Younger staff burnout on the rise, says research
Younger staff burnout on the rise, says research
Mental Health UK’s annual report into workplace stress levels (involving 4,418 adults) has highlighted the growing gap between 18-24 year-olds and other employees when it comes to burnout.
The younger age group are the most likely to be absent due to poor mental health caused by stress. They are also three times more likely to have needed time off due to waiting for NHS appointments than staff aged 55 and over. At the same time, there’s been a notable decline in their likelihood of speaking to their line managers about stress levels and the resulting mental health issues (dropping from 75% to 56%).
‘Often’ or ‘always’ stressed
In terms of the population as a whole, the survey suggests 34% of adults were ‘often’ or ‘always’ suffering from high or extreme levels of pressure and stress. This is down slightly from 35% in the 2024 report. The number of people needing to take time off work because of stress in the past year had stayed the same at 21%.
Staff aged between 18-24 were most likely to report high stress due to having to regularly work unpaid overtime, taking on additional hours due to the increased cost of living and feeling isolated at work. High stress due to high or increased workloads, and fears of redundancy, were most often reported by 25-34 year-olds.
Starting early
EAPA UK chair, Karl Bennett said: “Earlier conversations about stress and burnout, particularly with younger employees who have less experience of dealing with issues and knowing who to speak to, are becoming essential.
“Why is burnout happening? What are the particular reasons for stress in specific teams or areas of an organisation, is it workloads, management styles or the wider culture, for example? Working together and sharing information, EAPs can help HR with picking up trends and issues in different areas, among groups like younger people, and also tailor awareness campaigns and the best approaches for encouraging earlier engagement — maybe involving the use of more digital platforms with immediate access etc.”