The End of Burnout: Why Work Drains Us and How to Build Better Lives, by Jonathan Malesic is, sadly, a mostly-personal report on the author's tragic life-experiences, clothed in a discussion of historical-societal exhaustion, depression, and general suffering associated with "work". There are insightful bits – esp perhaps the discussion of "workload, control, reward, community, fairness, and values" as six key areas (identified by Michael Leiter and Christina Maslach). As Malesic summarizes near the end of Chapter 4:

... Workload and reward represent what you put into work and what you get in return. The relation between them is a question of justice, of getting what you deserve. Fairness is also about justice. Autonomy is indispensable to moral responsibility and action. Community is the human context for our ethical actions and the source of our moral norms. And values inform all aspects of our moral lives.

Justice, autonomy, community, values: these are the basic components of ethics. And when they are damaged or absent in a workplace, employees are likely to feel drawn across a widening gap between their ideals and the reality of their jobs. They're more likely to become exhausted and cynical and lose their sense of accomplishment. This means burnout is fundamentally a failure of how we treat each other; it's a failure of ethics, the norms of action within our culture. People burn out because, in our organizations, we do not afford them the conditions they desire or deserve.

Excellent insights! But overall, Burnout is long on anecdote and short on higher-level analysis. Malesic includes appropriate disclaimers, like "... I am just one worker; I want to be careful not to overdraw any conclusions about work itself from experience that may be peculiar to me. ...". And Malesic's vision is a noble one, as he summarizes in Chapter 6:

To overcome burnout, we have to get rid of that ideal and create a new shared vision of how work fits into a life well lived. That vision will replace the work ethic’s old, discredited promise. It will make dignity universal, not contingent on paid labor. It will put compassion for self and others ahead of productivity. And it will affirm that we find our highest purpose in leisure, not work. We will realize this vision in community and preserve it through common disciplines that keep work in its place. The vision, assembled from new and old ideas alike, will be the basis of a new culture, one that leaves burnout behind.

The vision, however, is far better captured in his op-ed essays in the NY Times, parts of which are derived from Burnout.

_{(cf Future of Work (2021-09-26), Not Your Job (2023-09-04), ...) - ^z - 2023-09-06}