Burnout isn’t a workforce crisis. It’s a leadership one

Alarmingly, these workers compensation claims, are only a fraction of total absenteeism costs. But also consider presenteeism – people showing up depleted and disengaged – costs organisations an estimated four to six times more. The burnout we can measure is only a fraction of what we're paying.

And yet most organisations continue to treat burnout as a personal problem. A resilience deficit. Something fixed with fruit bowls, a wellbeing app, a lunchtime yoga session, or a reminder to ‘practise self-care’. The data tells a different story, as 80% of Australian workers are currently experiencing burnout — making us the most stressed workforce in the Asia-Pacific region. Among HR professionals themselves, 73% are considering leaving the profession entirely, and 72% report being unable to switch off. We are burning out the very people responsible for fixing burnout.

Here is the uncomfortable truth: burnout is not a workforce crisis. It is a leadership one.

Why leadership is the real variable

New psychosocial safety legislation has made this a legal reality, not just a moral one. Employers now have a duty to identify and manage psychosocial hazards – including workload, role clarity, and the behaviours of leaders. The regulatory environment has caught up with what good leaders have known for years: the biggest driver of workplace distress isn’t the work. It’s the culture around it.

The 2025 Gallup Global Workplace Report found that managers account for up to 70% of the variance in team engagement and wellbeing. That means the single most powerful determinant of whether your people thrive or burn out is not their workload, their salary, or their commute. It is the person leading them.

Which raises an urgent question: what are those leaders modelling?

You can’t pour from an empty cup

Melissa Reynolds, CEO of State Trustees Victoria, is one of the most grounded leaders I’ve spoken with. State Trustees serves some of Victoria’s most vulnerable people – those unable to manage their own financial affairs due to mental illness or incapacity. Purpose is embedded in the work. But Melissa knows that purpose alone doesn’t protect against burnout.

‘I’ve realised that if I don’t look after myself, I can’t effectively look after my team or my family,’ she told me on The Caring CEO podcast. Her approach is intentional and unapologetically practical – weight training, daily movement, quality sleep, proper nutrition – and recently, a home sauna. ‘Thirty minutes in 65-degree heat, every day or every second day. I can meditate, listen to a podcast, journal, and get away from it all. It’s my own little sanctuary.’

This is not indulgence. In an always-on culture, Melissa has created a physical space for deliberate disconnection. She has recognised what the research confirms: leaders who model recovery give their teams permission to do the same.

She has also brought this intentionality into her leadership. A nightly gratitude ritual at the family dinner table – started with her daughter, now practised with her executive team. ‘We go around the room and ask, what are we grateful for? It’s incredible what our people will share – not only from a work perspective, but in their lives. It’s a beautiful practice.’

What Melissa demonstrates is that operating in the ‘green zone’ – the state of positive mood and clear thinking that enables effective leadership – is not accidental. It is the result of consistent, deliberate habits.

What caring leaders do differently

Preventing burnout in your team starts with your own practices. When leaders support wellbeing, 91% of employees feel motivated to do their best. When they don't, that figure drops to 38%. That's the finding from the APA's Work and Well-Being Survey – and it's a gap no organisation can afford to ignore. Here are four behaviours that separate leaders who sustain their people from those who inadvertently deplete them:

• Maintain a physical foundation. Movement, sleep, and nutrition are not lifestyle choices – they are leadership performance inputs. Leaders who neglect them are less effective, and model the same to their teams.
• Create deliberate disconnection. Identify a space or ritual that allows you to fully switch off. The constant availability that feels like dedication is, over time, a direct path to burnout – for you and those watching you.
• Build gratitude into team rhythms. Opening or closing meetings with a moment of acknowledgement – what went well, what we’re proud of – shifts psychological state and builds connection. It costs nothing and compounds quickly.
• Connect work to purpose. People who understand why their work matters are more resilient under pressure. Make the connection explicit and often – not in annual reviews, but in everyday conversation.

The question worth sitting with

The $288,000 distress claim is the end of a long chain of events. Somewhere earlier in that chain, a leader was running on empty and didn’t know it – or didn’t act on it. Their team read the signal. They adjusted accordingly.

Burnout prevention is not a program you roll out. It is a culture you model, every day, through what you prioritise, what you protect, and what you permit.

So here is the question: if your team looked at how you lead your own energy this week, what would they conclude is possible for them?

Graeme Cowan is a keynote speaker, author of Great Leaders Care, and founding director of R U OK?.