Court reporting demands much from those who choose this as a career. The stress of large workloads makes burnout a common occurrence among court reporters so here is a list of things court reporters can do to prevent burnout from happening:
- Prioritize
Go over your tasks and arrange them in such a way that you can progress through your list with minimal resistance. This can look like sorting your tasks by the ease of completion or arranging them by urgency and importance. The main idea, however, is to schedule your work in a way that relieves anxiety around getting everything done. Prioritizing like this means you remain cognizant of deadlines and ideally you finish with time to spare. If you know a task will require a significant amount of time place it near the bottom of your list so you will not be mentally distracted by smaller tasks. Organizing your priorities will ensure you have the time you need to refine your work and produce high-quality documents. - Delegate
If you have the resources, delegating part of your workload to a team is a great way to maximize your time. Taking on too much work by yourself can cause you to become fatigued, and resentful, and can encourage a hasty editing process that leads to errors. Delegating is like duplicating yourself and dedicating substantial attention to your tasks when you are short on time. Distributing your workload like this also gives you an opportunity to have a variety of people editing your project which means errors you overlooked can be corrected by someone else.
- Take Breaks
A court reporter’s career involves a lot of sitting down and typing so physical activity is vital to maintaining your physical and mental energy levels. Taking planned 30-minute breaks every few hours where you stretch or take a walk can help alleviate physical tension and mental fatigue that tends to build up while sitting at a desk for extended periods. Refresh your willpower by changing your environment and your headspace so your clients get the quality of work they deserve.
A court reporter must be able to recognize when they are getting burned out and do what they can to mitigate this. By practicing the tips above of prioritizing, delegating, and taking breaks, court reporters can stay energized, motivated, and engaged.
Sources:
https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/7-tips-court-reporters-handling-stress-donna-kadosh/