第六期 如何兼顾，避免工作劳累

第六期 如何兼顾，避免工作劳累

EPISODE 6 – Juggling it all

Buffy Gorrilla: This is Starting Somewhere - a podcast from theUniversity of Melbourne all about internships - finding one, landing it, andmaking the most of the experience.

I’m Buffy Gorrilla, I’ve cried at work, on more than oneoccasion...and now I’m host of this podcast.

Ben Pawson: And I’m Ben Pawson. My reaction to stress?Dandruff...and now I’m co-host of this podcast.

Buffy: So, we’re clearly the best people to help you startsomewhere.

Let’s take a moment, and think how you are travelling throughlife - how’s Uni? Are your courses going well, assignments, lectures, thatgroup work? And now let’s add in a social life because that’s fun and you needto blow off some steam. Of course, you are wise beyond your years, so you areinvolved in a few clubs or organisations, or volunteer somewhere you careabout. Also because you know it will look good on your LinkedIn profile. Youalso might have a part-time job because rent and flat whites don’t pay forthemselves. Now you want to add in an internship. How are you coping with allof this?

Ben: If I was trying to juggle all of that, I would probablydrop it like it’s hot, or an orange that I cannot keep in the air anymore -there’s an insta story video of that - it’s a must see if you like awkward.

Buffy: It’s so awkward. But here’s what we are going to look atin this episode: the signs you are reaching burnout, what to do when you seethem coming, and how you can plot your course back to reality - or better stillavoid it all together. These feelings of stress are becoming more commonplace -which might be a good podcast series on it’s own. But it is probably comfortingto know - you are not alone.

Ben: Here’s some data that backs up Buffy’s claim - and I am ahuge fan of data. According to the American Psychology Association, 39 percentof millennials say their stress increased last year, 52 percent report lyingawake at night from stress at some point in the past month and 44 percentreport feeling irritability or anger because of their stress.

Buffy: That seems on par with my millenial feelings... 

Various voices: I absolutely got burnt out in that role within 3months of doing it...I just felt tired all the time, I wasn’t really enjoyingwhat I was doing...I just started to be really, really tired, and I started tobe kind of - my anxiety started to grow...I felt by the end that although I hada great experience I was really burnt out...I actually reached a breaking pointwhere I was just like “I can’t handle this anymore”, and friends helped me alot to get through it.

Buffy: So it seems from our very small sample of four, thatbeing tired all the time is a sign of burnout.

Ben: Are we all burnt out? There is a small window on Fridayevening where I feel somewhat sprightly.

Buffy: But these are young people, Ben, not like you, and at theprime of their lives. If they are tired it’s probably because they’re stretchedtoo thin.

Ben: Well we are here to help. We talked to Lynn Cazaly - hersurname is a part of a famous AFL song, and later she’ll give us some hacks formanaging your work, and balancing your life, fun and studies.

Buffy: What are some of those hacks that can help us get backinto control? 

Lynne Cazaly: Some hacks for control...well, one of the thingsis that control is an illusion.

Buffy: Alright, interview over.

Ben: And Neil Wilson, a familiar voice from other episodesbut for the few of you who might not be familiar with him yet, He’s a clinicalpsychologist and counsellor, working at Counselling and Psychological Servicesat the University of Melbourne.

Buffy: Is burnout a common thing that you see across your work?

Neil Wilson: It's a common thing to see in the mirror every morning,actually. It's really common in our work and in our patients, clients andcolleagues.

Buffy: Neil and Lynne offer us some advice on how to juggleit all. But if uni/life balance isn’t your biggest worry, in episode eight ofStarting Somewhere we’ll dive into the thorny issues of exploitation andcompensation, if that’s what’s keeping you up at night. But first, let’s hearfrom Sarah Webster, a University of Melbourne student who didn’t have thebenefit of this podcast and tried to do too much.

Sarah Webster: Well, I've been playing piano all my life. Ireally loved maths throughout high school, and I wasn't sure exactly what Iwanted to do. So, I thought that doing the Bachelor of Science would be a safeoption, because I thought I'd really enjoy maths. And because piano hasalways been a part of my life, I wanted to continue that. So, I decided to dothe diploma on the side, in addition to the Bachelor.

Buffy: And how's that work load, is it overwhelming?

Sarah: It was pretty overwhelming, so a normal full time load isfour subjects for 12.5 credit points, subjects a semester. With the diploma,there's an additional two 6.25 credit point subjects, so it's the equivalent ofabout 5 normal subjects. And I did that throughout all of first year and secondyear, but at the end of second year, I was starting to feel a bit burnt out.And I decided that the best thing for me would be to extend my third year ofthe two years, and that's what I'm doing. Yeah, I’m in the second half of mythird year.

Buffy: And how did that burn out manifest itself for you, Sarah?

Sarah: I just felt tired all the time, I wasn't really enjoyingwhat I was doing. I felt like, I wasn't really learning stuff, I was kind ofjust learning how to do the exam instead of really absorbing content. And Ifelt like I wasn't really making the most of my time at university, and sort ofgoing through the motions instead of really enjoying things.

Buffy: Even professionals experience burnout, so Neil Wilsonknows of what he speaks.

Neil Wilson: There's a story I tend to tell from when I used towork with young people with cancer and I absolutely got burnt out in that rolewithin three months of doing it, because I just kept sacrificing and stayinglate and blah, blah, blah and “of course you can have a friend over, of courseI'll come in early”, blah, blah, blah. What I noted towards the end of thatspell of sort of reaching a more burnt out phase was that the quality of mywork was coming down. If you are actually stopping every now and again thequality of your work gets better rather than the opposite, but interns oftendon't have the experience or the objectivity to go, “no, I should actually justfight and work smart at the moment”. What interns typically want to do is workhard. Companies also like people who work smart. They love them actually. Soit's about stopping to speed up. I need some time.

Buffy: This tip is just so good. I have a confession, I say yesto everything...and at the moment I have around 5 jobs, and have tried Neil’strick of stopping to speed up and it’s been a lifesaver.

Ben: A day off, doing nothing but “treat yo’self” activities canreally help.

Grace Chen: Hi, I'm Grace Chen. I'm studying the Bachelor ofCommerce, majoring in economics and finance, currently in third year.

Ben: Remember Grace Chen from episode 2, where she talked aboutsecuring an internship at EY? Well, to be the best of the best takes an effortand that took it’s toll on Grace and she reached a point where she justcouldn’t handle it all.

Grace: Especially when exams were going on. At first, I kind ofjust kept it to myself. I was just, like, "I need to continue on." Itactually reached a breaking point where I was just, like, "I can't handlethis anymore," and my friends helped me a lot to get through it. Oh, Istill have a lot of club events as well. They said that “you need to dropsomething, you can't do basically everything. You're putting way too muchpressure on yourself”. Through talking with a lot, even with my managers at theuniversity, it lessened a lot of the pressure, and I managed to deal with it alot easier.

Ben: There’s that pressure again - we looked at where thepressure comes from in episode one and Grace confirms what we found, that itoften comes from within.

Grace: It's just that high expectations from everything. I'msomeone that if I'm involved with something, I'll put absolutely everything Ihave, and I think I spread myself a bit too thin last year. So I didn't evenhave much time for myself even, and that's very important to balance it allout.

Ben: But how did Grace’s stress manifest itself?

Grace: I stopped talking to a lot of my friends because I was sofocused on getting all my work done that the time that I would usually spendwith my friends, that kind of disappeared. It wasn't until a lot of my closefriends said, "Hey, I haven't really heard from you in like a month ortwo," that I realised how badly I had gotten.

Ben: And for Grace that was a sign that it was time to sit backand reevaluate.

Caleb Triscari: My name is Caleb Triscari, I was a University ofMelbourne student and graduated in July last year. And right now, I am aproducer for ABC Radio National and I'm also a freelance journalist. I studieda Bachelor of Arts, majoring in media and politics and I also did a diploma inmusic on the side. The thing is that in my first three years of my degree, wellI came from Perth initially. So I came to the University of Melbourne notreally having any friends. Not knowing kind of the tips and the tools of thetrade, and how to kind of get around campus and things like that. So I had tovery much learn that myself. And the way that I did that was by joining clubsand committees, and really really getting myself involved in those societies -especially through Farrago and the Media Department at the Union.

Buffy: Caleb’s story is so relatable especially for interstateand international students. Immersing yourself in Uni life helps withassimilation and maybe even warding off some of that homesickness. But can youdo too much?

I honestly did not find a balance. But I think what it came downto in the end, and I think it really kind of had to, like, I was forced to makea nice balance in 2016 when I became the editor of Farrago

Buffy: For those of your who don’t know, Farrago is theUniversity of Melbourne’s student magazine, and it’s the oldest in Australia -first published in 1925.

Caleb: Which was effectively in a sense like a full-time jobalongside my degree, alongside my other job at the University of Melbourne.So Ihad to find ... Yeah, I really did have to find that line. So I left the officeat a certain time. I went home, started studying for a certain amount of timein the evenings, on the weekends. I found it through forcing myself to do it,which probably isn't a really good answer honestly. But yeah, I worked underpressure basically. And that's how I really found my fine line between kind ofvolunteering and studying, and working.

Buffy: Self-imposed time management is one solution, but did itwork for Caleb?

Caleb: I realised that I was kind of very much burning out. Anda lot of it was happening in roughly mid 2017 as well. I can remember the time,'cause I was doing so many things. I just started to be really really tired.And I started to kind of ... My anxiety started to grow, especially around highperiods of stress, and when the workload was getting quite significant. Soyeah, that's when I realised that I was starting to burn out and I reallyneeded to just take a step back, maybe just take a week off or something tokinda just breathe and relax, and find my ground again.

Buffy: Breathe and relax - those are useful activities toremember to do in lots of situations. And check in with your support network,it can do wonders.

Caleb: I reached out to my friends. I just said like, “Hey, doyou wanna just grab a coffee and chat on the weekend, and just kind of relaxand chill out?” That's the thing as well, I was also neglecting my socialcircles as well, because I was taking on so much work, and it was quiteexhausting. And a lot of these were volunteer roles as well. I think that myfriends were very much like my support network

Buffy: And you may burn out just hearing about Caleb’sextra-curriculars.

Caleb: The main time when I was really really burning out wasroughly around July to September of 2017. During that time I was just finishingup my degree. I was also working at the library at the university. I had a rolein two arts festivals. One of them was Mudfest at the University ofMelbourne at the Student Arts Festival, I was doing their marketing. And then Ithink the fourth one that comes to mind is I was also a creative producer atthe National Writers Festival as well. Which is a position that I havecontinued on with, because I really really enjoyed it. Those were my kind ofmain four things. And two of those things, that the two festivals, they were... They weren't really paid. They were very much volunteer roles. So yeah,those were really the things that kind of added onto the stress and added ontothe workload. And eventually I kind of just went, “Oh my God, what is happeningto me? I'm burning out here. I'm going home exhausted, and I really don't wannaget up in the morning”. And it was just yeah, a lot. I have survived.

Buffy: Another tale of burnout survival - Tess’s. Unpaidinternships can put a financial strain on an already low-budget lifestyle.

Tess: This can be a tricky issue. For the first internship forme it was really quite an exhausting experience because I was working five daysa week at the community legal centre and I was also working Saturdays andSundays in my part-time job to earn enough income to make it work. That wasvery much a challenge, a financial challenge - however the caveat being for mefor both of those two internships I got course credit for those. So although Iwasn't being paid it counted as class time as well so there was that trade offwhich made it much more manageable. But it is a really, a financial reality fora lot of people deciding to intern when a lot of internships are unpaid. Ithink that goes back to speaking to the point about “well what's theorganisation you're choosing?”. I recognise that with community legal centresthey really do rely on volunteers to get their work done and serve the community,so I know what I'm contributing there is something really valuable even if I'mnot being paid as well. There were opportunities and I would advise futureinterns to look for scholarships as well especially if it's a universityrelated internship, do your research. I know of somebody who had quite aninventive approach to an internship that was unpaid, he went out and did aninternship and actually pitched an article and that article based on hisinternship and that article funded his internship. So get a bit creative - ifyou really want to do something that's unpaid do your research prior to gettingin.

Buffy: Working seven days a week is exhausting, even if you feelyou have all the energy in the world. With a creative approach like Tess’friend took, you may be able to carve out a bit of ‘me time’. But Tess? Tessdidn’t.

Tess: Yes, it was exhausting and I wouldn't advise anyone to dothe same. I felt definitely by the end, although I had a great experience, Iwas really burnt out. I think what it takes is a negotiation with your employerif you're working part-time early on and setting your boundaries. I think if Ihad worked one day a week as opposed, at my part-time job, as opposed to bothSaturday and Sunday it would have been much more manageable but I didn'tset those boundaries early, and my boss knew that I was not available Monday toFridays so therefore I was rostered on Saturday and Sunday. I thinkcommunicating really clearly as early as you can is a really important thing todo and it can be tricky and especially if you are doing shift work it can be anuncomfortable conversation because you don't want to miss out on your shiftsbut you also don't want to be in a position where it's too late to make changesand no-one can cover you if you want the day off.

Ben: It may be depressing to hear, but 80% of internships werestill unpaid in 2015 so plan ahead for your internship, like Tess suggests.Those coffees and travel are not free. This will help avoid additionalfinancial worries during your internship which is something Matthew Blundellcautions us to be aware of, but you can work around...

Matt Blundell: None of my internships were paid; however, thatis one consideration as an intern, is to make sure that you have the financialbackups, sort of looking one or two months ahead in how you can balance that.You're usually giving up two, three days a week where you are working for free,essentially. However, I saw the benefits of gaining experience and newknowledge over the financial motivations. I was quite poor during theseinternships; however, I was supplementing that by working in restaurants atnighttime. And another aspect that I guess everyone should take intoconsideration is also looking after your mental health while you're in aninternship.Those pressures of finances, trying to compete with yourself to keepup, working too hard. It's important to sometimes take a step back and ask fora day off if you need it.

Ben: Although turning up to an internship implicitly meansthat you are ready and able to work, the schedule of a student does mean thatemployers need to be flexible. But do they understand what their studentinterns are going through?

Dan Silver: What we've found is that the guys who reallyrespond to what we're looking for as a business, and you know about providingthat excellent customer service and wanting to change the way that Australiansinvest, that they're the ones that generally are pretty good about balancingtheir university studies with their Stake work, with their life outside ofboth. We want to make sure that they've got a good level of balance, andthey're not over committing themselves in any one area. But generally they'regenerally pretty strong at balancing it. We do make a point that when it comesto exams and stuff, that we give sufficient time off and we know thatultimately they've got to go and get their studies, and that's super important.

Ben: That’s Dan Silver, who is the Chief Operating Officer forStake, a startup that uses a lot of student interns in their customeronboarding, but they involve them in improving their real customer systems andthey pay them.

Buffy: No matter how supportive the company or how much you lookfor the brightside, sometimes you just want to have a good ol’ whinge...

But don’t feel bad about a bit of moaning about all thislearning, and figuring life out stress. Little complaints creep in and it’snormal there’s even research from the University of Melbourne that backs it up,no seriously, it’s true. It says that a low level gripe among colleagues canserve as a bonding function, and also an energising one, by helping staff andteams move through their negative feelings.

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