# Emotional exhaustion: the precursor to burnout - **Episode:** [223](https://agents.truthliesandwork.com/episodes/223.md) (2025-08-14) - **Type:** interview - **Tags:** burnout, emotional-exhaustion, wellbeing - **Time:** 11:12–14:14 (start 672s) - **Listen:** [https://truthliesandwork.com/223?t=672](https://truthliesandwork.com/223?t=672) --- [11:12] John Michel: Yeah. So emotional exhaustion is kind of the precursor to burnout. So burnout is when you become so taxed, so stressed, And your body, because you haven't coped emotionally or physically, your body is kind of giving out. So we've all experienced burnout. If we've studied for too long, if we've worked for too long and we start to feel sick or we start to get a headache or we start to get really exhausted, right? That's kind of the burnout. Emotional exhaustion is where we start to feel emotionally run down. Sometimes when people are highly emotionally exhausted, they may burst into tears for no explanation. Or they may get, they may lash out, you know, with anger for no explanation because they're just so emotionally taxed. So that's kind of like the first sign of burnout. So it's an important indicator of wellbeing. If people are experiencing a lot of emotional exhaustion, their wellbeing is lower. So they're not experiencing a lot of potential life satisfaction, flourishing, thriving in the workplace. And that's an important indicator because that's going to explain how much people are able to bring to the job [12:15] Al Elliott: Yeah [12:16] John Michel: Are they able to bring their full selves to work? And are they able to, you know, be able to focus their full energy in the tasks that they're supposed to focus on? So what we found using social exclusion theory is that engaging in these forms of uncomfortable small talk makes people feel lonely or, you know, ostracized or, you know, or isolated. So they start to feel like, well, I'm not part of the in-group. I feel like I'm kind of on an island here [12:45] Al Elliott: Yeah [12:48] John Michel: If you will. And that starts to— so that reduces the number of resources that they're getting or the amount of resources they're getting from their social support network. And then when they start to feel stressed, they can't rely on those other people to help bring that stress down. So that one way that people often cope is through their social support. I'm stressed, I'm going to take a break and I'm going to go talk to Leanne about something fun, or we'll go for a walk and get some exercise together and just have a conversation about life. So that's something I might do. If I start to feel like I'm excluded or I start to feel like I'm lonely or ostracized at all, then I don't have those people to go to. I don't have that network to draw on in order to protect me against the stressors that I'm experiencing, which makes me more likely to experience emotional exhaustion. So that was that finding. that, um, that, that, you know, we identified in that first study was just that people do experience more emotional exhaustion when they experience more uncomfortable forms of small talk at work [13:51] Leanne Elliott: I can imagine there's business leaders, um, and owners listening going, well, how do I approach this then? Because if I, if I've got the awkward small talk, that's going to mean that people are emotionally exhausted and then feel isolated. How do I know what small talk is good for building relationships and which isn't? Do I just ban small talk? Do we just talk about work? Where does it leave them?