Burnout Prevention: A Humanistic Perspective and Structured Group Supervision Activity

The consequences of burnout, including therapeutic ineffectiveness, premature occupational attrition, depression, and substance abuse, are potentially serious for counselors, both personally and professionally. After identifying the characteristics of burnout in professional counseling and introducing a humanistic existential theoretical model of burnout, the author presents a humanistic approach to burnout prevention through a structured group supervision activity. ********** Burnout is a form of impairment that affects all aspects of a counselor's functioning, not just his or her professional abilities. In addition, counselors may have increased susceptibility to burnout because of their training to be empathic, which is essential to the formation of a therapeutic relationship. In fact, research has found counselor empathy to account for two thirds of the variance in supporting clients' positive behavioral change (Miller & Rollnick, 2002). Empathy helps counselors understand the client's experience, but at the same time, a counselor may experience the emotional pain of multiple traumatized clients. As Larson (1993) summarized, "empathy is a double-edged sword; it is simultaneously your greatest asset and a point of real vulnerability" (p. 30); therefore, a fundamental skill of effective counselors, being empathic, may place counselors at high risk for burnout. The relationship between counselor and client is the foundation of therapeutic effectiveness. That is, counseling is an interpersonal relationship whereby the more the counselor becomes a real person and avoids self-protection or professional depersonalization, the more the client reciprocates and changes in a constructive way (Rogers, 1980/1995). Burnout is a psychological syndrome embedded in the context of a complex interpersonal relationship involving the person's concept of both self and others in which chronic stress leads to emotional depletion and then to cynicism and a detachment response (Maslach, Schaufeli, & Leiter, 2001). Therefore, burnout can have a serious effect on the counselor's abilities to establish a therapeutic relationship, maintain professional responsibilities, and manage self-care (Lambie, 2002). Sadly, findings from national survey research studies of counseling professionals in human service settings have shown the incidence of burnout to be approximately 39% (Ackerley, Burnell, Holder, & Kurdek, 1988; Fishbach & Tidwell, 1994; Golembiewski & Munzenrider, 1988). Although counselors may receive training to help individuals with severe presenting problems, they receive little or no training in how to deal with their own stress (Emerson & Markos, 1996). As Carl Rogers (1980/1995), a founder of the counseling profession, wrote of himself at age 75, "I have always been better at caring for and looking after others than I have been at caring for myself. But in these later years, I have made progress" (p. 80). Overall, counselors and other human service providers are at higher risk of burnout than are other professionals (Maslach et al., 2001; Pines, Aronson, & Kafry, 1981; Poliks, 1990). Counseling professionals are often in close contact with people who are in pain and distress. This continuous exposure to others' despair, combined with rare opportunities to share the benefits of clients' successes, heightens counselors' risk for burnout (Ackerley et al., 1988; Maslach et al., 2001; Pines & Aronson, 1988; Schaufeli, Marek, & Maslach, 1993; Skaggs, 1999). In addition, common counselor qualities of being selfless (i.e., putting others first), working long hours, and doing whatever it takes to help a client place them at higher susceptibility to burnout (Maslach & Goldberg, 1998). As a result, counselors may themselves need assistance in dealing with the emotional pressures of their work (Fishbach & Tidwell, 1994). The purpose of this article is to serve as a resource for professional counselors, counselor educators, and clinical supervisors through providing practical information related to burnout and its prevention and presenting a structured group supervision activity that may assist in the prevention of burnout. …