Originally written by Brigid Charmant on Small Business
“Looking for a #superstar biz dev person who can hustle their way into a FTSE 250 boardroom.”
“Wanted: dev genius who’s got the grind to keep going when the going gets tough.”
Okay, so these aren’t real job postings on a recruitment site. But were you able to tell the difference? The wording is eerily familiar to anyone in the startup world – the glorification of the grind, the headlining of the hustle. Entrepreneurial culture is obsessed with going hard and not going home. This work ethic might initially seem admirable – but at its core it’s rooted in a toxic approach to the world of work which is taking its toll on staff at all levels of the business.
>See also: Is a four day working week really a boon for productivity and staff wellbeing?
In our own recent research, we spoke to 2,200 business owners across Europe. What we found was alarming – almost one in three said that they or their staff have taken leave for mental health reasons, while almost half said that lack of time was detrimental to their or their employees’ personal health.
What’s ironic is that a significant majority of SMB