Secondary Emotional Labor: Supervisors Withholding Support and Guidance in Interdisciplinary Group Meetings in a Community Hospice Program

Emotional labor (EL) can be rewarding, but it can also lead to burnout. Research suggests that supervisor support may be essential to positive experiences with EL. Using qualitative data from a community hospice program, the authors compare interdisciplinary group meetings in which supervisors facilitated EL processing and skill building with those in which they imposed secondary EL, a dynamic that restricts these activities. The authors found that when leaders support EL talk, it increases the likelihood that workers will experience EL in positive ways, and thus improve their care of clients and the organizations for which they work.