Burnout

You may have noticed a rather hefty gap between this post and my last - and that gap was no accident. I’ve had a particularly crazy three months at work and I’ve been pushing extremely hard to get an important project over the line. It was my decision to crunch, but that doesn’t stop it from being very draining and taking quite the seismic chunk out of my spare time. Given that, there was only one topic it felt all too appropriate to talk about. Burnout!

Usually when I write these blogs I’ve had some idea bouncing around in my head for a few weeks that I feel the need to crystalise in written form - they’re fairly well planned out in advance and I know what I’m trying to get across before I start writing. This one’s a little different though; a little more off-the-cuff and personal.

I’ve had three times in recent memory when I could feel the tendrils of burnout creeping up on me, one of which was only a few weeks ago. Each time I’ve come to understand a little more about what it feels like, how it escalates, and what I can do to stave it off or recover. I don’t know if these experiences are universal, as I’ve never really spoken to anyone about them, but hopefully this goes some way to helping you recognise the signs within yourself.

The first time

I first experienced burnout in the run up to releasing DiscStorm with XMPT Games.

We had signed a contract with a publisher to release in six months’ time. The testers were lined up. The translators were lined up. The marketing and press were lined up. I’d just taken voluntary redundancy and accepted a job offer at Investec to start in six months and one day.

I didn’t have kids at the time so not having a job meant I more or less had as much time as I liked to focus on getting the game done. Aside from writing the soundtrack, adding the final polish and defect fixing, there was one major feature left to do: online multiplayer.

For anyone not familiar with game development, online multiplayer can be one of the hardest tasks around - particularly if the game in question is a fast-paced, real-time, single-screen shooter with projectile physics. Suffice to say, leaving this as the last feature rather than baking it in from the start was not a good decision. The weeks drifted by as I wrote and re-wrote the code, gradually edging close to proper dead reckoning and frame rollback. My sleeping schedule also began to drift.

Midnight… 1am… 2am… 3am… 4am… 5am.

I woke up, coded until I saw the sun rise, then went to bed. Some nights I’d just work all the way through and not sleep at all until the following night.

I didn’t leave the house for weeks as I felt the deadline looming and thought about all of the people I’d let down if I failed. As the big day drew closer I felt as if I had to keep going. I didn’t want to. I had to. It became very difficult to think about anything apart from the job I had to do. Anything outside of that became an annoyance, a distraction.

Eventually, the final day arrived. Bleary-eyed and running on nothing but adrenaline, I uploaded the final build at 6am. I showered, put on my suit and headed into London for an 8am start at my new job.

This was my first brush with true burnout. I learnt very little from it, aside from knowing what it felt like and that I didn’t want to feel it again. I realise in hindsight that although it was difficult on the day, having to start a completely new job the day after I stopped actually helped tremendously with how quickly I was able to recover.

The second time

It would be quite a long time before I found myself coming close to burning out again. A few years ago I took a new role - it was a new area of the business, with a completely new tech stack, and a completely new team. It all felt rather fresh and exciting. Soon after starting the new role the team I’d joined embarked on a sizeable new project.

Before I’d even been there a week or so, we were given a deadline. At the time everything was completely new to me about the job, but the timelines felt awfully aggressive.

I said as much, but it was clear I’d need to meet the date. It was a tough three months.

Last time the crunch had felt entirely self-inflicted. This time was a little different. I could give up but the pressure wasn’t just from me, it was from outside too. When it came to pushing myself to get DiscStorm out of the door it was my own project and my own company - it was a little part of me. That made it easier to sustain. This time was also different because I was a dad to a young child now too, so I couldn’t focus on it entirely as I had other responsibilities.

The first month was fine. I worked hard, but it was nothing unreasonable.

By the second month, I found my hours drifting and I caught myself logging on in the evenings just to “finish a few things off”. I still felt fine though.

When the third month rolled around I was working every hour I could in order to ensure I met the deadline, whilst still trying to hold onto some semblance of family life. After the project finished, I felt genuinely uncomfortable on the first evening I didn’t work and for a few weeks after that.

I felt like I had to be doing something.

I learnt a huge amount about my new job role, the new tech stack¹ and the new business area in a very short space of time thanks to that project. But I also learnt to recognise one of the most important signs that I’ve started pushing myself too far: being wholly unable to detach or feeling deeply uncomfortable when I’m not working on something. Once I took my foot off the gas on that project though, I had a good three months where I was simply incapable of operating at my fullest.

The third time

That brings us to today.

I knew what I was getting myself into when I committed to the dates over six months ago. It was something that would likely be very beneficial for the business and, due to a confluence of various bad timings, the only choice was to crunch to get it delivered or to miss the opportunity. I chose the latter².

Knowing full well that I could be heading into a brutal start to the year, I told myself that I’d ease off my work commitments in the months that followed to give myself time to recover.

The project got rolling and I began to feel the familiar symptoms: everything felt fine at first, then came the gradual extension of my hours until I was working every evening, followed by a discomfort whenever I took a break, and finally the inability to focus on anything else.

Something very interesting happened this time though.

I had an offsite scheduled which happened to fall the week after I finished on the project. The offsite involved flying out to South Africa and spending the majority of the week deliberately away from normal work of any kind. I was forced to do something very different in a completely different setting. The result was that, although things were a little stressful in the run-up, when I came back I found I’d shed any symptoms of burnout entirely.

This got me thinking about the first time I’d experienced burnout and how having to get up and go to work at a new job immediately meant that any ill effects never really lingered. It also made me realise that the reason I struggled so much after the second time was because nothing about my circumstances had meaningfully changed once the project was done. There was nothing to break the cycle - no jolt to the system, no moment of contrast, just a silent slide back into routine.

The last time?

I’m certain this is not the last time I will experience burnout. But I have learnt to spot the symptoms as they begin creeping in and be cognisant of them. This gives me more agency over how I respond. I can carry on, knowing exactly what the consequences will be. Or I can find a way to break out of the cycle and de-escalate things.

Whilst I’d never suggest opting into crunch, I’ve also begun to discover ways to help myself recover quickly if I do find I’m too far gone. When you stop, it’s vitally important to do so with a deliberate and meaningful change of circumstances. Work from a different location if you can. Book a holiday. If you’re self-employed, change the type of work you’re doing. Sometimes it can even help to pick a drastically different project to throw yourself into for a week or so, like DIY, family life or a hobby.

What it is isn’t too important, but it must be a fairly dramatic change of setting to help you re-adjust to a sudden and significant drop in how hard you’re working.

I hope that if you’re feeling some of the things that I’ve described in this blog it’s now easier to recognise them - and if you’re wanting to get off the treadmill, that you now have a few more tools to help you step back, step away and recover.