Australia’s ‘great burnout’ is here — but we have the solutions

Recently the University of Melbourne’s relatively new Work Futures research initiative launched its first report, which looked at the ongoing impacts of COVID-19 in the workplace.

Researchers asked a simple question: how are Australian workers faring into the COVID-19 recovery? The short answer is: not great, especially if you’re a woman, caregiver or from a culturally and racially marginalised group.

Media reports have already highlighted what the report had to say about the entrenched discrimination carers face, in particular the discrimination male carers are increasingly reporting when or if they seek the kind of workplace flexibility women have long sought.

But it’s also important to consider what the report had to say about the alarmingly high levels of burnout workers are experiencing — and what that means for policymakers and employers. We are in the centre of a burnout crisis.

The term “burnout” was first coined by Herbert Freudenberger in 1975, when it was defined by three key elements: emotional exhaustion (the fatigue that comes from caring too much for too long); depersonalisation (the depletion of empathy, caring and compassion); a decreased sense of accomplishment (a sense of futility because it feels like nothing makes a difference).

And in the nearly 50 years since, research has consistently shown it’s the first element of burnout, the emotional exhaustion, that’s most strongly linked to health. 

Now, the new report says, Australian workers are in poorer physical and mental health across all ages and stages since the pandemic, with “prime-aged workers” hit especially hard. Some 50% reported feeling exhausted at work, about 40% felt less motivated than pre-pandemic, and 33% found it more difficult to concentrate because of responsibilities outside work. 

Most alarmingly, 33% are thinking about quitting. 

Crisis, indeed. I thought we would get here, just not this quickly. These findings should serve as a veritable mic drop for anyone still contemplating — and I hope many are — how we “build back better”.

In my most recent book, Leaning Out, I included a chapter entitled “Burnout, pandemic style”. Through all the feedback I’ve received, this was by far this chapter that resonated most. And I understand why.

Who among us hasn’t felt the compounded impact of the past few years? It has often felt like the pandemic sped up the trend towards the intensification of work. And in reality, it did: research from The Australia Institute found the average worker did 6.1 hours of unpaid overtime in 2021, a substantial increase over 2020. 

I also understand that burnout has always been more harshly felt by some than others, including women. Women were always more likely than men to experience burnout, but during the pandemic the “burnout gender gap” doubled?

In my book I highlighted that the causes and solutions for burnout are structural, not individual. In the words of my great friend Angela Priestley, publisher of Women’s Agenda: “This isn’t something more lunchtime Pilates is going to fix.” Underlying structural drivers will have to be tackled, including workplace discrimination, lack of flexible workplaces, a languishing “care infrastructure” that supports (or fails to support) those juggling work and care, and the intensification of work with its associated culture of long hours.

And finally, I also warned Australian policymakers and employers against a false sense of security that might, I feared, lead to complacency. While Australia had escaped the kind of highly gendered “great resignation” we saw abroad, a “great exhaustion” was taking hold that could — if we failed to act — manifest in a “great burnout”.

Fast-forward a few months and according to the research out this week the “great burnout” is here. And it brings me no joy to say I told you so. Having said that, I’d like to repeat that we have the solutions, if we are brave enough to apply those lessons from the pandemic, particularly around discrimination, flexibility, care infrastructure and work intensification.

The conversation around women’s workplace burnout and the factors driving it has played a significant role in moving the conversation on from the kind of “lean in”, “girlboss”, individually focused “empowerment feminism” that has dominated the Australian gender equality discourse for over a decade to something more meaningful. We now understand the solutions are not individual, they are structural. 

And it would appear — as the new research indicates men are also suffering — the structural change that’s now needed to tackle the burnout crisis is something that men and women can, likewise, pursue in common cause.

That’s a reason for optimism.