The Case of Lazy Leadership
By Charisse Bayona (Bacolod City, Philippines)
February 21, 2021
IT'S 9'O CLOCK ON A BRIGHT MONDAY MORNING in August of 2019, but I am sitting in a cramped jeepney under the sweltering sun. I am on my way to the company I work for as a writer. Traffic, smog, and noise pollution diminish the barely good night's sleep I had. In an hour’s time, I arrive at the office, but it already feels like half of the day has passed. Thankfully, the cool breeze from the AC welcomes me with a glimmer of relief. I psych myself up that I can get through another week. “Think about your hopes and dreams,” I remind myself. But I spot my boss a few meters away, and I get flashes of long hours, tight deadlines, and emotional exhaustion. Instantly, I am filled with dread and anxiety. When I get to my desk, I take out my laptop and open a blank Word document. I type my resignation letter with as much passion as I had when I first started in the company.
Then, I hit delete. I never sent the letter.
Burnt Out of Burnout
I’ve seen the same scenario play out every single year – burnout – to feel so chronically stressed and depleted to the point of impulsively wanting to quit one’s job. But experience has taught me that if I hang on a little longer, it eventually passes, and then I am fine again.
It’s true, though. I did feel fine again.
After all, burnout isn’t unique to me. When I talked to fellow young professionals in high-stress industries, they said they experience burnout regularly, too. Raine, a senior account manager for an advertising agency, shared that a 55-hour week (plus weekend work) is essentially normal by industry standards. Chris, a Biology teacher in a state-run science high school, even quipped burnout is already part of his life, as he juggles the demands of being a teacher and completing his master’s degree.
As naturally-adapting creatures, we have already found ways to cope with burnout. Chris likes to take long walks around the campus and going shopping. Raine trains for football three times a week. I, on the other hand, like my alone time in a café or in the cinema.
Burnout is already a shared, common occupational phenomenon. The term has been around since the 1970s, and with its resurgence among overworked and underpaid millennials in the 2010s, several actions have been made to address this.
Many western companies shifted to 4-day work weeks to incorporate more rest. Books like The Sleep Revolution: Transforming Your Life, One Night at a Time by Arianna Huffington, which advocates more sleep for better productivity, became an instant New York Times bestseller upon release. And not so long ago, Buzzfeed News’ top story of the year was an article on millennial burnout. Locally, the ad agency IXM made noise on the internet when an article feature by Esquire Philippines revealed they provide breakup leave, “date your parents” leave, and dating app subsidy to make work more fun for its employees.
Suffice to say, burnout is old news. Using it as a reason to resign almost seems like a cliché. But then COVID-19 happened, and the world changed overnight.
Festering Wounds
When global lockdowns were mandated back in March, well-established systems that had always put the world in order were ultimately upended, including our coping mechanisms for burnout. Chris could no longer go to the mall for retail therapy, and it rendered this usually jovial and social person to never open his cam for any of their Zoom meetings in the last 7 months. Raine hasn’t stepped on a football field for months, and it has affected her mental health especially now that workdays go as late as 2 AM. “There were days when I experienced panic attacks which never happened to me pre-COVID. I thought football just made me happy, but now I know its importance in my life and mental health,” Raine observed.
When the lockdown dragged on longer than expected, everyone was eventually forced to come up with new ways to cope indoors, from whipping Dalgona coffee to becoming plant parents. Most companies employed life coaches to help employees with their mental health. Self-care has become an emphasized buzzword. But while the economy was shut down for an unprecedented duration, companies were also losing money at unprecedented rates.
The Philippines is projected to suffer the worst drop in its GDP among its Southeast Asian neighbors. This sent managements into full crisis mode that resulted in a heavier workload and longer working hours for increasingly dissatisfied employees who already endured pay cuts. During the first month of lockdown, an online study conducted by a group of researchers from different universities gathered that 28.8% of its respondents were already experiencing moderate to severe symptoms of anxiety.
Sad to say, I was one of them. My burnout worsened as the lockdown stretched on, causing me insomnia and appetite loss. In the middle of Zoom meetings, I would drift off and have existential questions about work and life – what was the essence of being more productive when a global health crisis was claiming hundreds of lives at the very same moment? No amount of "self-care" could make me feel fine again. It was then when I realized that our self-care routines and coping mechanisms to manage burnout were band-aid solutions to festering wounds from a broken and outdated work culture.
And so, I did a post-mortem of this recurring burnout. Much like why Chinese scientists swiftly sequenced the genome of COVID-19 in order to find a vaccine, I needed to find the root cause of this problem that has become a pandemic of its own kind. After talking with fellow young professionals, doing research, and processing my own experiences, I arrive at this observation – "lazy leadership" is inherent in Filipino companies.
“Noong Panahon Namin”
I am no business and management graduate. I am writing this strictly from the POV of a disillusioned employee who is hoping for a better “new normal.” Hear me out when I say that lazy leadership simply means a stubbornness to unlearn old ways of doing things. The resistance comes from a place of comfort and familiarity. Why change the system when it has worked for the longest time? However, many practices and mindsets that worked in the past are not only counterproductive and harmful in the present context, but also main contributors of burnout.
We’ve all heard “noong panahon namin” (“back in the day”) stories from our seniors and bosses – anecdotes of harsh working conditions during their time, but they sucked it up, did the job anyway, and eventually “made” it. Such stories are usually told with much pride, like a badge of honor. Everyone loves a good success story about hard work and perseverance. But there is an underlying danger in this mindset. Like the “resilience narrative”, it romanticizes suffering as a prerequisite to success, and as a result, normalizes unfair and unjust labor practices. And because such practices are the norm, calls for change and reform are deemed unnecessary.
Let’s take Anthony as an example, who used to work for a production company. During a management meeting with an agenda to improve workplace culture, he and his team proposed putting sleeping quarters in the office for some staff members to have a decent place to rest before and after consecutive shoots. He was shot down by management because according to them - “they had it worse.” A senior producer then commented that she used to sleep on the floor and she turned out fine. With this kind of work ethic, we all know she didn’t.
If not totally shot down, people who point out wrong practices are tagged as “reklamador” (complainer) and entitled (which seems to be the most favorite adjective of dated Boomers to describe the young workforce).
Mike, a freelance writer, knows it too well. The freelance industry is notorious for ambiguous, and most often, delayed payment schemes. Mike accepted a gig with an impossibly tight timeline out of a pressing need to make it to rent. But after meeting his deadline, his client kept promising payment was coming, until three weeks had passed to no avail. When Mike confronted the client, he said that Mike was acting up over an unfounded issue since a three-week delay was nothing compared to the norm. “Kung makapag-follow-up, kala mo kung sino ka,” (“With the way you follow-up, you think you’re some kind of big shot”) was the client’s remark. I was disappointed but not surprised.
Lazy leadership manifests not only in work attitude and ethics but also in business decisions. In a time of crisis, a company’s ability to quickly adapt to change could mean a lifeline. This is what Curt Nickish, host of the Harvard Business Review podcast IdeaCast, calls agile leadership. “In a crisis, bureaucratic rules go out the window. Companies go from having detailed strategic plans with multi-stage budgeting, approval, and operational processes to suddenly crunching all that into just a few meetings… Some breweries pivoted to making disinfectants. Practically overnight, some retailers added curbside pickup. The British company Dyson designed a ventilator in ten days.”
Even Vogue Editor in Chief and Condé Nast Artistic Director Anna Wintour herself acknowledges in her Oxford Union address that even a giant like them has once become stubborn with innovation - something that we can say, paradoxical for an institution so stable, trusted and has stood the test of time that it should supposedly be a space where risks aren't the devil.
"I'll be the first to admit that at Condé Nast we have been guilty of arrogance. 'We are Condé Nast. We have always done it this way.' We're so busy on working at being the best, being perfect, that we haven't always been open to disruptions or to seeing new things. So I hope that's changing because it isn't good," she says.
These are quite strong and compelling words coming from a powerhouse like Wintour. And its power comes not on its boldness but because of the humility it bears - a very essential quality that "lazy leaders" do not possess because they simply are (consciously or unconsciously) comfortable with practices they got used to that they'd rather rest on their laurels and fool themselves into believing that the glories of the past will never lose its magic. And whether you're a Silicone Valley bigwig or just a novice entrepreneur selling Ube Cheese pandesal on Instagram, we all know that being slow and resistant to evolution is just absurd because change - in whatever form it may come - is ever constant in business. The COVID-19 crisis couldn't have proven it more.
Sadly, for Darwin, a resigned employee in a production company, his management struggled to be agile during the pandemic. They struggled to swiftly pivot to digital platforms. “Sayang dahil ang laki bigla ng demand for digital content noong quarantine, pero nahuli sila sa innovation. Ayaw kasi mag-risk, gusto doon sa nakasanayan na,” (“It’s a shame because there was a sudden big demand for digital content, but they were late to innovate. They didn’t want to take risks, and stuck with what they’re used to,”) Darwin lamented. Limited local content platforms brought about by the constraints of the pandemic resulted in huge financial losses which later ensued the retrenchment of a big fraction of their workforce. Darwin was spared, but this significantly increased the load and stress levels at work. Despite being a breadwinner and passionate about his work, he resigned. “I cannot stay anymore and sacrifice my peace of mind, my sleep, and the simple gesture of eating three times a day.”
This is both sad and alarming. Toxic work culture is depleting passion-driven young people early in their careers. In the long run, this will have serious implications for our economy. So why can’t we just reform the system if it’s causing too many problems? For one, it entails a lot of hard work and money. Changing one’s eating habits is hard enough, what more of a systemic change? Aside from that, perhaps company leaders aren’t even fully aware of the scope of the problems in the first place.
Emotional Intelligence (and the lack thereof)
“Shall we have a Fitness Day for employees to improve everyone's health?” asked an upper management member. This was the suggestion to address mentally and emotionally tired employees. Anthony and his teammates exchanged dumbfounded looks. If anything, the management meeting he attended revealed how shallow their understanding of employees’ struggles was.
A similar, but worse incident happened to Jessica, also a corporate employee, who got infected with COVID-19, shortly after her grandmother passed. As soon as her test results returned negative, she was immediately asked to report back to work by her immediate supervisor, citing that urgent and important tasks can only be accomplished by her. Jessica appreciated the trust from her boss, but she would have liked some compassion at a time when she was also grieving.
Such stories reveal a shortage of what we call Emotional Intelligence. In her Emmy award-winning daytime talk show Super Soul Sunday, Oprah interviewed Daniel Goldman, the author of the groundbreaking book, Emotional Intelligence, which explored our emotional quotients. “The essence of emotional intelligence is a sense of self-awareness, a sense of empathy and compassion,” Oprah summarized. Afterward, she credited most of her success not on her business strategies, but on her empathy. Now that’s interesting.
One of the most important lessons of the pandemic is the value of empathy. It’s a superpower that only requires us to care, to be human. By being aware of and actually caring for other people’s needs, empathy has helped contain the virus by making us lookout for one another - patiently staying at home, wearing our masks, and donating. When practiced in the workplace, empathy can solve many of our systemic problems. Empathic leadership is the antithesis of lazy leadership. Imagine a work culture that is compassionate and considerate of employees’ needs especially at a time of difficulty and strife? For some lucky ones, they don’t have to.
Sana all.
The airline industry is one of the hardest-hit sectors during the pandemic. Despite this, Noel, a junior pilot, commended his company for handling the crisis with transparency. Employees were informed three months ahead of their retrenchment and pay cuts were proportionally adjusted depending on employees’ position and salary rate. The measures taken by management were mindful of their employees’ financial welfare. This sheltered Noel from feeling anxious over the derailment of his training. If not for COVID-19, he should have been a commercial pilot by this time. In spite of this, his faith in the company didn’t waver. “I know I’m in good hands.”
Empathic leadership also shines through in benefits that are thoughtful of employees’ specific concerns. Anne, a legal counsel for a telecom company, made me green with envy when she proudly mentioned how her current company not only gave them discounts but also offered a low-cost salary deduction payment scheme for their purchase of Herman Miller chairs (with prices starting at an average of Php100,000) to boost comfort and productivity while working from home. Since they are a tech company, they also had the advantage of digitizing most of their legal paperwork early on, allowing Anne to stay in the province with her family and work from home for the entirety of 2021. “Sana all,” (“I hope this for all,”) I let out a sigh.
That’s right. Sana all. Everyone deserves empathic leadership like Noel and Anne. But if we are to ask for change from our seniors and bosses, then the change must also begin with ourselves. First, we must speak up.
Play the Victim or Walk the Rant
It is a general observation that Filipino workers are polite, non-confrontational, and matiisin (tolerant) – sometimes to a fault. Speaking from experience, I suffered overwork – with meetings going as late as 4 AM – for years when I didn’t have to simply because I didn’t open my damn mouth when I needed to. Oftentimes, speaking up requires courage and confidence, and I didn’t feel brave and confident to raise my voice until I had contributed enough to the company three years later.
“It helps if you know you’re valuable,” said Pam, an OFW who works as a nursing aide in New Jersey. She’s been working abroad in the medical field for six years, so she has ample work experience to know what she brings to the table. Despite being a minority in a foreign country, her confidence in her competence made her unafraid of taking up issues with rude patients, or difficult nursing staff to her immediate supervisor. “Kung mananahimik ka lang, walang mangyayari. Maaabuso ka talaga.” (“If you remain quiet, nothing will change. You will definitely be subjected to abuse.”)
Admittedly, people like Pam and I are able to speak up because we have certain privileges that would cushion us in the worst-case scenario of getting fired or having to quit jobs. For a lot of people, it’s a high reach.
I consulted an expert to better understand this nuanced observation. Jayeel Cornelio, PhD, Associate Professor and Director for Development Studies at the Ateneo De Manila University School of Sciences, said that moral worldviews justify this. “For many Filipinos, they are in this job even if they don't want to only because they need to support the family. So nagiging matiisin ang Pilipino para sa pamilya. (Filipinos become tolerant of their jobs for their families). The other moral worldview is religious. To suffer is a holy thing, isn't it? It renders injustices as a divine will which should not be questioned.”
This is why now more than ever, people in a position of power and privilege, must speak up and take action for those who can’t. We are all victims of lazy leadership, but having the means to spark change and not doing so is being complicit in the toxicity. This is empathy in practice – feeling the pain of others and doing something about it.
In this regard, I feel optimistic. The opposite of lazy is active, and that’s what the young professionals I talked to, especially those who hold leadership roles, have been doing in their own institutions – actively changing and optimizing to a better “new normal” with empathy. Anne learned to pay attention to things that are immediate, such as family matters. This helped her to be more considerate in managing her team remotely, some of which are parents with children at home. Chris acknowledged that distance learning is mentally and emotionally straining to his students, so he keeps himself readily available 24/7 for a one-on-one consultation. Raine realized the trivial nature of her job in the context of the pandemic. She’s planning an initiative to partner her agency with a non-profit organization.
Hearing their stories restores my hope for the future of work after COVID-19. We spend one-third of our lives at work. If we are able to change its culture to accommodate more purpose and a sense of enjoyment while we’re at it, then that would be a silver lining to this insufferable madness of a year.
Humanity over Lazy
Known for our generation's acquired passive-aggressive nature encouraged by available social media platforms, a young employee would simply express his or her frustrations and rants in an endless thread of tweets like it would solve the problems in the workplace. Sometimes, despite being a millennial myself, it's upsetting and exhausting to read endless ramblings on private group chats with fellow colleagues or join nightcaps of cursing at evil, heartless, or dense superiors. And I say this not with condescension but with so much compassion - Twitter or a chug of a cold Pale Pilsen can only do so much. If we want to change the system fundamentally, we have to learn to end this lazy leadership by not lazily giving in to the system as well. Ultimately, difficult as it may be to admit, change isn't just on them. We have to be able to take responsibility for our own sanity and passions by setting boundaries and knowing when to say No. By choosing to be expressive when needed instead of just opting to be impressive like we used to. An army needs obedient soldiers but if you have a douchebag of a colonel, you better report it to the damn general, right? You won't win a war by tweeting about your power tripping commander anyway.
And to be fair, some employers would at least try to address these issues especially during fresh starts of a new year or in commencements of corporate plannings. But just like most failed new year's resolutions, the subject matter is eventually dropped along the way and as if they are programmed that way, managers start to regress into emotionless creatures when faced with the pressures of the bottom line. Efforts to improve corporate culture go back to the bottom of the priority list and turn into lip service like that of a politician's promised platform. Yet, from a business standpoint, it makes total sense to invest in taking care of one's employees because it is not machines, not mighty office buildings, not even your operational expenses or your money in the bank alone that will help you reach your ROI but PEOPLE - actual, thinking, living and breathing humans in all of their complicated glory. An inspired team is the most sensible and effective business strategy one could ever have.
Moreover, conversations on the systemic flaws of corporate culture can only move forward if we cease making it an issue of generation gap or millennial entitlement. This isn't an issue of knowing when to submit that resignation letter or not. This isn't about differences of values or degrees of work ethic because good values are simply not found in employment conducted with the qualities of slavery. That culture is just plain ancient and barbaric.
To give in to lazy leadership (whether you are on the managerial or subordinate side) is to deny the very essence of work - basic human decency. Work gives a person dignity. It empowers a human being to be in charge of his fate. But if we keep on looking at this issue as simply spoiling people or encouraging entitlement - relegating the young workforce into "mahihinang nilalang" (weak creatures) who aren't as strong as the ones "nung panahon namin" (back in the day), then we will never be able to make a fundamental change. We will always end up with the conclusion that perpetuates injustices and institutionalizes inhumanity: it is what it is.
But the pandemic itself is telling us that what it is is NOT what it should be. This pandemic is more than just a medical or health crisis. It has challenged and brought down systems. Paradigm shifts are palpable now more than ever whether in business, politics or in any institutions of power that even a simple work from home set-up that used to be a novel idea for business innovation has now become a means of survival.
Now isn't a time to look away or to just get on with it. We are all "grounded" in our homes for a reason. And being grounded isn't just a punishment. It is a chance to learn a lesson and ask ourselves important questions we would not have pondered on had it still been "normal". And now more than ever, taking stock to bring about change isn't just stuff of faux soul-searching. It's a necessity.
As for me, things have slightly changed, too.
It’s 9 o’clock on a bright Monday morning in November of 2020. I am out in the garden watering the plants under the warm sun. The water flowing from the hose, and the sun rays caressing my cheeks almost put me in a meditative state, like the good night's sleep I get every night of the week. I finish my task in 15 minutes, and I still have the rest of the day to enjoy.
I sent the letter – nine months later.
And this time, I don’t feel just fine. I feel like myself, again.
Editor's Note: Names have been changed to protect the privacy of individuals interviewed for this piece.
