127. How School Leaders Can Beat Burnout with Brooke Carroll

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[00:00:00] Welcome to Mindful School Marketing, your go-to podcast for personal and professional growth. We’re school marketers, business owners, and moms passionate about connecting other school professionals with tools and strategies for success. We love solving problems, exploring new ideas, and thinking outside the box.

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Aubrey: Welcome to Mindful School Marketing. I’m Aubrey Burch. 

Tara: And I’m Tara Clays. Today we’re joined by our friend Brooke Carroll. Brooke is the principal, consultant and coach at AC Strategies supporting small school leaders. We’ve had Brooke on before, but today we’re really excited to have her join us to talk about burnout.

Welcome, Brooke. Thanks for joining us. 

Brooke: Thanks for having me. I’m always glad to hang out with the two of you. 

Aubrey: Absolutely. We’re so excited that you’re back as a return guest to our show. It’s so fun to chat with you. Um, Brooke, you know, it’s so interesting ’cause this topic comes up a lot. But to start us off, can you share, you know, what you’re seeing right now in [00:01:00] schools when it comes to burnout and, you know, what is, what’s showing up for faculty, staff, and leaders and your work with schools?

Like, what are you seeing. 

Brooke: Yeah, so, so just to contextualize burnout a little bit, it, it burnout is a phase along the continuum, the stress continuum, right? And so, um, we, we all working in schools is stressful. Um, and so, I, you know, I, when. Talk with coaching clients. When I’m consulting in schools, uh, there’s always something that’s stressful going on and people talk about that and, and we work through and we problem solve and all those things.

And, and I’ve noticed over the past year or two I. You know, there the stress is normal and all of that kind of thing, but there’s some people where it moves into, it’s not really normal, you know, it’s not just the everyday kind of dealing with, with stress. And so, and as you said, Aubrey. We hear [00:02:00] about burnout more and more now, and so I, I was got curious about it, so I started kind of doing some reading and so just to, just to put this in context, stress is a physical response to things that happen or things that we think, and it’s, the response is a, is a chemical one in our body.

So, you know, we get the, the, it’s the fight, flight, or freeze, right? And the chemicals flow the. The cortisol and the adrenaline and and stress there, you know, there’s some different levels of stress. Stress can actually be good. Um, it’s called eustress. And so, I mean, if you think about like getting married or buying your first house or buying a house, um, or I was also thinking like in this time of year.

Many of us you know, have kids who are like in college or are adult young adults and who are coming home. And I was thinking, you know, there’s some eustress there about them coming home and and, and that kind of thing. So, so that’s a, that’s the positive. We label [00:03:00] that and value that positive. And then there’s distress, which feels negative and is, is, is not so good.

And you know, and you all know what that is. And then, but then we have acute stress. And so that’s where it might be a short term kind of thing. So my daughter’s coming home, I’m meeting her at the, at the airport and you know, I’m like, oh, how’s she gonna be? And so there’s a little stress there. Some, some chemicals.

And then she. She arrives and we get in the car and the chemicals go away because it’s all good and it’s, you know, that was an acute kind of phase. Or I might get in a, a fender bender or something like that and that’s distress. But, but the, the chemicals kind of fade away ’cause it, ’cause it’s an acute thing.

What. What also happens is when there’s chronic stress and you can have chronic stress in your, your personal life or in your professional workplace. And that’s what I’m really kind of talking about here and thinking about is, is workplace stress [00:04:00] and and chronic workplace stress when it’s not managed, can sometimes lean to burning.

So, so that’s just kind of thinking about burnout and this continuum of stress that kind of, on one, one end is can, you can think about it as positive stress and then you can, thinking about it as negative stress or short-term stress or chronic stress, or really bad chronic stress. And then when it’s not managed, it gets to burnout.

Um, thank 

Tara: you. 

Brooke: So, 

Tara: yeah, that, I mean, I think relating it to stress is really helpful. But let’s go back to the actual word burnout. Like what does burnout mean? 

Brooke: Yeah, what does that mean? So, so burnout, we, you know, people have been talking about burnout for a long time, but in 2019, the World Health Organization classified it in their international classification of diseases.

As an [00:05:00] occupational phenomenon, it’s a syndrome that conceptualized as resulting from chronic workplace stress that has not been managed successfully. And and I’ll just say that some people kind of tweak that a little bit, that the word workplace kind of implies. You know, a professional workplace, like a school.

Um, and, and that is true, but, but we see burnout in any, any place where it’s kind of work. So caregivers at home, um, could, could feel burnout too. But, um, but anyway, so I’m gonna say it again. Burnout is a syndrome conceptualized as resulting from chronic workplace stress that has not been successfully managed.

And it’s characterized by three things. One is overwhelming exhaustion. So exhaustion that you can’t sleep away cynicism. Detachment. So if you’re starting to feel detached from your work or [00:06:00] or, or really cynical about about the school. And then the third is a sense of not being productive or effective.

Like, why am I even trying, I can’t, I can’t make a difference here. So, overwhelming exhaustion, cynicism, or detachment and a sense of not being productive or effective. So, so really anyone? Anyone can feel this in whatever role you’re in head of school, you know, to a teaching assistant. Anyone can get to that place of feeling those feelings.

And that then is, is what we think of as burnout. 

Aubrey: Wow. Thank you so much for defining that, because I think a lot of people assume it’s one thing, but then when you listed off those things, I was like, oh, I’m thinking early in my career when I was working at a school of working like 80 hours a week. Yeah.

Oh, mm. Yeah. It can happen a lot. Wow. So thank you for that definition. Uh, now now speaking of, you know. Leadership [00:07:00] in schools. Mm-hmm. Um, we, we often see a lot of turnover, staff turnover especially like from your perspective, what’s driving like that churn and how is that connected to burnout? To 

Brooke: burnout?

Yeah. Um, I think some, some of it is directly related to burnout. You know, that, that there are some leaders. I, I think some of the challenges that our schools are facing right now are really feel really intractable. Intractable and and that creates that chronic stress that you can’t manage and or feel like you can’t manage.

And so I do think some some leaders are reaching that burnout place and they’re just exhausted. They feel like they’re, you know, I, I’m not making a difference here. I’m gonna leave and let somebody else who can make a difference. Come in. I, I also think that and, and. I think that some people are, are leaving to prevent burnout.

Like, I’m on the road, I see it’s [00:08:00] coming. I I don’t wanna get there. I’m gonna leave before, before I get to burnout. I, I also think that kind of in our post COVID era there is more of an awareness. This kind of thing, as you said, you know, people are talking about burnout more and, um, and, and we’re recognize it and, and people are not willing to stay in that chronic stress.

And, and maybe that’s a good thing. You know, maybe it’s a good thing. And I, and I think that it that it really. Forces schools or, or schools should be thinking about what do we do to manage the chronic stress? So, 

Tara: okay, so if a school wants to take this idea of burnout seriously. 

Brooke: Mm-hmm. 

Tara: Um, as like a systems issue, not just an individual resilience.

Because I think it’s easy to look at it as like, that’s your problem. Right. You know? Where should they start? What are a few organizational changes that they could use to move the needle? 

Brooke: Yeah. [00:09:00] So when, so when we look at what. What are the causes of chronic stress? Like, what are the, what are the major chronic stressors in a workplace?

And this is kind of in general workplace, but it completely fits in schools. The top three. The first one is work demands. So if you feel like you have more work than you can accomplish, raise your hand in schools if you feel like you have more work than you can accomplish. Right? And ar just said when I was working 80 hours a week.

So that’s a pretty common one. If you have more work than you feel like you can accomplish. The second is about expectations and agency. So if, if the expectations for your work are not clear and you know, you think you’re on the right track, but you’re not really sure, and then your boss kind of gives you a weird look or if [00:10:00] you feel like.

I don’t have a voice here. Like what I say doesn’t really matter. And I’m not part of the team. So that’s kind of the second one. Those feelings lead to chronic stress. And then the third one is about culture and climate. Um, and that really is about those behavioral, um. Kind of trends, the behaviors that are typical in a workplace and the feelings that people have in the workplace.

And, and these can be with a supervisor, you know, so it can be this, you, you can have like a negative workplace climate with your supervisor, or you can have a really good relationship with your supervisor, but like the climate with your peers is not good. So those, those three are the major major causes and major impacts that create.

Chronic stress in workplace work demands too much work that, that somebody can [00:11:00] reasonably do. Clear expectations and the sense of agency and then culture and climate. So to answer your question, Tara, you know, schools and, and I, you know, I work a lot with boards and so from the board level this is important.

And then certainly at the leadership level, I do a lot of coaching with heads of schools and other senior supervisors in schools. And so, you know, we work on, we work on this like, how are you managing culture and climate? What does that look like? How are you ensuring that expectations are clear and that people feel like they have agency and, and and their work matters, they’re valued.

Those kinds of things. 

Aubrey: This is fascinating. Uh, I’m like replaying all my conversations with all the, the leaders I talk to and I’m, I’m just, I’m thinking about like, I’m almost. Maybe. Maybe if you could clarify, like, I’m thinking about all the leaders. We often talk about, like with small schools and leaders, you know, they have many things at their hat.

When you’re talking about setting expectations, I think about all the people who don’t [00:12:00] have clear job descriptions or outcomes associated with their job, their roles. So like they’re not sure if what they’re moving the ball towards is what everyone wants them to move the ball towards, and then all of a sudden.

You know, I’ve seen it happen, like the board says something or the head of schools and they’re like, what? Like what’s going on? And like, I thought I was over here doing my stuff. So that creates that additional stress. 

Brooke: Absolutely. 

Aubrey: I think that’s so interesting. And then the other kind of, I guess, comment or thing, when you talk about the.

I guess that peer, that culture? Mm-hmm. Like I’m almost envisioning, you know, I’ve worked in different workplaces. Like there was one where everyone left at 4:00 PM like that 4:00 PM stop time. Everyone, like that was the culture. That’s what everyone did. And then there was the culture of like, everyone stayed and they stayed late and like that was the culture.

Like something along those lines can also be culture, right? Beyond like just talking. A 

Brooke: hundred percent. And that’s, yeah. And that’s how I differentiate culture versus climate. Yeah. So culture are kind of the behaviors and the traditions and things like that. And that was a [00:13:00] beautiful example. Like in some schools the culture is we lead smack on the.at four and others there’s a culture of no, we say late and we work, you know, hard.

And so imagine somebody walking in to either one of those from the other. Right? 

Aubrey: Mm-hmm. 

Brooke: And, and so climate is how we feel about it. 

Aubrey: Mm-hmm. 

Brooke: So, in the school where everybody stays till six o’clock or seven o’clock, that might, they, people might feel great about that because that’s the time that they’re, you know, yeah, we’re working, but I’m getting to talk to my, my peers and we’re exchanging ideas and it’s so creative and that kind of thing.

And then somebody, a new. Teacher comes in from a school where they left at four o’clock and, and he’s developed a whole afternoon structure and he’s like, wait, wait, I don’t wanna stay till six o’clock. And so that’s climate. So that’s like how you feel about it. So the [00:14:00] culture itself, the behaviors themselves are not good or bad or whatever.

It’s how you think about ’em and how you feel about ’em. That makes sense. 

Aubrey: Yeah, absolutely. Thank you so much. I appreciate that. 

Brooke: Yeah. 

Aubrey: Kind of building on that whole small schools with lean teams, many hats type thing. You know, a lot of schools might say like, well, we don’t really have the budget to kind of, you know, do this complete overhaul to address burnout in our, you know, our teams and everything.

You know, what are, what would you say, like what are some low cost or no cost, things that schools can do to reduce burnout for their faculty and staff? 

Brooke: Yeah. Yeah. So if we think about those three things, work demands, expectations, agency and culture and climate work demands is the hardest one to, to get to.

In our small schools. We all wear multiple hats. Um, you know, there’s, it’s, there’s, there’s limited resources. Monetary resources, materials, personnel, you know, personal resource. [00:15:00] And, um, and we, and we kind of have to make, do and, and you know, in different parts of the country, schools, particularly small schools are feeling enrollment crunches, uh, you know, for a variety of reasons.

We’ve got demographics are shifting and we’ve got fewer children. And with the, with the economy, it’s just enrollment is is kind of a rollercoaster a little bit. And so schools have to tighten the belt and so, you know. Saying, well, I, I wanna teach one less class ’cause I am overworked or, you know, I don’t wanna do that after school club or that kind of thing.

Is, is challenging to be able to change if, if that’s the, that’s what you’re into. Uh, you know, that’s what your school has been doing. I think it, that’s a board level conversation of if, if, if the board want is taking seriously, not burning out their employees. Um, that’s a, that’s a business model conversation.

So that, that’s the, that’s the most [00:16:00] complicated one. The other two, however, I think you can do without a lot of money. And, and as you said, Aubrey, you know, just, just being clear about expectations, making sure everyone has a, a valid job description, and then having the conversation about, okay, here’s the job description.

Here’s these words on the paper. What does that look like in real life? That doesn’t cost anything except time. Right. And and, and then I mean, and then I would say the next level of that is how do tho that job description and how do those expectations then blend and mesh? In collaboration with the other people that you work with.

So on the administration, what’s the overlap, what’s the, you know, what’s the separation teachers too? So that work to clarify expectations. And it’s also, it’s also clarifying expectations [00:17:00] about, you know, everything. How do you. How do you let people know that you need to take a personal day or, you know, those kinds of things.

Those policies and procedures, making sure that is crystal clear. And this is something else I say about, about small schools. The goal in a small school is to feel like a small school, you know, this close knit, um, community where everybody feels known and feels part of the team and, and included.

And yet act like a big school. And one of the acting like the big schools is having those clear policies and procedures and expectations. So, so I think, you know, doing that, making sure. Checking in with people, making sure that they feel like they have agency, that they, um, feel valued. That kind of thing.

And, and PE people, somebody said this this morning, you know, we need, we need, we talk about differentiation. We need to differentiate for our staff too. Right. And so not everybody’s gonna feel valued in the same way. So thinking about [00:18:00] that and then addressing culture and climate. I really encourage school leaders to learn about culture and climate.

Do your own professional development about what, what culture means, and how it is shifted, what climate means, and how it is supported a positive climate. Don’t just assume, you know, because there’s a lot of information out there, good information, helpful information, and leaders. Have a huge impact in this area.

And, and they can inadvertently make a culture not so good, or the climate not so good. So again, I don’t, you know, you can do that without spending a lot of money. So those would be my recommendations. 

Tara: Thanks. Let’s talk about our audience who do marketing. Right. Uhhuh, so talking about marketing, development, enrollment, all of those things.

In a school, they often carry [00:19:00] specific pressure to meet number goals 

Brooke: Yeah. 

Tara: And deadlines. Especially as we come into this season of, of applications enrollment. Yeah. You know, what unique burnout risks do you see for the people who do that work, and what can heads do to support them better? 

Brooke: Yeah, I think of in our small schools often our marketing development and enrollment teams are teams of one.

And they’re not really teams. They’re just one person or sometimes even a half a person, right? You know, you’re, you’re half, half your foot is in marketing and half is in enrollment. And so I think that, that, I think folks who are, uh, a team of one can feel a lot of pressure and burden and responsibility for the outcomes of their.

Of their, their, their realm. And that that can create a chronic stress [00:20:00] that is you know, that’s hard to manage. And, and they might, they might not be making that up. You know, they might actually, people might actually, and the, their heads of schools and others in the school might actually. Be thinking, you know, this is all you and you need, you’re responsible for getting all the enrollment numbers and things like that and getting all the, all the fundraising dollars.

Um, and that’s not really true and it’s not really fair. Because those, although we need. People to lead those efforts. Those efforts are truly a team, team effort. Admissions is a team sport development is a team sport, marketing is a team sport. And and so heads of schools can be aware of how they’re, their staff members are, are feeling the director of enrollment or director of marketing, how they’re feeling, whether [00:21:00] they are taking on, whether they have a sense of like, I’m on this island all by myself and I’m, you know, people are looking to me to, to achieve these numbers on my own or whether there is definite a sense of we’re in this together, we all have a role to play.

And this gets at that, at, at culture and climate, you know, is there a, are the behaviors, you know, here are the numbers you need to meet, come back to me when you’ve met them, or is the behavior, hey. Here’s, you know, we’re gonna meet weekly and have a brainstorming session and, you know, all those kind of things.

And how do people feel? So I think that that’s you know, as, as heads are thinking about the culture and climate in, on their leadership teams paying attention to how, how they’re, how their behaviors are, are either making those folks feel included and part of a group or [00:22:00] isolated and solely responsible.

I think that’s, I think that’s one thing. I think that for everyone I, I, you know, I think, I think everyone needs to. Think about their own wellbeing. And this is, you know, stress. When we talk about stress, kind of the other side of that is wellbeing. And for those of you listening who are in the mar marketing development, enrollment, you know, if you’re feeling stressed, I would urge you to find to, to, to really do some self-reflection and then find somebody in the school hope, you know, hopefully it’s your head of school or somebody else who you can talk to about that.

Hey. I feel like I’m doing this all by myself, and that’s really stressing me out. How can we, you know, how can we problem solve that? So I think everyone does does have some responsibility to self-reflect about their own level of stress and then do some problem solving, solving about it. I don’t know.

Is that helpful? 

Aubrey: [00:23:00] Yes, of course. Thank you, Brooke. I appreciate those. I’m curious, you know, oftentimes people think when, when they’re talking about like protecting their energy, reducing burnout, you know, and we think about just as individuals, you know, what we can do. Often there’s that, you know, oh, self-care cliche.

Uh, but like, what, what can, what can we do? What are like practical, actionable steps that we can, as individuals do to reduce. Burnout and how can we fit it into what I know all those school leaders are thinking like, how do I fit one more thing in my busy week? Right. 

Brooke: You kidding me? Right. Yeah. Well, and that’s the, that’s the first thing that I talk about right there, Aubrey, is I talk a lot with my coaching clients about scheduling and I think about scheduling in chunks, daily scheduling, weekly scheduling, monthly scheduling, and quarterly scheduling and and that.

That you, that we all, again, it, I mean, there’s, there’s a, [00:24:00] there’s a responsibility for self care that that think about your day. What is it in your day that you need to do to manage your time and your energy? And I think, and I, I talk about those two things. So there’s time management, like how am I gonna get all the work done?

But energy management too, some of us are early birds, you know, get to work early and that’s our best thinking time. Some of us are not early birth, you know, and their best thinking time is. In the afternoon, that’s when I particularly wanna take a nap. So, so I don’t schedule my, my really intense thinking time in the afternoon as much as possible, right?

So, so think about your schedule. What do you need to do to restore your energy on a daily basis, on a weekly basis, on a monthly basis, on a quarterly basis? So that’s the first, that’s the first step. The second step, and I, I just referred to it as wellness, and I think of it [00:25:00] as putting your oxygen mask on.

You know, um, and I talk about that a lot with, with the leaders that I coach, is that you cannot be a good leader if you are. Chronically stressed or have gotten over and shifted over into burnout, you are gonna be ineffective. ‘Cause remember, burnout is exhaustion, cynicism, or detachment. If you’re detaching, you can’t be effective, and a sense of not being productive or effective.

So wellness is not a like. I’ll get to that sometime, or it’s a nice to have wellness and, and this is physical wellness, emotional wellness, spiritual sleep, exercise, all those things is, is, is critical to your ability to be an effective leader. So, so scheduling, paying attention to wellness, whatever that means for you.

And it’s, there’s not, it’s not just one size of fits all. The third one is ask for help. [00:26:00] That’s hard for some people. And, and you’re you know, it’s, it’s lonely at the top and there are maybe not anybody within your school who you can really say, gosh, I am feeling really stressed and on the road to burnout and I need some help.

Problem solving, how I can schedule, how I can how I can make my own wellness a priority. So find that person. Whoever it might be. Hopefully our school leaders have a coach. And you know, and that’s somebody you can talk to, but find a trusted person who can help you problem solve what you need to do around chronic stress and, and approaching burnout.

And the last one is, is probably the hardest one, but it’s about mindset. And you know, and there’s a whole, there’s a whole realm of of research on resilience and, you know, and some people are just. Kind of have developed a resiliency [00:27:00] that protects them against burnout. And it doesn’t mean that they can’t get to burnout.

It protects them against burnout. And, and a lot of that has to do with mindset. And, and there’s also, you know, gratitude and and, and framing and all of that work and that, I mean, that’s a whole nother conversation, um, about mindset. But you know, so, so. So to get back to your question, Aubrey, you know, I think the self-care cliches like a massage is gonna feel good.

Is that going to get you out of burnout? Probably not. You know, is that gonna manage your chronic stress, yet? Probably not. Regular massages that allow you a time to disconnect. Change your mindset, you know, that kind of thing. Perhaps that could do that. So, um, so I do think it’s about everybody taking that step back and saying, what do I [00:28:00] need?

You know, given what I know about myself to, to schedule in time where I can manage my stress. 

Tara: Thank you. It’s really helpful. It’s a really, it is a, I mean, this season that we’re, you know, that we’re in, in, in the world and in work and in schools, it is rife with stress and, and burnout. As you, you know, as you’ve clearly said, is.

Is part of that. So, I really appreciate the, just the definition too, because I, I hadn’t really thought about things like being cynical as being part of burnout. Mm-hmm. So, um, that’s super interesting. Thank you. 

Brooke: Yeah. 

Tara: Thank you for all of this great information. We are gonna move into our fun rapid fire questions now.

And I know we’ve asked you these before, so we’ll see if they’ve changed. 

Brooke: Oh. 

Tara: The first one is, I can’t remember. I’m gonna tell you. The first one is, if you could put one book on the high school mandatory reading [00:29:00] list, what would it be? 

Brooke: I, you know, I’m, I’ve struggled with this one. I, I was saying, I can’t remember what I said before.

I, I think that I don’t have one book, I don’t have a title, but I think I would love for our high school students to understand about financial management. So. Something about financial management and managing their finances. So there you go. 

Tara: All right. Last time it was 365 days of Wonder. 

Brooke: Oh, that’s a good one.

Tara: Yeah. 

Aubrey: That’s awesome, Brooke. I too wish there was more in the high school curriculum about finance. Brooke what is one app you couldn’t live without? 

Brooke: My calendar.

Tara: Next rapid fire question. What are you reading right now? 

Brooke: I’m reading Think Again by Adam Grant. 

Tara: Mm. Love him. 

Brooke: Having fun with that one. Oh, 

Aubrey: and what is one great piece of advice you’d like to leave us with? 

Brooke: Well, I think, I think in the theme of, uh, managing stress take care of yourself. It’s [00:30:00] important. You all are doing really important work and and we need you to be healthy and strong, so take care of yourself.

Tara: Thank you. That’s beautiful. Yeah, this has been great. Really appreciate it and it’s great to see you as always. Where can people find you online? 

Brooke: I’m at AC Strategies. Www ac strategies.com is my website. I’m on LinkedIn. I think it’s Brooke or it’s AC strategy, something like that. 

Tara: We’ll put it in the show notes correctly promise.

Brooke: Okay, good. 

Aubrey: It’s always a pleasure to talk with you. Have a great day, Brooke. 

Brooke: Thank you. Take care. You too. 

Aubrey: Take care.

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