London - Bosses who are fair and go out of their way to make their employees happy run a high risk of burning themselves out, researchers have claimed.
They say the constant pressure of monitoring and dealing with employees’ well-being wears them down over time.
They also warned it can lead to exhaustion and an impaired ability to make decisions.
The study at Michigan State University’s found that monitoring the workplace for fairness wore down supervisors.
“Structured, rule-bound fairness, known as procedural justice, is a double-edged sword for managers,” said Russell Johnson, who led the study.
“While beneficial for their employees and the organisation, it’s an especially draining activity for managers.
“We found it had negative effects for managers that spilled over to the next workday.”
For the study, published in the Journal of Applied Psychology, the researchers surveyed 82 bosses twice a day for a few weeks.
Managers who reported mental fatigue from situations involving procedural fairness were less co-operative and socially engaging with other workers the next day.
“Managers who are mentally fatigued are more prone to making mistakes and it is more difficult for them to control deviant or counterproductive impulses,” Johnson said.
“Several studies have even found that mentally fatigued employees are more likely to steal and cheat.
“Essentially managers have to run around making sure their subordinates’ perceptions remain positive, whether the threat to the atmosphere of the workplace is real or imagined. Dealing with all of this uncertainty and ambiguity is depleting.”
Tips for managers include getting sufficient sleep, taking short mental breaks during the day, following a healthy diet and detaching from work outside the office – for example, by not reading e-mail or memos at home after 7pm. – Daily Mail
THE TRIALS OF BEING A GOOD BOSS
The researchers said trying to be fair was exhausting because it required managers to conform to particular fairness rules.
They singled out suppressing personal biases, being consistent over time and across subordinates, and allowing subordinates to voice their concerns.
Employees might be concerned about not having given personal input for a decision, sceptical about whether accurate information had been used to make decisions or resentful about not receiving the same consideration as a more favoured employee, the team said.