When Work and Life Collide
That was the question one nonprofit executive asked after a discussion about nonprofits, self-care practices, and well-being in the workplace during the Alliance for Nonprofit Management Conference in 2015. Someone shared the story of one nonprofit leader he knew who ignored the early warning signs of burnout, kept on going, and suffered an almost-fatal heart attack. That nonprofit leader was lucky. He left the hospital in a wheelchair not a hearse. He subsequently changed his attitude and behavior, prioritizing his well-being so he could continue to lead his organizationās important work.
Sacrificing oneās health in service of a cause is a common narrative in the nonprofit sector. Nonprofit consultant and blogger Joan Garry1 spent eight years as a nonprofit executive director and worked herself and her staff hard. Like most nonprofit leaders, she was so driven by her organizationās mission that every task took on urgency, and there was never any downtime.
While preparing for a board meeting, Garryās development director revealed that she was wearing a heart monitor due to stress. As the organizationās leader, Garry admits that she should have told her development director to go home and rest, but instead she and everyone else kept prepping for the meeting. Looking back, Garry recognizes how toxic the combination of passion for oneās work and Type A behavior can be.
Garry recently told this story to an executive director who quietly confessed that one of her staff members was currently on a heart monitor. Garry asked, āWhat are we doing to each other? How can we take care of others when we canāt take care of ourselves?ā
An organizationās work may be mission-based, but its people are mission critical. The passion that social change activists feel for their work is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, that fervor helps them keep going in the face of difficult challenges, especially in the early stages of their careers. On the other hand, they can be so driven they donāt stop to refuel or smell the proverbial roses or even notice they are experiencing symptoms of burnout.
Aisha Moore has worked for 15 years in social justice and health care fields. One day, when leaving the office for lunch, she began to feel dizzy and light-headed. The next thing she knew, she was being wheeled out of the office on a stretcher and taken to the hospital in an ambulance. After a battery of medical tests, Moore learned from her doctor that her symptoms were the result of chronic stress.
āStress? But I love my work,ā she told her doctor. Moore was so anxious at work that she did not even notice that stress was making her sick until she passed out. She recovered through a systematic program of self-care she created for herself. She then launched a wellness coaching practice to help other social changemakers avoid her mistakes.2
Cindy Leonard, who manages the consulting and technology programs at the Bayer Center for Nonprofit Management at Robert Morris University, was driving home from work when her heart started to race. She thought she was having a heart attack, pulled over, and dialed 911 for help. The EMTs arrived on the scene and took her vitals. They determined she was having a panic attack, not a heart attack. Leonard learned that she was experiencing an early stage of burnout due to stress. She sought help and began practicing self-care techniques to improve her well-being.3
Laura Maloney, currently chief operating officer at Panthera, a global conservation organization, headed up animal rescue efforts at the Louisiana Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals during Hurricane Katrina. She remembers how the traumatic events affected her and her staff. Later, as the chief operating officer of The Humane Society of the United States, she oversaw the Animal Rescue Team. She noted that while staff at SPCA and The Humane Society are dedicated to their mission of saving animals from inhumane conditions, working long hours and witnessing horrible situations without any relief can be draining, even dangerous.
Maloney became a compassion fatigue educator to teach self-care practices to those in the field of animal protection who were showing early signs of burning out. Maloney recalls an exercise she facilitated at an organization where she invited staff to add ideas and suggestions to a bulletin board on self-care.
āSomeone suggested that once a month, staff leave the office an hour early and do something fun as a group,ā she says, adding that next to the suggestion, someone else wrote, āBut the animals donāt leave their cages at 4 P.M. How can we take a break?ā
These stories, and many more like them, illustrate how good people working in the nonprofit sector view self-care: as something that gets in the way of their work serving an important cause. Self-care is seen as a guilty pleasure, a one-time or once-in-a-while feel-good luxury instead of an individual and organizational necessity. Itās time to change the status quo.
