I have only a little experience here (I realized I very nearly burned out once but only after I narrowly avoided it mostly through luck) but personally I find the best way to ward off burnout is realistic planning.
He absolutely nails it when he says:
The best way to stop burnout is to avoid it entirely through balanced behavior and thinking.
It's definitely important for an employee to pace himself appropriately but it's also equally important for milestones from on high (whether they be one week or 2 months out (any non-vague deadline planned for longer than 2-3 months is bound to be ripe with failure)) to be both realistic and challenging. Not 24 hour death march challenging, challenging that you have to plan your time appropriately and, when working, you work efficiently.
In my experience the major driver of burnout is bad planning. I also think this is a large part of why our type prefer startups. Because startups do very little planning compared to BigCos, it's mostly up to the employees to manage their time effectively. Of course, the pressure is there to do as much as you can but it's tempered by not having completely arbitrary nonnegotiable deadlines that you absolutely have to come through on. (The deadlines you do have to come through on in startups are usually not arbitrary which makes a world of difference when trying to meet them.) When planning is out of sync with provided value it burns people out.
He absolutely nails it when he says: The best way to stop burnout is to avoid it entirely through balanced behavior and thinking.
It's definitely important for an employee to pace himself appropriately but it's also equally important for milestones from on high (whether they be one week or 2 months out (any non-vague deadline planned for longer than 2-3 months is bound to be ripe with failure)) to be both realistic and challenging. Not 24 hour death march challenging, challenging that you have to plan your time appropriately and, when working, you work efficiently.
In my experience the major driver of burnout is bad planning. I also think this is a large part of why our type prefer startups. Because startups do very little planning compared to BigCos, it's mostly up to the employees to manage their time effectively. Of course, the pressure is there to do as much as you can but it's tempered by not having completely arbitrary nonnegotiable deadlines that you absolutely have to come through on. (The deadlines you do have to come through on in startups are usually not arbitrary which makes a world of difference when trying to meet them.) When planning is out of sync with provided value it burns people out.