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These factors include: the amount of support received from the director, opportunities for
professional development, clarity of job expectations, an equitable reward system, and
the work environment. Benefits contribute positively to the work environment. In 1998,
two-thirds of the teaching staff questioned by the authors of You Bet I Care! received
paid coffee breaks, but only about a third received paid lunch breaks. Over half the
teaching staff did not get paid preparation time (Doherty et al., 2000). In a sector that
requires immense emotional investment, failure to address working conditions has lead to
high levels of burnout and frustration amongst staff (Doherty & Forer, 2005).
Burnout is characterized by physical and emotional exhaustion, lack of a sense of
personal accomplishment in one’s work and, eventually, the development of negative
feelings towards and alienation from the people being served (Goelman & Guo, 1998).
Indicators of burnout predict an individual’s intent to leave the centre, the proportion of
staff in a centre intending to leave, and an individual who intends to leave the field
altogether. Indicators of burnout in the centre’s director strongly predict a setting with
staff retention problems, actual turnover rate, and difficulties recruiting new staff.
The strongest other predictors of one or more of the outcomes noted include low
wages and poor compensation-related benefits, the lack of benefits that improve working
conditions (coffee breaks or paid preparation time), staff dissatisfaction with wages and
working conditions, staff perception that their occupation is not respected by others, the
average level of training of the staff and the lack of opportunities for promotion. Other
factors include the lack of attention paid to staff needs, the length of time the staff body
as a whole has been working at the centre lack of clarity around staff responsibilities and
centre requirements, and little social support in the workplace, e.g. from a supervisor