Second probably only to the President himself, the White House press secretary has to be the toughest, most stressful job on Earth. We’ll probably never know exactly what tipping point finally drove Jay Carney to step down today, but it isn’t hard to guess. Anyone in the public relations or marketing game – for an entire nation, a small business or somewhere in between – has to keep a lot of plates spinning at once. And they have to do it with a relaxed smile.
It’s not hard to see why Fast Company in 2007 called the CMO the “most dangerous job in business”.
Over the last few years, we at LBC have seen a lot of marketing burnout among our clients, colleagues and competition. People get tired of relentlessly, day after day, struggling to figure out the next smart move in a marketplace or political climate and how to execute it successfully. Eventually the stress overwhelms and you begin simply getting angry at, or even resentful of, the business that you’re fighting to serve. Before too long, you’re done and simply want to quit.
We’ve been through it, too. If you’re feeling the weight and working to figure out the next move in your own life as a marketer, consider a few of these strategies.
Don’t do it alone. Marketing is a very competitive business, but it is a mistake to allow that competition to isolate you from other people dealing with the same problems. There are plenty of robust online (on LinkedIn, for example) and offline professional communities for marketing professionals. Find a good one, listen and read for a while, and start contributing when you can. Let others enjoy the benefits of your wisdom and experience. Enjoy the fruits of theirs.
Don’t try to do it all. There was a time when a single marketing professional could keep up with the velocity, volume and integrity of the information required for their job. That day is long past now. Every day delivers a new deluge of important data in the marketplace, and information overload is a constant threat to the sanity of any professional marketer.
In our experience, one of the truest signs of impending burnout is the tendency to want to do it all – writing, graphic design, website, trade shows, you name it – yourself, without relying on the good people you have nearby to help bear the burden. It’s a self-defeating strategy: one person simply cannot manage all the many intricate tasks demanded of a modern marketer. If you try, you will only invite failure, more stress and a faster track to burnout. Instead, build a team of trusted professionals and advisors to distribute the load and manage the flow of information.
Give yourself time. As Daniel Gilbert points out in his 2006 book Stumbling on Happiness, human imagination cannot easily transcend the boundaries of the present. Imagination is primarily operated using perception’s toys: when we imagine our future, we start with the image we see today and typically stay there.
Understand this psychological blind spot that we all share, and rather than trying to rush forward towards a future that looks a lot like now, give yourself adequate time to build the future instead. Human beings are not mentally wired to accurately deal with time, and that cognitive weakness is a major contributor to job burnout. So give yourself the gift of time.
Get back to the basics. At the root of all marketing is human tension, which is another way of saying that we’re all emotional creatures. Any of the tools of the marketing trade – from press releases to social media – are only adornments of the single question: do you want to see something you’ll like?
However, we marketers often spend so much time trying to keep up with the many tools and avenues and techniques and trends that we lose contact with the cool things that we actually like. And that ability to enjoy is the place we’re expected to lead others toward.
So get back to the basics. Look at your work and remind yourself of the moments when you enjoyed what you do. When you felt that what you did truly mattered. Find that place where you can regenerate, where you can mentally rest and heal.
Marketing a business today is hard, stressful work. It isn’t for the timid. But by understanding your needs, both as a marketer and as a human being, you can avoid the dangers of burnout and instead turn those insights outward to overcome the challenges of an increasingly information-driven world.
