Have you ever been ground down by a job where the work culture seemed increasingly at odds with your own personal ideals? Or felt drained by the way that management treated you and your colleagues’ concerns? Perhaps you’ve wondered whether your work is really making a difference.

If that’s the case, you might have been experiencing moral burnout, a type of burnout which, according to a recent study, can prove more intense in its impact – and more difficult to overcome.

Many of us will already be all too familiar with the symptoms of burnout. The World Health Organisation has defined the condition as an occupational phenomenon, characterised by “feelings of exhaustion, increased mental distance from one’s job, or feelings of negativism or cynicism related to one’s job, and reduced professional efficacy,” Dr Sarah O’Neil, clinical director at Spectrum.Life, tells Stylist.

Moral burnout, however, speaks to more than work volume and job design: it can indicate a fundamental lack of compatibility between you and the company you work for. “It is linked to how an organisation operates,” O’Neil says, adding that the ‘moral’ component refers to moral injury, which is “a phenomenon whereby an individual suffers distress resulting from feelings of helplessness or guilt. This distress stems from an individual believing they have participated in or failed to stand up for what’s right or morally just.”

Could moral burnout be impacting your work motivation?