Burnout Survey: Red Tape Drains Australian Workers

Australian workers in organisations with high levels of “system friction” face 84 per cent higher odds of burnout, according to a new survey pointing to clunky online systems, lengthy bureaucratic processes and pointless meetings. More than one in three Australian workers experience burnout, the report found.

Think tank Infinite Potential published the State of Workplace Burnout Report in partnership with Beyond Blue and the University of Technology Sydney Business School. It drew on responses from 999 Australian survey respondents.

The Findings

The headline number grabs attention. The detail deserves a closer look.

Study author John Chan, Infinite Potential’s managing director, said burnout rates differed widely between organisations, and he wanted to find out what set them apart. Anna Stephens, a senior lecturer at the UTS Business School who helped design and conduct the survey, said organisational factors linked to burnout create “unnecessary difficulties in actually completing your work.” She pointed to poorly designed online systems, lengthy bureaucratic processes, unclear instructions and expectations, and pointless meetings.

Chan described the cognitive load as workplace “friction.” Another factor was fragmentation: switching between activities during the day with little control over meetings, tasks and software. Stephens called it “constant interruption or multiple competing priorities” that divide attention.

Job security mattered, too. Burnout affected 68 per cent of Australians who didn’t feel secure in their jobs, compared with 20 per cent who felt very secure. Chan said insecurity could stem from restructures, global politics or uncertainty about AI.

A Note of Caution

Not everyone accepted the numbers at face value. Paula Brough, a professor of organisational psychology and director of the Centre for Work, Organisation and Wellbeing in the Business School at Griffith University, didn’t contribute to the survey. She urged caution because of its small sample. The reported burnout levels were a little higher than she expected, she said, and there was “nothing new” in linking environmental factors with burnout.

The survey didn’t include participants’ industries. That’s a gap. Brough said burnout typically runs higher in public-facing and high-risk jobs, including bus driving, customer service and emergency services. Without industry data, it’s hard to know how much of the headline figure reflects workplace systems and how much comes from the nature of the work itself.

The survey also relied on the World Health Organization’s definition, which describes burnout as an “occupational phenomenon” and “not a medical condition.” WHO identifies three dimensions: exhaustion, increased mental distance or cynicism toward one’s job, and reduced professional efficacy. Chan said all three must be present. The term had become a buzzword, he said, reducing stigma but also causing misunderstanding. “If you’re just simply exhausted, that’s not burnout,” he said. Brough added that stress and burnout aren’t interchangeable. “Burnout is the extreme end of the continuum [and] stress is the start of it.”

One Worker’s Choice

Amlan Sharma, a 38-year-old occupational therapist, said exhaustion, feeling less purposeful and confident, and achieving less at a job he loved became normal in the years after the COVID-19 pandemic. He pointed to rigid schedules and limited autonomy. “It was high job demands, excessive workload, time pressure, constant interruptions,” he said.

Sharma, a father who also cares for a family member, chose self-employment and cut his hours despite the financial challenges. That helped his recovery, he said. “Over time I started to realise that actually I’m not the problem,” he said.

Shared Responsibility

The experts didn’t place all the onus on employers. Chan said leaders and organisations have a responsibility to create the right environment, “but then people also need to speak up when something isn’t right or they need certain support.” Brough said workers and employers “have a joint responsibility to look after your mental health.”

Brough offered a practical point, too. “You can have a high workload, but if you also have high levels of support and control, it doesn’t necessarily equate to levels of stress or burnout,” she said. Stephens recommended monitoring workload, communicating often with managers and avoiding, where possible, the normalisation of workplace friction and fragmentation.

Why This Matters:

The survey’s strongest finding is also its most practical: badly designed systems, red tape and pointless meetings track closely with burnout. Those are management problems, and organisations can largely fix them without new mandates or regulation. Employers that streamline processes and give staff more control stand to keep workers productive and in their jobs. Still, the small sample, missing industry data and Brough’s warning that the findings aren’t new should make policymakers wary of building sweeping workplace rules on one report. Sharma’s move to self-employment, financial hit and all, shows how much individual choice and autonomy matter. The sensible response is for employers and workers to share responsibility, not for Canberra to act alone.