Burnout is a unique type of stress syndrome. Although it has been shown to be potentially very costly in the helping professions, such as nursing, education, and social work, little work has been done to apply the concept to technical professionals such as information systems (IS) professionals. Given the nature of information systems development, we believe that burnout can be a potential problem for IS professionals. The study described herein examined the levels of burnout among a group of IS developers in the United States. The results indicated that the levels of burnout among IS professionals differ according to their job types and work contents.

THE STUDY OF BURNOUT IS A MAJOR research area in industrial and organizational psychology. Hundreds of articles have been written examining the syndrome of burnout. It is generally accepted that burnout has impacts on employees' absenteeism, turnover, reduced productivity, and human considerations. However, very few information systems (IS) researchers have applied the knowledge gathered by industrial and organizational psychologists to the study of burnout among IS professionals.

In broad terms, burnout refers to the syndrome of physical and emotional exhaustion involving the development of negative job attitudes and loss of concern and feeling for others. The most common accepted definition of burnout is the three-components conceptualization used by Maslach and Jackson: (1) emotional exhaustion, (2) depersonalization, and (3) reduced personal accomplishment. Emotional exhaustion reflects feelings of frustration and tension as individuals realize they cannot continue to give of themselves or be as responsible for clients as they had been in the past. Primarily, emotional exhaustion occurs in "intensive" and "people-oriented" occupations, in which jobs involve intensive interpersonal interactions. Depersonalization represents the tendency to treat clients as objects rather than people. Individuals may display a cynical, callous, uncaring, and negative attitude toward co-workers, clients, and the organization. Reduced personal accomplishment is characterized by a tendency to evaluate oneself negatively. In extreme burnout, individuals no longer believe their actions make a difference, and consequently they quit trying.

During the past 20 years, information systems function has experienced a rapid growth in almost every organization as a result of the intense competition in the industry. This growth has led to more complex and specialized jobs for IS professionals. These jobs often require IS people to interact with individuals outside the information systems department. Individuals in other departments may have orientations and expectations that are very different from those of the IS professionals. The outcome of these interpersonal contacts may result in high level of burnout.

The purpose of this article is to investigate the burnout phenomenon among IS professionals. A questionnaire survey was designed to examine the levels of burnout, the effects of job assignments on burnout, and to compare IS professionals' burnout with burnout levels in other professions.

IS professionals from 34 companies were asked to complete a questionnaire. A total of 522 survey forms were distributed, and 175 usable questionnaires (34%) were returned. Demographics of the respondents are shown in Exhibit 1.

The instrument used to measure burnout is the Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI). The MBI contains 22 questions designed to elicit the respondent's level of burnout. The MBI uses a seven-point scale ranging from "never" to "every day" to determine burnout in three dimensions: personal accomplishment, emotional exhaustion, and depersonalization. An analysis of the MBI provides mean scores and categorical rankings (high, moderate, or low burnout) for each of the three burnout dimensions. Sample items for each scale, with the number of items in the scale in parentheses, include:

The Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI) was selected for three primary reasons. First, it is the most widely used of the burnout instruments available. Second, while many other instruments measure burnout in the respondent's personal life and daily activities, the MBI was designed to measure burnout in the workplace. An analysis of research has shown that the MBI applies in a commercial setting involving a broad range of specialties. Finally, the MBI has application across a broad range of industries. That is especially important in a young field like information systems.

Because of the wide variety of IS job titles, respondents were asked to select one job type that best describes his or her job responsibility from a list of six job categories. The following job categories were adopted from Turner and Baroudi(n9) with modification.

The respondents were asked to select one work content that best describes his or her current software development activities from the following five systems development phases.

The levels of burnout among IS professionals are shown in Exhibit 2. The emotional exhaustion subscale analyzes a respondent's sense of being overextended, tired, and emotionally exhausted in the work setting. In the MBI, it can range from 0 to 54. The higher the score, the higher the sense of emotional exhaustion and the higher the level of burnout. Emotional exhaustion scores of 1 to 16 are considered low burnout, scores: of 17 to 26 are moderate, and scores of 27 or greater are high. The depersonalization subscale analyzes a respondent's sense of uncaring, unfeeling, and impersonal responsiveness to clients. In the MBI, it can range from 0 to 30. The higher the score, the higher the sense of depersonalization and the level of burnout. Depersonalization scores of 0 to 6 are considered low burnout, scores of 7 to 12 are moderate, and scores of 13 or greater are high. The personal accomplishment subscale analyzes a respondent's sense of competence and accomplishment in the work setting. In the MBI, it can theoretically range from 0 to 48. The lower the score, the lower the sense of personal accomplishment and the higher the level of burnout. Personal accomplishment scores of 0-31 are considered high burnout, scores of 32 to 38 are moderate, and scores of 39 or higher are low.

Most of the respondents demonstrated some evidence of burnout, and between 16.5 and 39.5 percent of the 175 IS professionals fell into the high burnout range. Over 16 percent showed a high level of emotional exhaustion, and another 67 percent demonstrated a level of emotional exhaustion in the middle range. Thirty-six percent indicated that they depersonalized others regularly to cope with the demand of the people they encounter on the job, and 52 percent depersonalized fairly frequently. Over 39 percent showed a high level of reduced personal accomplishment, and 41 percent showed moderate level of reduced personal accomplishment.

The burnout mean scores for each job type are shown in Exhibit 3. Exhibit 4 shows the comparison among six job types. Among the six job types, liaison is the most burned-out group. IS professionals who work as liaison have to spend a great deal of time interacting with end users an well as other IS professionals. They have to react flexibly when different communication requirements appear. This intensive interpersonal contact could be the source of their burnout.

The burnout scores for each software development phase are shown in Exhibit 5. Exhibit 6 shows the comparison of burnout scores among the phases.

Systems Analysis. Thirty-two IS professionals (18.3 percent) were working at this system development phase. The results show that IS professionals of this phase have moderate emotional exhaustion, high depersonalization, and low personal accomplishment. System analysis often requires extensive interpersonal contacts with users. The outcomes of these interpersonal contacts may result in high level of depersonalization and reduced personal accomplishment.

System Design. Thirty-seven IS professionals (21.1 percent) were working in this phase. The results show that they have moderate level of emotional exhaustion, moderate level of depersonalization, and moderate level of reduced personal accomplishment. Because the function of whole system was already designed in the previous phase, in this phase IS professionals can devote themselves to designing the program in one module without concerning the perspective of the system or potential problem. Therefore, their burnout scores are lower than in the systems analysis phase.

Coding and Debugging. Seventy-one IS professionals (40.6 percent) were included in this phase. Coding and debugging require not only mental but also physical work. The debugging requires patience and concentration. Moreover, most of the IS professionals have to do overwork and night work in this phase to cope with approaching deadlines. These conditions are considered to be sources of their burnout. The results show that they have moderate burnout in all three dimensions.

Test. Fourteen IS professionals were working in this phase. In this phase, all work done in the preceding phases is evaluated, and if there are problems, they must revise the whole system. It often happens that the system operates in a different way from the required function. The results show that they have the lowest level of depersonalization when compared with other groups. Emotional exhaustion and personal accomplishment are moderate.

Maintenance. Twenty-one IS professionals are included in this phase. In this phase, IS professionals maintain the system after it has been delivered to the users. Routine work plus endless maintenance are the cause of their burnout.

Exhibit 7 provides a comparison of the burnout mean scores arrived at in this study with those reported in the literature for other professions. Only studies that used the MBI scales were included in the exhibit. In terms of emotional exhaustion, Exhibit 7 reveals that IS professionals reported a higher level of burnout than police and nurses. However, their emotional exhaustion level was lower than that of teachers, welfare managers, and hospitality industry employees. Likewise, for depersonalization, IS professionals indicated that their burnout tendencies are higher than teachers and welfare managers, but lower than nurses, police, and hospitality industry employees. Finally, in terms of personal achievement, the mean values obtained for the IS professionals sample are the second lowest (high burnout) compared to those for other professions. Only public welfare agency managers had a lower score than IS professionals.

Based on the examination of the burnout scales, it appears that the levels of burnout among IS professionals differ according to their job types and work contents. IS professionals had increased levels of burnout, especially in the dimension of reduced personal accomplishment, in the systems analysis and maintenance phases. IS professionals with job types in the areas of application development and liaison also have higher burnout scores than other IS job types. It is suggested that some measures should be taken to cope with burnout in those areas. For example, constructing the aiding system for the requirement analysis phase, developing methods to analyze users' requirements effectively, and searching for the problems in communication between users and IS professionals. It is also recommended that effective project management methods should be implemented. An example is developing a method to estimate the length of the proposed deadline adequately to avoid overload, or exploring a software development management method to avoid the delay in each phase.

This study also suggests that interpersonal contacts contribute to IS professionals' burnout. However, such contacts seem to be unavoidable as IS organizations attempt to serve the increasing number of users in the organization with limited resources. Training to help IS people cope with those intensive and frequent contacts may be helpful for the existing staff. In the future, corporate managers may want to consider recruiting those individuals who have tolerance for both intensive and frequent interpersonal contacts, as these may be unavoidable conditions during systems development.

GRAPH: EXHIBIT 5 Mean Values of Burnout Dimensions Among IS Professionals by Job Types

GRAPH: EXHIBIT 6 Mean Values of Burnout Dimensions Among IS Professionals by Work Contents

GRAPH: EXHIBIT 7 Mean Values of Burnout Dimensions Among IS Professionals in Comparison with Other Professionals