Teacher Burnout Prevention: How Does Your Team Digitally Communicate?
We’ve all experienced the annoyance of receiving a work email outside of contracted hours, perhaps accompanied by the nagging urge to respond right away.
When unlimited sending and responding to work communication becomes a team norm, it can seriously impede everyone’s ability to maintain a healthy work-life balance.
As a health coach for teachers, one of my top recommendations to prevent burnout is to set healthy limits with work communication, ideally as a team.
Doing so can help reduce conflict between teammates, increase productivity during working hours, and lead to improved rates of teacher retention.
So my question is: Has your teaching team established clear communication boundaries yet this year?
How To
Gather your team together, and answer the following questions:
Through which main mode(s) of communication (email, phone, text, etc.) would you like to reach each other this school year? Are there any modes of communication that are off-limits as a team or for certain individuals (consider personal email, personal phone numbers, certain texting applications, etc)?
What hours are appropriate to be reaching out to people on your team? What times would you largely like to avoid sending and responding to work communication as a team? What about for certain individuals?
What times are appropriate and inappropriate for parents and students to be reaching out and respecting responses from you and from teachers on your team? How can you communicate these limits with parents and students in your community?
In the case of an urgent emergency, how will your team communicate? What does and does not count as an urgent emergency?
Write the clear expectations for how and when it is appropriate for your team to communicate, making sure everyone is clear on what the limitations are.
Yes, you can allow for flexibility with what you outline above. There can be exceptions when it makes more sense to communicate right away than to wait. What’s important is that there is a plan in place, so that work communication outside agreed hours is the exception, not the norm.
QUOTE OF THE WEEK
“Burnout is a response to unhealthy boundaries.”
-Nedra Glover Tawwab
If you found this teacher wellness post helpful, share it with an educator you care about :)
Until next week,
Emily Hemmingson
Health Coach for Teachers
Founder of The Teacher Wellness Center
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