How I deal with burnout as a designer (may or may not be helpful to developers). Employers should take note because your designers/developers who are burnt out won’t tell you and you’ll just be wasting their times and they yours.

1. Always have a side hobby project to work on, preferably something small that I can finish and feel satisfied from completing it. This way I can still work on the thing I absolutely have to, but can get my mind off it when needed.

2. Sprint to get 70% done, but not finish. Then go to 1st item, and rotate back into the main project. Finishing a thing is super exhausting unless it’s so small that it’s not a big deal.

3. Work as much as I can when I’m in the zone, but don’t push myself if I don’t have any energy to work on something, even if it feels like I’m wasting a lot of time. 10x productivity in the zone vs. slugging along and doing a poor job when I’m drained.

4. Take many breaks.

5. 1-4 is mostly about avoiding burnout, but if I do get to a point where it feels like a long slog then I take many breaks and try to get inspired by other people’s work. Often looking at things that are not your own is enough to push me to do better without feeling terrible.

How do you deal with burnout?