Burnout is one of the most important occupational threats since the COVID-19 pandemic. Burnout imposes costs for the individual, firms and society in terms of lost productivity and well-being. However, there is little evidence of its causal effects on productivity. In this study, I exploit a natural field experiment in the call center of a collection company in Ecuador to assess the effects of burnout on worker productivity. Through a random encouragement design, I estimate whether participation in a three-week intervention, which consists of giving workers a platform to share positive professional experiences while reading their colleagues’ stories, could reduce burnout, and the effect of the reduction in burnout in measures of worker productivity. The results indicate that encouraging employees to participate in the intervention could reduce burnout by 0.86 points. Although the change in burnout is too small to assess its effect on productivity, band estimates show that a 1-point reduction in burnot can increase worker productivity by 6 to 14 percentage points. Beyond the magnitude, the sign of the effect validates a negative impact of burnout on worker productivity. This findingd demonstrated that low-cost interventions intended to increase perceived social support among employees can reduce burnout and have a positive impact on worker productivity outcomes.
