Burnout contagion across entire organizations

Burnout is a well-known occupational phenomenon with significant adverse effects on individuals, workplaces and organizations. Despite growing recognition of burnout's potential to spread among employees, existing theories, research, and interventions have largely concentrated on contagion within work teams or have failed to clearly distinguish between intra-group and inter-group sources and dynamics of contagion. This narrow focus overlooks the fact that organizational structures frequently involve cross-group collaboration and other dynamics, that can enable burnout to spread through various channels and (possibly) mechanisms. This project aims to develop a theoretical framework for understanding how burnout might spread across entire organizations. By using empirical data and potentially agent-based models, the project will investigate how burnout can move across team boundaries and be affected by broader organizational dynamics. The expected outcomes will enhance our understanding of burnout, contribute to the development of preventive strategies, and help in the development of effective approaches to address its widespread impact, which is currently primarily confined to the individual and team levels.