How Professional Boundaries Can Be an Introvert's Secret Weapon Against Healthcare Burnout
Professional Boundaries Can Be Your
Secret Weapon
Many in healthcare feel exhausted and stretched too thin. It's become the norm.
To make matters worse, there's an increasing sense of dissatisfaction and loss of control within the medical community. Healthcare professionals feel exposed to the whims and vagaries of the healthcare system.
Professional boundaries are one way to reclaim a sense of choice. They can be protective shields that provide a safe haven for your mental, physical, and emotional well-being. If you’re an introvert, they can help you protect one of your most valued resources: your energy.
When you establish boundaries, you name what is and isn't OK for you.
Having this awareness is essential for meeting your needs. At the same time, fostering an atmosphere of openness towards boundaries allows you to also acknowledge and respect the needs of your patients and colleagues.
To get started, you first have to understand all the ways boundaries can present themselves. There are numerous ways to classify boundaries. I’ll share seven common types of boundaries with you.
7 Types of Boundaries
It’s important to recognize that boundaries can be nuanced. Introverted healthcare professionals can use many types of boundaries to create a work environment that supports the well-being of all involved.
Here are seven types of boundaries to consider in the workplace:
Time Boundaries: This is one of the more commonly discussed boundary types.
You are a human with human needs, not a machine.
Time boundaries help you respect your time by defining clear working hours, taking appropriate and effective breaks, and intentionally planning how much of your time you want to devote to work.
Emotional Boundaries: This type of boundary can be especially important in patient care.
Empathy and caring are the ideal when delivering health care. Equally important is self-care, which requires a degree of detachment.
Learning how to manage your emotional investment at work is essential so you're not taking on the burdens of all your patients, especially if you're an empath.
Intellectual Boundaries: Your thoughts, opinions, and values matter.
When honoring intellectual boundaries, you acknowledge the importance of respectful exchanges with patients and colleagues. This may require limiting your exposure to negative conversations and gossip.
You will never agree with everyone one hundred percent of the time, but it’s within your right to expect that colleagues and patients share differences without belittling.
Material Boundaries: You decide how your possessions and finances are managed.
In the workplace, this might mean having a small space for your belongings that's safe from intrusion or setting clear expectations around shared or personal equipment.
Physical Boundaries: You get to define your comfort levels regarding privacy and physical touch.
Your patient or colleague may be a hugger, but if you're not, it's OK to say so.
Physical boundaries also entail your bodily safety and attending to your physiological needs. Food, hydration, rest, and bathroom breaks are necessities, not nice-to-haves.
Energetic Boundaries: These are especially important for introverts, who need alone time to recharge.
Energetic boundaries can include limiting exposure to situations and people that drain your energy, building time for solitude into your schedule, or learning how to communicate your needs to protect your energy.
Spiritual Boundaries: I've spoken to many who've felt their spirituality has been squeezed out of their work life.
Your spirituality helps define your purpose, your essence, and connection to something greater than yourself. You get to decide how much of this aspect of your life you bring to the workplace.
Though setting and enforcing professional boundaries can feel intimidating at times, they are essential for navigating your way to an intentional life. Healthy boundaries help you create the optimum conditions for you to thrive.
Because we are all unique individuals, your needs may differ from those of your patients and colleagues. At times, you may feel what you want for yourself clashes with someone else’s needs.
Because of this disparity, setting healthy boundaries can sometimes be confused with selfishness. Recognizing the distinction between the two requires looking at intent.
Setting Boundaries Vs. Being Selfish
Consider the following differences if you're concerned about whether your boundary is an act of selfishness or self-care.
Healthy Boundaries Encourage and Support…
Mutual respect by honoring your must-haves while also respecting the needs of others.
Well-being by fostering the conditions in which you thrive and reducing your risk for burnout. This benefits you and those around you.
Open Communication through a willingness to share your thoughts and receive feedback from others.
Flexibility in application. Boundaries can be fluid depending on the context of a situation or relationship. You're allowed to change your boundaries according to your needs.
Empowerment of Others as you model for others how boundaries can benefit them as well.
Selfishness Gives Rise To…
A Unilateral Focus in which you are only concerned with your own needs, possibly at the expense of others. This may look like taking advantage of others or creating unnecessary difficulty for them.
Closed Communication and an unwillingness to hear others' perspectives or be open to adjusting your approach.
Rigidity in application. In this case, you are blind to the nuances of individual situations or relationships and may enforce boundaries that are unnecessary or harm others.
Resentment when you make unilateral demands without respecting others' boundaries.
In short, healthy professional boundaries are acts of self-care that also inspire healthy and respectful relationships with your patients and coworkers.
So, how do you start implementing your boundaries? Here are a few ways to get started:
How to Implement Professional Boundaries
If you've never established boundaries, especially in the workplace, you may feel at a loss as to where to start. When starting anything new, a good practice is to keep it simple and build as you go.
Here are the basics:
Be Clear and Direct While Showing Respect: Start with "I" statements to express your needs. For example, "I need 10 minutes of uninterrupted time," or "I will not answer calls after 6 pm when I'm not on call."
Offer an Alternate Solution: Let others know you desire a win-win outcome for all involved. This may sound like, "I'm not willing to organize the office holiday party, but I’m happy to contribute in other ways.”
Maintain Consistency: Expecting others to respect your boundaries requires you to respect your boundaries. If a boundary is important to you, be willing to request it repeatedly. Being consistent may also mean taking action to protect yourself if your boundary is repeatedly violated.
Be Ready for Resistance: Think back to a time when a new rule was imposed on you. Your natural reaction was likely to question why it was necessary to interfere with the status quo. Know that your request for a new boundary may be challenging for others. Stay calm. Have compassion for all involved. Then, continue to restate your needs.
Boundaries and Burnout
Loss of autonomy is an established contributor to burnout. Setting boundaries can be an important tool in creating a sense of autonomy.
If you're an employee or not in a leadership role, you may have the false impression that you don't have access to the power of boundaries. This is not true. Your needs matter, regardless of your role in healthcare.
Here are ways to support your professional boundaries, even when you're not the boss.
Emphasize the Why: Most of us are willing to consider requests when we understand why they’re needed. Explain the reason for your boundary request. For example, “I’m unable to stay past my scheduled work hours because I’m responsible for picking up my child from daycare by 5:15 pm.”
Look for Shared Goals: Find solutions that benefit you and your employer or supervisor. How can your boundary benefit all involved? "I'm more productive and better able to focus when I have uninterrupted time. Is it possible to create a private workspace for me?”
Focus on What You Can Control: Start by exploring boundaries you can set within the general structure of the work-system you're in. Many roles in healthcare don't lend themselves to working from home. An alternative might be requesting dedicated, uninterrupted quiet time for non-patient-facing tasks, such as paperwork or phone calls.
Educate Yourself: You can more effectively advocate for yourself when you're familiar with your employee rights and workplace regulations.
Document Your Requests: Proactively record your requests, offers, and outcomes. This can be helpful for documenting positive changes over time or be a valuable resource if you have to escalate your requests or seek external support.
Boundaries are an important and necessary aspect of creating well-being in life. They are no less important in the workplace.
If boundary-setting feels intimidating, start small. Recognize that boundary setting is not a one-and-done task. Rather, it's an ongoing process.
Be patient. Celebrate yourself through each step of the process. The more you establish boundaries, the less awkward it will feel.
Remember, healthy professional boundaries are not selfish. They are an essential component of self-care that help you function at your best, both personally and professionally as a healthcare professional. When you thrive, the system thrives. And that’s good for all of us.
Want to learn more about creating autonomy when you feel out of control?
Create calm in the middle of your busy day with my free Mindful Minutes Toolkit.
You can access it for free here.
Ready for 1:1 support from someone who understands your introverted nature?
Learn more about working with me here.
Charity is a physician burnout coach helping introverts in healthcare escape feelings of apathy, irritability, and resentment brought on by the increasing demands and decreasing rewards of medicine.
She uses her 20 years of experience in clinical medicine combined with coaching to help introverts discover ways to be diligent, thoughtful clinicians while prioritizing their needs and protecting their energy. She wants you to know you don’t have to feel guilty for wanting a thriving life inside and outside of medicine.