2024 will be a Peak Burnout Year, Here’s How To Prevent It

Did you know that presidential election years are peak burnout years? We did, and this is why we have your back!

2024 is expected to be a peak burnout year for organizers. Election years are years when electoral work is added to the never-ending workload organizations are already engaged in. Additional workloads, hours of GOTV and canvassing, and the anxiety of the outcome are other stressors that can impact organizers’ wellness.

Activists, organizers, managers, and organizations need information and tools to recognize burnout and know how to care for their staff during election years (and during off years). Organizer burnout is why many organizers step away from organizing and movement-building work.

To win, we need to stop the culture of burnout and the turnover of organizers.

The Monarca Center is here to stop the culture of burnout and change the culture and way we organize in a fight for a new world. We can effectively shift the culture of burnout through education and awareness building. In 2022, we created a one-of-a-kind popular education training series to teach individuals and organizations how to identify, prevent, and bounce back from burnout.

What is Burnout?

Burnout is a special type of work-related stress. It’s a state of physical or emotional exhaustion that also involves a sense of reduced accomplishment and loss of personal identity. Stress does not equal burnout; burnout is an outcome of having too much on your plate.

There are 4 types of Burnout: Mental, Emotional, Physical, and Spiritual. 

Burnout isn’t a medical diagnosis, so it’s more challenging to identify and treat.

Here are a couple of ways  Burnout Manifests in Your Movement Work:

• Lack of pleasure in role:  You no longer have the drive or satisfaction you had in your organizing work
• Reduced creativity: You find yourself lacking creativity or producing new ideas
• Lack of energy & exhaustion: You lack the motivation to complete tasks, or you feel too exhausted to complete your work

We have so much more information on burnout to share. Our workshops are 2—to 3-hour sessions that introduce burnout and explore our relationship with it by reflecting on our work and practice.

Interested in having your organization attend our burnout training? Contact us today to set up an information session.