Narrator: You're listening to the humans of DevOps podcast, a

podcast focused on advancing the humans of DevOps through skills,

knowledge, ideas and learning, or the SK il framework.

Colleen Verriest: Especially if now there's extra work at a

certain point in time, and we all live in workplaces where

certain months are really crazy, or certain weeks are really

crazy. And if we just take it all on, and we don't

compartmentalize and put certain things aside, then we're sort of

ramping up to beyond, you know, towards that burnout place.

Jason Baum: Hey, everyone, its Jason Baum, Director of Member

experience at DevOps Institute. And this is the humans of DevOps

podcast. Welcome back. It's been a couple of weeks. I hope you

enjoyed our rerun episodes that we had planned for you. You

might remember from the last Live episode that we did, I was

taking vacation. And I'm back now, obviously. But let me tell

you just how wonderful it was to finally take an actual vacation.

It's the first one for my family since COVID. It was also the

first one for me in nearly two years where I actually

disconnected for a week. And by that I mean, no phone, no

checking work, email, no work calls, no slack, nothing. I know

shocking. It's it's hard to imagine these days. I found it

to be incredibly rewarding, refreshing, and it allowed me to

come back ready to take on whatever hurdles were coming my

way. And as always seems to be the reality after vacation,

those hurdles pretty much began immediately. I'm sharing all of

this because today's episode is all about burnout. I don't think

I need to go too in depth. To set this up for you. We've most

likely all experienced burnout at some point in our careers or

lives for that matter. In fact, a study by haystack analytics

found that 81% of developers reported experiencing burnout

due to the pandemic. When I looked into this deeper, I found

out that the phrase to burnout was actually used by Shakespeare

in the 1600s. In 2019, the World Health Organization define

burnout as a syndrome conceptualized as resulting from

chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully

managed. So according to that definition, individuals

suffering from burnout are said to experience feelings of

exhaustion, increased mental distance d motivation, and

cynicism in relations to one job. It also is important to

know that burnout as defined by the WHO is caused solely by

stressors at the workplace. In 1981, Lance Morell wrote an

essay in time that was entitled the burnout of almost everyone.

And that talks about burnout as the disease of the thwarted a

frustration so profound, that it exhausts body and morale.

Burnout in advanced states imposes a fatigue that seems at

the time, a close relative of death. So and that here with

those powerful words, and introduce my guest for today,

Colleen veriest. Colleen is the founder of Whole Heart healing,

and has been nurturing change in individuals and organizations

for nearly 20 years. As a licensed clinical social worker,

and nonprofit leader. Coleen assumed several progressive

leadership positions in the nonprofit sector in the

nonprofit sector, starting as a clinical director and moving on

to Vice President and then finally to CEO, Collins

leadership is grounded in the question, what is possible. Her

focus has always been supporting the growth of agencies and

programs, but most importantly, the growth of people, those on

her team and those served. She has found that leading with

compassion, flexibility and fairness has brought success

throughout her career. What matters most to Colleen is

leading with the heart leading with intention and a good dose

of vulnerability. Colleen is filled up by just being with her

family. She loves attending sporting events, and traveling

with her fiance and son, taking a run and connecting with her

ever loving circle of friends and family. Colleen, welcome to

the humans of DevOps.

Colleen Verriest: Thank you, Jason. Thank you for having me.

Absolutely. You've already defined burnouts Well, I've got

nothing left to do.

Jason Baum: I did my research but I'm, I'm not a professional

by any stretch of the imagination. Although at times

on this podcast, it certainly feels that way. I do not pretend

to be a professional. So I'm really excited to get into this.

I've been waiting to do this episode. load, mainly because

who hasn't had burnout? I mean, it's law, much like when we did

our imposter syndrome episode. I don't think that anybody, like

the stat was 87%. And as I said, with impostor syndrome, when it

was something like 80% of people have experience, I think that

that means 10 or 20% of people are lying.

Colleen Verriest: Or you didn't talk to the right people,

Jason Baum: or you didn't ask everyone. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So

Coleen, are you ready to get human?

Colleen Verriest: Yeah, absolutely. It's my favorite

thing to do.

Jason Baum: Yeah, as as a, as a licensed clinical social worker,

I'm pretty much sure that all you do is, is get human.

Colleen Verriest: Yeah, one of the things I said actually,

during the pandemic, to my team, in terms of the human services

field is like, the reason most of us went into it is because we

like humans. So when we couldn't be together, for those of us who

really thrived in that kind of environment. That was really

challenging. Yeah. So I like humans. I like connecting. And

I'm happy to get human with you.

Jason Baum: Awesome. I'm excited to do it. Yes, me too. And it is

challenging, right? So I defined burnout from a few different

people's perspectives. And I think that's the thing you could

Google burnout, and you'll get a million different answers to it.

So what's what's your definition of burnout,

Colleen Verriest: my sense of burnout, and I think you touched

on core pieces to it. But from like, a nuanced perspective, I

think for and again, you're right, I think most of us

wholeheartedly have felt this a different point in our career,

and even in our lives, you know, work is one place, but life is

another, like life holistically. So, and certainly our personal

lives can exacerbate the burnout, we feel we could talk a

little bit more about that as well, in our time together

today, but a big piece that I find is dread. You know, like

having this sense of dread. When it comes to work, that Sunday

evening bellyache, we get, you know, the that those

butterflies, the heart palpitations, the dread, of

going back to work. And that can be for a variety of reasons, but

one reason could be burnout. You know, I think also just a sense

of anxiety, worry, you know, can be a sign that something's

amiss. A lack of excitement, or enthusiasm, feeling detached,

you know, like, starting to feel like it feel as though I just

don't care what's going on anymore, you know, I'm doing the

best I can. But this is all I got. Overall, not being able to

concentrate in the workplace, feeling an effective, that's a

big piece of it as if, you know, what I'm doing is just not, I'm

just not performing at the level that I'm accustomed to, and what

I, how I would like to be performing, and not always

feeling as though we know the answers as to why, you know, not

being able to dig into that, and just a lack of satisfaction

overall. You know, those are some pieces that to me, but I

would say that feeling of dread is a big piece that I've heard

from colleagues, you know, I've experienced myself. And it's

really, the critical piece is paying attention to that, like

listening to that inner voice. You know,

Jason Baum: it's interesting, and we did say, you know, in the

reason why I had that, that quote, from time from Lance

Morrow, because I thought he said such he made it the imagery

that comes to your mind from his words. But he also went beyond

just the workplace. He actually called out. Now this was also

written in 1981. So he mentioned like, mothers and moms at home,

I would say right now, any parent, especially in pandemic,

there are elements of it, and I would just that just serve just

normal life, right? That's just that's just dealing with life in

general can cause burnout. But the way you just put it with

that that pit in your stomach on a site who has an eye, I mean,

that is such a calm, and not just for work. I think that goes

all the way I mean that can go all the way back to school and I

I know I felt it.

Colleen Verriest: Yeah. Like I remember in college or grad

school, or that break would end and oh my gosh, you know, yeah.

Jason Baum: Right. Yes. Even though you have elements of fun

and things that you'd like to do, there's still that that pit

in your stomach. Right that there's that. Ever, Hank,

whatever it is that stressor that you're going to have to

face.

Colleen Verriest: And I think exhaustion, you know, that you

mentioned that just exhaustion. Over, you know, your day could

be a typical day, maybe nothing extra is involved with feeling

white. You know, I think that's also something to pay attention

to. And just an overall sense of negativity. I mean, we will all

experience team members, colleagues who kind of think

more negatively than others. But when someone who typically isn't

oriented in that way, begins to comment in a more negative

fashion have more sort of negative things to say about the

work that's actually happening or the workplace or their

colleagues, then that's also a sign, you know, so I think it

can be a number of things, but I, you know, you're 100% correct

in, in alluding to life outside of work, and yeah, now it's just

our teams, our organizations, corporate structures, you know,

they have parents who also have kids, and at any given point,

there's a COVID outbreak in the daycare closes.

Jason Baum: Yeah, been there, okay. And I

Colleen Verriest: just had a, a team member that used to work

with me telling me that, yeah, all of a sudden, someone, a baby

in the room got COVID, or they didn't have enough staff at the

daycare, they shut it down, they shut that baby room down. So

what are parents supposed to do? So just that compounded stress

is really, you know, that's powerful, really powerful.

Jason Baum: If your listener, you know, I have shared it many

times, I constantly share about being a parent. I have a four

year old daughter, she's lovely. She is in preschool. And I can

tell you just in the pandemic a lot we we had her out of school,

and then we put her back in, you know, for it just got to a

point, right, where what's what's worse, being at home or

going to, and, and just since being back, I mean, they've

closed I don't know how many times too many to count. She has

joined me on conference calls. I mean, it's there's only so much

bluey they can watch.

Colleen Verriest: So true. I would like to be watching blue

instead of working. You know, it's true. It's true. Yeah,

you're you're one, you know, you're not alone. That's the

truth. I mean, I've been, I mean, I was held holding board

meetings. And my son would come in and say goodnight in his

pajamas. You know, so everybody got to know each other's

families and newlon in new and exciting ways, that's for sure.

Jason Baum: Yeah, in some ways, I think it sort of made it less.

It wasn't, there was like, no shame to it or anything. It

wasn't, yeah, not a taboo, like it would have been maybe early.

But yeah, it is, we're all on the same boat here. So it almost

lessened it. So I don't know if it necessarily cause burnout,

but the fact that you are on as a parent, and as whatever you

are in your career, whether you're a developer or coder,

whatever it is, oh, my gosh, you have all this going on.

Colleen Verriest: And you're not turning it off, and you make

that whole work from home. And I think most people I speak to

feel the same as that. Work was home, there was no separation.

So you know, that same table you were eating at, is now your

desk. You know, if you didn't have the workspace that, you

know, that's the luxury to have workspace in your house, you

know, so that really, I know, for myself, I had to be really

careful about that. Because I could you know, and you have

these phones that have your email on it, and you know,

those, they're always there. You know, at one point when my son

said, I want to throw that phone out the window. I want to break

your phone. I was like, Okay, that's a sign. Yeah, that's

enough. That's enough. So there are things that we can do.

Personally, you know, to combat I would say burnout that's

coming from our personal and, and work lives, you know, and I

also believe that management and leadership have a role to play

in all this as well. I think personally, some of us have

characteristics that lead us more or less towards burnout,

right. So if we are of the personality type that puts a

tremendous amount of pressure on ourselves. Okay, we're not good

delegators that can, can contribute to burnout.

Especially if now there's extra work coming in at a certain

point in time, and we all live in workplaces where certain

months are really crazy, or certain weeks are really crazy.

And if we just take it all on, and we don't compartmentalize

and put certain things aside, then we're sort of ramping up to

beyond, you know, towards that burnout place. If we, if we are

the type of personality where we really need a tremendous amount

of reassurance, or, you know, a pause now, not to say, that's

not positive and workplace to be giving sort of kudos out. But

there are some times where the leadership is, is also swamped,

and they just may not be thinking in that way at a

certain time. So if we have staff, and team members who are

really need that constantly, and you're not getting it

constantly, you can start to feel as though you're not

getting recognized. Why am I doing this? Why do I bother, you

know, and having more of a controlling a need to control in

environments where things can kind of be unpredictable? Right?

Those are things that also can contribute, I would say, the the

critical piece around our personality traits, and burnout

is knowing who we are. Who am I being honest with ourselves?

Okay, am I more or less like this? You know, and there's no

shame in that. It's just knowing ourselves. And knowing that,

what do we need to do to mitigate that part? In the

workplace, like who we are in the workplace? And I, I would

say in that, in that DevOps world from, like, in preparing

for today, and looking at that, you know, the burnout in this

area 81%, you know, that was specifically DevOps. Right, what

you were thinking?

Jason Baum: Yeah, I think it was sad developers. Yeah. Developers

that work. Okay.

Colleen Verriest: So when you think about the pandemic, and

then just having to take it and development and support to it to

the scale that no one was anticipating prepare for, I

mean, the whole world was working remotely. Right. So and

not having the resources or the planning to prepare for that. I

can't imagine what that felt like for developers, you know,

Jason Baum: and it's already an industry that I think is

synonymous with burnout, because coders all you ever think about

I think about the the movie, The Social Network, and you look at

the they had like the like a glimpse of what it was in the

early Facebook, and you're thinking about the Silicon

Valley startups. And you think about all these software

companies, and they're so cool, because they've got the ping

pong tables, and this and that, but really, what they're what

they're doing is creating an environment where it's normal to

be at work all the time. Yes. Right. And I don't know if

that's very healthy.

Colleen Verriest: I would venture to say, it isn't you,

because there is no downtime, going back to what I was just

saying, like, in terms of that downtime is almost a trick. You

know, it's like, it's tricking you to think that it's fun to be

you know, those are like, and that became like a movement.

Now, I don't think organization should shy away from bringing in

supportive things like, you know, downtime into the

workplace, self care days, you know, things that are nurturing.

But the same thing happens on Wall Street and some of the

like, I know, you know, hedge funds, and some of these offices

where people are at the office when, you know, the markets open

in Asia. And they're there till whatever time of night and

they're having food brought in and they're dry cleaning and

massage all this stuff so that people are there and and they're

there and they're there and they're working. You know,

they're at some point that takes a toll on most people. Now, some

people really thrive and this doesn't become an issue and

that's all they that they can manage that and that feels good.

But most people at some point in time, max out and burnout in

those kinds of environments. You know, in terms of the internal

peace, being something we have to pay attention to, and that

knowing ourselves there's also the external piece, you know,

what kind of environment? Are we in? What is this office setting?

What is this business setting organizational setting? Is it a

toxic work environment? You know, am I in a place where I'm

being supported? Or I can be heard?

Jason Baum: Or, you know, if you're in a toxic workplace?

Colleen Verriest: Well, that's a good question. And I think that

depends on the person. Now, if it's a person who if it's a

person who can really put on blinders, and doesn't pay

attention to what's happening, kind of goes and does their job

leaves and goes home, some people can do that. And we've

all known colleagues who are like, Yeah, I'm just here to do

my job, and I'm going home, and none of this affects me, you

know, then if you're more of a, you know, a tuned in a different

way. I mean, I think it really, it's personal, because what's

toxic to one person may not feel toxic to another. And, you know,

for for most employees, you know, having I mean, being

micromanaged can feel toxic to some people, not having a sense

of professional sort of latitude where they can make some

decisions and feeling feeling a sense of being affected. Right.

So that goes back to the micromanaging. bullying in the

workplace is certainly something that is part of or can be part

of a toxic work environment. I think something that contributes

to toxic work environments can be folks when there's change

leadership that don't, don't open themselves up to new things

and kind of hold on to the old things, and then spew a lot of

negativity against change, you know, in the, in the, how many

times have we heard well, we never did that. We never did

that before. That's not how we used to do things, you know,

well, you know, and that we're not doing that anymore, here's

what we're doing. And sometimes that train of progress needs to

move, and you either have to get on or not. So when you have

folks who kind of hold on to old ways of doing things, and resent

change that can can create a toxic work environment. A lack

of respect, you know, the inability to have honest

communication for some, you know, that can feel like a toxic

work environment. I think, I think employees are coming to

the table with higher expectations, and rightfully so

about what work should feel like, you know, and what, what

can be possible in the workplace. And, and I think that

organizations have, it's will be important for them to heed that

call, because retention will get better turnover will, you know,

you'll see less turnover, less burnout, really. And if people

feel heard, and if people feel supported, particularly when

they're starting to feel overwhelmed. And if they're

brave enough to speak up and feel like they have the safe

space to do that. And then they get the support they need, then

wow, that's a win, because you have an employee who you feel is

doing a great job, but he's struggling right now, because

they're human. Leadership responds, does what they can to

support them, hopefully, that works out and they feel heard

and seen. And then they're going to show up in a new, an even

more committed way. I've found that to be true. You know, when

people feel supported, and they're at their lowest or they

need to they need that help. You know, it's it's a win.

Jason Baum: Yeah, that's a that's a culture thing, right? I

mean, that's culture is the culture. You know, something

that you touched on earlier in the podcast. And you kind of

just said it with retention, obviously makes me think of the

great resignation that's going on right now. We'd be remiss not

to talk about it, because there is a movement right with people

go, although I've said it on this podcast, I'm not sure if

people are leaving their bad job going to another bad job. And

then someone else is taking their bad job like is that

what's happening but because where are all these jobs coming

from? But the one of the things that I've read about it is

interesting. There's, there's that piece of the great

resignation, where people are actually leaving, right? It's

gotten to the point where whatever their workload, the

culture, the toxic work, whatever the reason, because

it's often not about the money anymore. It's very much about

the environment where you're talking about. But there's

another piece of the great resignation where people are

resigning without quitting. They're kind of just not doing

their work. They're just gliding they're just I sort of just

existing without actually doing anything and kind of giving up.

And that sounds like someone who's went through some type of

burnout to me.

Colleen Verriest: Okay, so you're saying resigning without

quitting? So another staying in the job? Yes. Not producing not

not actually filling the objectives of the role, just

existing. But just showing

Jason Baum: up? Yes. Just showing up.

Colleen Verriest: Yeah, so that could be burnout. That could be

please fire me. For me, do for me what I can do for myself, or

pay attention? And I wonder, you know, how, how is leadership

responding to that? Organizations? You know, I find

that to be really fascinating, because I, in multiple

leadership roles could never just ignore that. Right, you

know, and, and let's be honest, not every employee of every

organization, you're not, this is the truth. Not everyone will

be happy all the time. That is the truth. You wish it were not

the case? Because you ultimately, you want everyone to

feel okay. But we're humans? Well, we're humans and normal.

Yeah. So it's not. However, if, you know, people are just

gliding. I think there's also, you know, there's this piece

where business folks that I've connected with recently have had

real difficulty hiring and replacing. So I don't know if

people are afraid to confront that sort of gliding, because

they're afraid they're not going to get someone to fill that

seat. And people have a sense of like, I'm just so tired of this.

So I'm just going to do the bare minimum. If that I guess and

see, don't roll the dice. If they're not going to get rid of

you know, I'm not sure that's a really dicey, tricky, dynamic.

Because then how do you know, there has to be some level of

accountability that that, you know, you still have to produce

whatever it is that organization or entity is producing, whether

it's human services car dealership, who knows what, you

know, you name it, I mean, you still need people show up and do

their job, you know, right. If someone's burnt out, then, you

know, ideally, from a leadership perspective, you have to be able

to confront that. And check in, you know, and create, ultimately

create a sense of trust with your team members. And I know

when I've noticed changes, and ideally, any leader that notices

changes in a team member, it's really incumbent upon them to

check in. It's, it's, it's a miss when we can and if you if

you don't feel comfortable doing it alone, do it with a colleague

that's non threatening. You know, like, Hey, call me and I'm

noticing this is not like you, you know, are you okay? And

that's the first step I believe in, in someone feeling

recognized, you know, if they're sort of showing up in a way

that's different, that can be really, it can be a little

scary, but can be very validating.

Jason Baum: Maybe that's all they need to sometimes know. It

feels like to me, right? Yeah, it opens the door, it allows

them to be like, Look, and then they can unload. It's like, I

got this, I got this, I got this somehow I got this too. How can

we don't have more people doing it? You know, they'll go off,

right? When you give them the opportunity to and at times,

that's really what they need. And then yeah, you hear him?

Right, the fact that you notice and can hear there's a problem

and acknowledge the problem is, is half the battle.

Colleen Verriest: Yeah, and I, I have seen that work in just the

way you described. And I've had a staff member where I did

notice, even in a meeting, if someone was just not presenting,

you know, and then here we all are on, you know, Zoom now and

so you're not feeling like that body language, but you can sense

you know, I think that body language and people's energy can

is can be a little bit harder to tap into. It's not impossible.

But I had a staff member who just wasn't themselves in a

meeting, I mean, just really not themselves. And I checked in and

then I asked if they were, you know, something going on because

you're just Something's off. And then I found out there was

something totally unrelated to work going on, you know, whether

these whether someone feels comfortable sharing that or not,

sometimes it can just be you know, what, the tip of the

iceberg, you know, and you're letting them know in this and it

has nothing to do with work. But yes, I have a lot going on. Then

you know, as a leader, this person has a lot going on

outside of work. How could Okay, and then the next question is,

how can I support you? You know, is there anything we can do?

Hear a shift here for the next week? Or a couple of days? You

know, it doesn't have to be forever, you're not. I think

sometimes people are afraid they're going to make

accommodations that they then have to, you know, hold on to

forever. But that's not the case.

Jason Baum: Or that there's no one like that, that no one wants

to help or that there's no, I don't think and maybe I don't

want to speak for every manager that's out there. But I don't

think there is any manager who is actively like, I'm going to

overload this person to the point where they're going to go

quit. No, no, I don't think that's I don't think that it

should be not the mentality of any manager that is out there.

I'm sure there's probably some some some bad managers there. Of

course, there are. But I don't even think for them that the

mission is to get someone to quit because why now you're now

you're down in a, someone to help with I mean, now you have

the workload on your on your back to write. So I think maybe

it is just hearing it and understanding what what is on

their plate under and then working towards how you can

divvy up the work past it, maybe some things aren't necessarily

as high priority as as, as they thought, you know, there's so

many

Colleen Verriest: things, right, helping someone prioritize, I

think can be really effective. And sometimes, in the midst of

being overwhelmed and burnt out, in a sense, it can be about

looking at something, reframing something, you know, taking

whatever those items are within someone's work life, let's say,

and being able to look at it with a fresh set of eyes. And I

think sometimes we're just in it, and we don't see it clearly.

And sometimes just having that conversation with a peer

sometimes who's not maybe you're not so threatened by can be

helpful, like, Hey, am I looking at this correctly, maybe you

don't have to go to your supervisor, if you're feeling

less comfortable doing that initially. And sometimes appear

a colleague can say, you know, can give you a suggestion. And

it can kind of open up a new paths, a possible way of

handling something or prioritizing something and I

think, you know, monotony at work can attribute to burnout,

you know, certainly I would imagine, in the developing

world, that monotony, you know, and, and this sense of like, is

having a feeling of impact like is what I'm doing really having

an impact. Feeling that sense of, again, it goes to efficacy,

you know, and, and, depending on what it is, that fills us up as

individuals like what energizes us, what satisfies us in the

workplace, and if you can find those things in your day, day to

day, where you can kind of get to those sooner and know that

you can maybe prioritize those things that energize you. And

then realize that the other things may be necessary parts of

your job. But you know, if you can shift them to like a later

part of your day, or knock them out in the beginning, but kind

of looking at your, your work life, your work day in a way

where you can recognize the things that actually you do

enjoy, I think that's important. And then realizing I'm not going

to love every part of my job, you know. And then being able to

kind of carve out those times, so that maybe you bookend your

days with two energizing parts of your work if you have the

luxury of like scheduling your own time.

Jason Baum: Yeah. And I do want to there's this word that just

keeps coming to my mind constantly as we're talking. And

it is. Boundaries. But before you before we get into that, I

do want to ask, before we get into that as part of this, it's

hard. Part of the same question is, you know, how do you avoid

burnout? And is it even avoidable? Because it sounds

pretty normal. But then the other piece for me because I'll

just speak about myself. I set it in the beginning when I went

on my vacation, I shut everything off. For really the

first time in two years I did that I've really been working on

boundaries. And I think for myself, I have seen improvement

in my own sense of when I am feeling burned out regardless of

where it is in life. I have the ability to say no. And not like

impolitely like nope, not doing it. But but you know, but But

thinking of alternatives, but also saying no. or delegating

like you said earlier trying to figure out how I was a bad

delegator before took too long and too much on you have heroes

right? You have the people who want to play hero you have

people who are like, I'll take it I'll take it I'll take it

out. And then And then we talked about that. So is burnout

avoidable? And, you know, how do we combat it?

Colleen Verriest: Yeah. I think burnout is something we can

mitigate. I don't know that we can avoid it altogether. At

certain times, you know, and maybe it's elements of burnout.

Maybe at one point in time, you may have the exhaustion piece,

but you may not be so pessimistic about work, but you

may have elements of it, right. So I don't know that anyone

feels burnout. 100%, for sure, but I think we have elements of

it that we can mitigate. And boundaries is a key piece.

Pausing, taking breaks, are critical. So just let's speak

about the boundary piece. And you mentioned it, Jason. So one

of the things that I think can feel really uncomfortable is

setting new boundaries, it can be uncomfortable for the person

and uncomfortable for our colleagues, because we've now

sort of created a new pattern of behavior that those are those

around us are accustomed to, say, responding to email after

6pm. And they want an answer after 6pm. So use an example of

I'm going to stop checking email at 6pm. Because it's so easy on

our phones, and etc. So, a colleague of mine started doing

that. And the response was, are you okay? Is everything okay?

You haven't been getting back to me? Are you sick? Are you going

for treatments, you know, that kind of thing. And in reality,

that person was really okay, and actually doing something really

healthy. So, when you do that, you have to be prepared for

people being uncomfortable, and not all the people in your life,

but some people because some people will never turn it off.

However, once we do that, I think it gives permission to our

colleagues, like, Oh, if that person does it, then maybe I can

do that too, and create sort of a culture shift. So I love the

idea of boundaries. And I'm a big proponent of that, you know,

stop checking it six, or 530 or five, whatever your number is,

you know, and then nothing is going to change that's life

threatening. With between five and nine or five at 8:35pm to

8:30am. If you needed to be contacted for an emergency, I'm

sure someone would figure out how to get in touch with you.

And most things can wait 24 hours, most things. So being

able to sit with that. And in I think because we're all really

wired now, you know, anything, we want to look up any answer we

want, we get it whenever we want. I see it in my son just

Google that for me or ask Alexa, you know, so we have to like

trick ourselves and start working with ourselves to take

that break key key. Because especially if we're not happy in

our jobs, why would we want to spend more time engaging in a

job that we're not happy in after hours, it's just going to

make that feeling of dread worse, and dissatisfaction

worse, because you're resenting all the time you're spending

working, when you don't like your work, or you're feeling

disconnected. So it's sort of a vicious cycle. I also think, oh,

go ahead. Did you want to say something? Jason?

Jason Baum: No, please go ahead. I was just gonna add something.

But yeah, please go ahead.

Colleen Verriest: You know, and I also think, in that when you

take time off, you take time off, this is just another piece

of the boundary that when you're on vacation, and for some of us

who've had different roles or leadership roles, you understand

that you're taking on certain things at certain times. How,

however, if you're on vacation, and this is quality time that

you've now designated, and gosh, we need to unplug, we all need

to unplug, you know, kudos to you for doing that. That was

awesome to hear that, you know, and then the impact

Jason Baum: comes at a breaking point, though. It shouldn't get

to that but yeah, right.

Colleen Verriest: Right. You know, it also, and I've seen

this, as I said before, it really does give permission to

your staff. If my staff saw me answering email my entire

vacation, what did you think? What message are you sending?

You know, I'm sending a terrible message. And it's not it's

ideally not what I want my staff to do all you so you have to

walk the walk. And I think as leaders we have to walk the walk

and also don't penalize anybody. If they actually do that, you

know, on your team. It can't be like, Oh, well, we're calling

goes on vacation. We never hear from her. No, you don't, you

know, no, you don't, you know, let the people on your in your

circle now. And really take advantage of that break, because

that will help. It will you will feel refreshed, you will feel a

sense of separation from the workplace, which then can help

with burnout. Ultimately,

Jason Baum: there are so many studies that have been done

since the pandemic, even just just specifically about what you

just talked about this time, right? And the fact that we do

need to have time to disconnect and that you're, I mean, just I

so many businesses are now implementing it. Not enough more

need to but you know, mental health days or an extra day

holiday a month or I've seen the four day work week starting to

really take off in many companies. I hope that's the

thing. I'm going to say out loud and proud. I know. Our CEO

listens. I'll say it now it's public. No, I've cuz I'm a

believer. And I've I've also read up on it's not just oh, I

want a four day work work week. There. There are proven studies

on companies that actually have four day work weeks, where

productivity actually improves. Oh, for sure. And it's because

the weight load is not you know, they're not people aren't

carrying all this for so long, and they get a breather and you

come back refreshed, just like I did on my vacation and told my

entire staff, you got to do it. Now you got to go on vacation,

you need to do something for yourself and unplug. So, yeah,

unfortunately, we're running up against time. I would love to

continue this conversation. Perhaps we should.

Colleen Verriest: I would love to. There's more to be said

there's more to be said.

Jason Baum: Absolutely. Colleen, thank you so much for joining us

today. This is an absolute pleasure to have you and talk on

this subject.

Colleen Verriest: Oh yeah. Thank you so much, Jason.

Jason Baum: And thank you for listening to this episode of the

humans of DevOps Podcast. I'm going to end this episode The

way I always do, encouraging you to become a member of DevOps

Institute to get access to even more great resources just like

this one. Until next time, stay safe, stay healthy, and most of

all, stay human. Live long and prosper.

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