The night before a JPMorgan software developer was due back at the office, he lay in bed, unable to sleep. “The best way I can describe it,” the 30-year-old said, “is I got time away from a toxic family member. When you have separation, it’s easy to forget how much you hated work.”
He’d spent six months using the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), which guarantees eligible employees up to 12 weeks a year of job-protected leave for their own serious health condition, or to care for a spouse, child, or parent with one (while federal law doesn’t require the leave be paid, many states, including New York and California, offer partial wage replacement and some companies, like JPMorgan, will offer leave beyond the guaranteed three months).
But the software engineer wasn’t dealing with a life-threatening illness or caring for a family member with one. He was feeling “stuck” at work.
“I wasn’t advancing my career,” he said. He didn’t like his manager, and didn’t feel his contributions were going to make or break the multitrillion-dollar bank. He’d been planning to quit without another job lined up, until a colleague who’d already taken leave mentioned that “burnout” alone could qualify him for FMLA.
Burnout isn’t a recognized diagnosis under FMLA. But if you can get a healthcare provider to certify that an underlying condition—like anxiety or depression—requires ongoing treatment, you can typically get approved for FMLA. “The bar for FMLA is quite low,” Cassandra Lammers, a senior HR executive who has spearheaded leave policy at large employers including The New York Times and Audible, told me.
