You may ask yourself, “Am I a Workaholic?”
You’re a hard-working professional.
You love your work, the sense of achievement, and the rewards it brings.
Like most people, sometimes you work too much. It’s the nature of the beast. There are times when you just have to push harder to meet a tight deadline or complete a major project.
But ask yourself this. Have you reached the stage where you always work too much?
Are you the first into work and the last to leave? Do you work evenings, weekends, and on vacation? If, that is, you take a vacation. Do you feel anxious when you’re not working? Do you think about work when you’re not at work? Do you go into work when you’re sick? Do you put work ahead of everything else?
If so, you could be heading down the slippery slope of workaholism.
Workaholism, or the addiction to work, is far more than simply working long hours. It’s a compulsion or a need to work just to feel ‘normal’. And it can have detrimental effects on your health, your relationships, and your career.
You may well be thinking, “But how can my working longer and harder possibly hurt my career?”
Fair question.
In our individualistic – and subsequently competitive – North American society, dedication and commitment are often measured by the amount of time spent working, the amount of vacation left on the table, and the degree of self-sacrifice for the job. If you don’t know what I mean, consider how many times you heard, “What a trooper!” when someone showed up at the office too sick to be there. And the number of times you’ve heard “Get a waterproof case for your phone”, said to people before they leave for their beach vacation. And how many times have you seen eyes roll when a colleague calls in sick? Harmless as these words and actions may seem, they can quickly enable those with a propensity to work addiction.
Who are these people and are you at risk?
The majority of workaholics I’ve met, both during my executive career and as a burnout prevention coach, have been well-intended, hard-working people who often have a tendency towards anxiety and low self-esteem. However, workaholism – as with any addiction – transforms personalities to the point where people become attention-seeking, credit-grabbing, blame-assigning, emotionally numb, isolated shells of their former selves.
Their intimate and social relationships fall apart, but they fail to notice or seem not to care. At work, colleagues describe them as ‘political’ and ‘fake’ as the workaholic consistently hoards work, avoids delegation, and always manages to be in the front of line to grab high-profile projects. While managers may initially appreciate their ‘work ethic’, workaholics soon fall out of favor as they become an isolating and toxic influence on the team.
How does this happen?
Let’s begin with anxiety. For those who struggle with any degree of anxiety, avoidance is a popular coping mechanism. While a completely natural feeling, anxiety causes discomfort and people will go to great lengths to avoid it. While some turn to alcohol, food, shopping, gambling or other addictions, many turn to the most readily available, never-ending, legal source of avoidance. Work. Anxious people can be seen busying themselves with all forms of work and work travel, all with the sole intention of avoiding having to feel. A compounding factor is that work offers both personal and financial reward, so it’s easy to see how work can be an irresistible temptation.
Unfortunately, busyness can easily morph into workaholism. Achievement, recognition, and approval reinforce the workaholic’s behavior, as they seek out more work in order to generate more of the same. If work is the addiction, then praise is the fix.
Praise causes a release of happy chemicals into the brain and the workaholic is immediately rewarded with a shot of ‘chemical confidence’. As low self-esteem is a popular bedmate of anxiety, the workaholic will seek out praise and recognition in ways that become detrimental to themselves and those around them. Embellishing their own contributions while minimizing those of others, hogging the limelight, taking a disproportionate amount of credit, and assigning blame when things don’t work out as planned are commonly seen traits in the established workaholic. They manipulate situations to trigger praise. As with any addiction, as time passes the dose and frequency of the abused substance must be increased to achieve the same effect. Therefore, the workaholic will escalate these behaviors in order to get what they need. And they do this at the expense of others.
It is perhaps not surprising to learn that, because of these undesirable behaviors, many workaholics lose their jobs. It is at this point that they arrive at my door experiencing their own brand of withdrawal. Generally, they present with crippling anxiety and emotional and physical burnout.
My hope is that as a working society, we redefine our measures of commitment and dedication to focus more on results than on the effort exerted to achieve them.
Yes, work hard. Be passionate. Love what you do. But please, don’t use your work as an emotional crutch. In the long run, it will only do you harm.
