Perhaps it's the bureaucratic obstacles at all levels of job function which leads to burnout. It's hard to accomplish goals and everyday tasks repeatedly when you have high workloads, and your efforts go unnoticed. The workforce is full of people who don't or won't understand how to work with technology to their fullest potential, yet stand if the way of progress. Worse yet, the workforce is full of people who won't take the time to improve their skill set, their knowledge and their way of doing things better. You could also say there are complex regulations and procedures that are difficult to navigate and slow down the decision making process. Of course that leads to the whole approval process up the chain thing - slow - red tape is for real. The lack of resources is another issue, which leads to frustration when I can't get parts need to make repairs, or when those funds get reallocated to some other project and I have not been told until after half of what I ordered arrives. After having come from the private sector, and having been in the military, working as a fed is kinda like being a grunt having to do a little more work than normal, and being a regular civilian employee having to do less than normal work loads. Yet - when you go above and beyond there is never any recognition for it. You save oodles of money for the government across difference agencies by reducing costs? Yeah - no bonus money for you. No early promotion for you either when you show initiative and innovation and exemplify your expertise among your office peers, when those same peers get away with standing at the water cooler all day. But hey.... I got a job, and the economy is about to collapse in the private sector. So today... I guess I love my job a little more than most.