Experiencing Burnout as a Contractor

Knowing When It’s Time to Take a Break

Every professional in every industry will at one point in their career experience burnout. It’s important to avoid this as much as possible to maintain quality of work, customer relationships and your own health. This is especially true in the trades and applies to anyone working in contracting work. Whether you’re an electrician, a home builder, a painter or working in any other trade, knowing when to take a break is a must.

You Feel Tired of the Work

Your trade is your passion and you should love it. For any business owners reading this blog, you especially know this is true. You started your business to get away from the typical 9-5 schedule and you need to keep the passion for your business. However, overworking will lead to burnout and you’ll begin feeling tired of the work. If you’ve started to feel this way in your day-to-day work, it’s time to take a break.

You Feel Physically Ill

There’s nothing worse than feeling physically sick of working. You may be experiencing back pain, neck pain, headaches, and the like, which are all good signals from your body that you are burning out. If you’re someone who has been taking more and more time to visit your chiropractor due to pain, it will only lead to feeling worse and it means it’s time for you to take a break.

You Begin Arguing with Customers

Another tell-tale sign of burnout for a contractor is a damaged relationship with customers. Arguing over petty details, project length, costs, and due dates will happen more and more when you’re experiencing a feeling of burnout. If you have found yourself annoyed with customers as of late, it’s time to step back and take a break. Let your customers know you’ll be taking off for a week and you’ll return with a much better attitude.

You Take Work Home with You

Like arguing with customers, it’s common to take the everyday stressors of a contractor’s life home to where you begin arguing with family members. Likewise, you may feel stressed out more at home when your home is supposed to be your place of solace and comfort. If you feel like you have been taking work home with you and have felt more stressed out lately, it’s time to schedule a break.

You Start Making Costly Mistakes

Perhaps the most costly sign of burnout for a contractor is making mistakes on projects. If you’ve noticed common tasks and projects become more difficult because you have too much going on, it’s a good sign that you need to take a break. Don’t let burnout interfere with your quality of work; take a much-needed break and continue to deliver great work for your customers.

What You Can Do

Not every contractor can up and take time off for a few weeks. In fact, most contractors and business owners work 6 days a week, which makes this idea nearly impossible. However, everyone can plan. If you beginning planning to take time off and let your customers know well in advance of any upcoming projects, you’ll be able to take time off while still successfully running your business.

 

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