back when people assume they must work through holidays, days off, or breaks they were already promised. Rest is treated as part of doing good work, not a reward for surviving too much of it. The conversation also complicates gender. Moss says the evidence is hard to read when males may be less comfortable admitting burnout, especially in cultures or industries that prize stoicism. Ashley closes by pointing listeners toward Jennifer Moss, Danielle Freed, Jamie Hand, and earlier Broad Experience episodes on burnout and women in medicine.

As heard by us

A practical workplace burnout episode that moves past wellness fixes and asks what employers actually change.

Burnout lands here as a workplace problem, not a personal failure to be fixed with yoga apps or a week off. Ashley Milne-Tight keeps the episode grounded in the pandemic-era reality of blurred home-office boundaries and employees still being treated as if business were running…

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Why you'd press play

If burnout feels built into work, this conversation goes straight at that.

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