Beyoncé’s new status as a billionaire is the ultimate endorsement of an idea she came to later in her career: stop overworking and start working smarter. Her evolution from 24/7 grind to boundary-setting strategist tracks directly to what workers and executives are discovering about burnout and sustainable success in today’s economy.
From grind to billionaire
In late 2025, Beyoncé Knowles-Carter joined Forbes‘ billionaire ranks, becoming one of only a handful of musicians—alongside Jay-Z, Rihanna, Bruce Springsteen, and Taylor Swift—to cross the 10-figure threshold. Her wealth is built on stacked revenue streams: blockbuster tours like Renaissance and Cowboy Carter, high-margin merchandise, an owned catalog valued in the hundreds of millions, and Parkwood Entertainment, which lets her keep control of the products she creates.
That portfolio is the compound interest on two decades of disciplined reinvention—from Destiny’s Child to solo superstardom to entrepreneur—each chapter designed less around being everywhere and more around owning what matters most.
Her pivot: working smarter, not harder
Beyoncé has been candid that the early years of her career were defined by saying yes to almost everything: nonstop tours, red carpets, awards shows, and press that eventually led to insomnia, exhaustion, and deteriorating mental health. She has since told GQ in an interview that she draws a hard line: if a project doesn’t obsess her when she wakes up and follow her into her dreams at night, she passes—even if it is lucrative.
That philosophy extends to her calendar. She structures touring around her children’s school breaks and disappears from public events between major projects so she can recover, create, and be present at home. The result is fewer appearances, but each is bigger, more meticulously produced, and more profitable—culminating in tours grossing hundreds of millions and films that extend the earning life of each era.
What leaders can learn about burnout
Beyoncé’s shift mirrors a broader reckoning. In 2024, roughly 82% of knowledge workers surveyed across North America, Asia, and Europe reported at least some level of burnout, even as 88% also described themselves as highly engaged. That “burned out but locked in” paradox—employees simultaneously exhausted and deeply invested—creates a dangerous incentive to push hardest on the people already at their limit.
For HR leaders, the warning is clear: relying on a small cadre of “work horses” risks a toxic cycle where top performers quietly hit a wall and leave as soon as the job market improves. Beyoncé’s own playbook offers a lesson for business leaders: define the culture you actually want, clarify strategy, and invest in what you’re already good at instead of layering on more work for the same people.
The year of “no”
If the early Beyoncé era was about never saying no, today’s workforce is moving the other way. Roughly 65% of employees now feel empowered to decline additional responsibilities, with workers 25 and under the most likely to say no to extra tasks. That resistance is not laziness; survey respondents describe it as a survival strategy against chronic burnout, even as many still feel guilt when they set boundaries.
The most effective employers, research suggests, are those that normalize these boundaries by redesigning roles and workloads rather than glorifying the martyr who always says yes. Beyoncé’s refusal to trade her time for every opportunity—even when demand is virtually unlimited—is a high-profile version of the same move.
A billionaire blueprint for sustainable ambition
Taken together, Beyoncé’s trajectory and recent workplace data point to a new blueprint for high achievement:
Own the leverage, not the hours. Beyoncé’s billionaire status flows from asset ownership—catalog, company, creative IP—rather than simply stacking more tour dates or endorsements. Workers and executives alike gain the most when they move away from performative busyness toward roles and projects where their unique skills compound over time.
Make boundaries a performance strategy. Her choice to tour around her family’s schedule and to vanish between eras is not a luxury; it is why each launch lands as an event, not just another release. Fortune’s reporting shows that companies that build similar space—by empowering employees to say no, rebalancing workloads, and focusing on results rather than constant availability—are better positioned to retain engaged, high-performing talent in a tight labor market.
Redefine what “hard work” looks like. Beyoncé has said she has already “worked harder than anyone” she knows—now the challenge is to work smarter. For ambitious professionals, that means trading the visible grind of late nights and endless emails for the less visible work of prioritization, creative focus, and long-term bets that, like hers, can eventually be measured not in hours logged, but in enduring value created.
For this story, Fortune journalists used generative AI as a research tool. An editor verified the accuracy of the information before publishing.
Be honest. Are you someone who can’t slow down? Perhaps you are non-stop busy because you “just care,” you’re responsible, or there’s so much to do. Slowing down feels irresponsible, indulgent, or risky.
So, you do what most good leaders do: You push yourself. It’s the incessant work, the answering one more email, or the jumping on one more call. You tell yourself you’ll pause later—ideally when things calm down. For a while, it works. Decisions are made quickly because the pattern works…until it doesn’t.
Eventually, burnout shows up and the costs begin to add up in health, culture, judgment, retention, or all four at once. By the time it’s visible, it’s usually systemic—not personal. Your pace has quietly become your company’s pace. Not because you announced it, but because everyone is watching you.
What no one says about burnout
Your actions are more believable than your values statement. What you do matters more than what you say. When you’re “always on,” people learn that being “on” is what gets rewarded. When you respond instantly, any delay is perceived as disengagement. When you never stop, they don’t either—even when stopping would be smarter.
Reduce burnout
Social psychologist Christina Maslach’s research is clear. Burnout is not an individual failure—it’s a workplace design problem. You can’t put “well-being” in a values statement and model urgency all day long. People believe behavior, not posters. Deloitte’s research on burnout reinforces this, proving that leader behavior is a stronger predictor of team burnout than workload alone.
Reflection questions
When was the last time you stopped during the workday without calling it “catching up”?
What does your behavior teach people about what really matters here?
What are you protecting by moving so fast all the time?
Slowing down is a strategic advantage
You’ve been trained to believe speed equals competence. The evidence is less flattering.
Stanford research shows productivity drops sharply once people surpass 55 hours of work a week. After that, mistakes multiply, judgment narrows, and everyone gets busy fixing problems that didn’t need to exist.
HR firm isolved’s second-annual Business Owners Report, based on responses from 2,032 owners, founders, and CEOs in the U.S., finds that 76 percent say running a business has become more complicated in the past year, a steep climb from just 52 percent the year prior. While it’s easy to blame pressure from profit measures, the real challenge is far more human and requires a human approach.
Eighty-two percent of business owners report that their concerns about employee wellness have increased in the past year. They’re right to worry: 79 percent of employees report experiencing burnout, and burned-out employees are 35 percent more likely to job hunt. Supporting employees isn’t just the right thing to do; it’s essential to building a resilient, committed workforce.
Luckily, many business owners are already leading with empathy. For those looking to follow their lead, isolved’s study makes a strong case for three ways to start: treating workers as people, not positions; pairing purpose with practical tools; and embracing humane leadership.
Treating employees as people, not positions
Business owners feel confident they’re taking the right steps to support employee well-being, with 99 percent planning new investments, most often in financial wellness. This is a vital area to focus on, as 42 percent of employees say salary is a top motivator for job hunting.
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But compensation alone reflects only one part of the employee experience. Viewing work strictly as an exchange of labor for pay is outdated. Employees want to feel valued for who they are as whole people, not just the positions they fill. When employers don’t do that, employees will jump ship for companies that do.
So, if business owners are pouring money into wellness, they need finance perks that will drive impact, and that means going beyond financial wellness. Another critical area to prioritize is flexibility. Forty-six percent of workers say the promise of flexible work arrangements (such as hybrid or remote options) would entice them to job hunt, outranking salary. Also, more than a quarter (26 percent) say flexible benefits also serve as a compelling factor for taking a new job.
“By mastering benefits and flexibility, employers tell their workers just how much they care,” said Amy Mosher, Chief People Officer at isolved. “Yet many employees say their employers miss the mark on both. Thirty-nine percent (39 percent) are still waiting for their employers to embrace flexible work and scheduling options, and 72 percent say their benefits experience is stressful. Until business leaders close these gaps, top talent will keep walking out the door.”
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We have all heard about feeling burnt out at work, but what about in your relationship? Workplace burnout usually signals it’s time to move on and find a new job, but does the same apply to your relationship?
When the connection that once felt effortless now feels distant or draining, you might be experiencing something couples rarely talk about: relationship burnout.
What is relationship burnout?
Relationship burnout can show up in many different ways and may be experienced by one or both partners. Here are some signs of burnout:
Constant feeling of overwhelm
Kids, work, and finances create busy lives. But when you are in a state of overwhelm more often than not, it likely signals something more than busy schedules. It may mean that you have lost your sense of ‘we-ness’ where you are no longer tackling life’s responsibilities as a team but as individuals.
Getting easily flooded during interactions with partner
Relationship conflict can cause stress and lead to flooding, but the majority of your interactions with your partner should not cause you to become flooded. You may have several unresolved conflicts and stuck problems, or you may anticipate conflict when you interact.
Negative sentiment override
When your partner doesn’t respond to a text, does your mind immediately think how inconsiderate they are? Do you find yourself criticizing your partner’s every move? You are likely in what Dr. John Gottman calls ‘Negative Sentiment Override’ when your brain defaults to expecting the worst from your partner. You interpret their actions, tone, and intentions negatively even when they are neutral or even positive. It is a dynamic that is easy to fall into when life stressors take over, and your emotional connection with your partner wanes.
You may feel lonely even in the presence of your partner. This signifies a lack of emotional connection. Your relationship is not providing the support you need for your emotional wellbeing. You are no longer operating as a team but on your own.
Feeling like every conversation is ‘one more thing’ to deal with
Do you dread having conversations with your partner? Perhaps you find yourself putting off necessary conversations, or they feel like one more thing on your ‘to do list’. You may be so emotionally overloaded or fatigued that even small interactions feel like pressure vs connection.
Causes of Burnout
Chronic stress
When you experience chronic stress (from either inside and/or outside the relationship) your nervous system is in a heightened state. This can cause the following:
Increased irritability and reactivity
Lowered empathy
Less energy to be emotionally available to your partner
Increased conflict
Decrease in physical wellbeing
Unresolved conflict within relationship
Gottman’s research tells us that 69% of relationship conflict can not be solved, so many couples get stuck in the same arguments that don’t go anywhere but rather leave both partners feeling upset, disconnected and frustrated.
One partner carrying the mental load
When one partner bears the weight of the mental load for the household and family, it can feel overwhelming and isolating. This responsibility typically falls on the female partner (regardless of whether she works outside the home), and because it is often ‘invisible labor’, it goes without acknowledgement and appreciation.
Running on autopilot
The relationship can feel transactional where any conversation between partners is about schedules and responsibilities. There is no effort to have emotional connection because it is not prioritized in the chaos of daily life. This usually goes hand in hand with a lack of emotional and physical intimacy which can further drive a couple apart.
Is It The End?
The short answer is NO! Unlike work burnout you are in control of many of the variables that are causing your relationship burnout. Burnout doesn’t mean your relationship is broken, it means it needs some attention and care. With small, consistent changes, couples can rebuild warmth, teamwork, and connection.
How to Recover from Relationship Burnout
Here are 8 strategies to recover from relationship burnout:
1. Self care
It can be difficult to prioritize your individual needs especially when they are so many other priorities in life. However, if you are not taking care of your physical and mental health, it will negatively impact your relationship. Self care might include taking time for mediation, daily walks, or anything else that helps you feel regulated and re-energized.
Pro tip: If there are things that you can do with your partner that satisfy your individual needs while you are together, that is the best case scenario. Walking the dog, going to the gym or taking a yoga class together are some examples.
2. New experiences
When you experience new things together, it can be very powerful, activating the brain’s reward system. This releases dopamine, which creates feelings of excitement, pleasure, and motivation. When partners experience this together, the brain starts to associate that good feeling with the relationship itself.
3. Rituals of connection
These are small but consistent interactions that keep partners feeling connected even during busy or stressful periods. They are intentional, repeated moments that are predictable and meaningful habits. They strengthen the “us” in the relationship.
Morning check-in: Share one thing happening today and one way you can support each other.
Partings and reunions: Kiss and hug goodbye, and greet each other warmly when reconnecting.
Bedtime ritual: Develop a ritual even if you actually go to sleep at different times to connect.
Consider their needs: When you go to the store, ask if they would like anything.
4. Notice the positive
Spend one evening only looking for the positive things your partner does. You may be surprised by what you find. The brain has a built-in tendency to notice, remember, and react more strongly to negative experiences than positive ones. It’s a survival mechanism, but in modern life and relationships it can create problems. When you notice the positive, tell your partner and express appreciation. Make a habit of doing this on a daily basis
5. Stress Reducing Conversation
Learn how to have this daily conversation to manage external stress. Research shows that happy successful couples do so on a regular basis. Set aside 20 minutes every day to share with one another how your day went. The purpose is to listen, empathize and provide emotional support. There is no problem solving, and you always take your partner’s side. Even if you don’t fully agree with them, you focus on how they feel and express understanding and support. The result is a sense of ‘we-ness’, that is you are operating as a team.
6. Manage conflict in a healthy way
When there are issues within your relationship that are bothering you, talk to your partner using a ‘gentle start-up’. This is where you express your feeling using an ‘I’ statement, followed by explaining the situation, and ending with what you need (stated in a positive way).
7. Share the mental load
Identify the responsibilities and load that exists. If it makes sense, transfer some of it to the other partner. Make sure to acknowledge and appreciate the invisible labor that is being done on a daily basis.
8. Repair
When (not if!) you say something hurtful, unkind, or inconsiderate to your partner acknowledge your mistake and make a genuine apology.
Relationship burnout is real, and while it feels like you’re stuck, it is possible to find your way back to each other. Ideally both partners will try to implement these strategies, but more often than not one person finds themselves taking on the responsibility of the relationship. You can still implement these changes, and likely your partner will follow. If you take these steps and do not feel any positive changes with your partner, you may need more support. Consider working with a therapist; sometimes a little support is what you need to make these significant shifts in your relationship dynamic.
Have you ever felt like your brain was one of those viral egg experiments, cracked open and sizzling on a bare sidewalk that was truly, much too hot? You may have been experiencing signs of burnout (and dehydration). As an introverted professional, I’ve been there as well, many times in my career. Over the years, I’ve developed healthy reflective coping methods to recharge my batteries and prevent (or at least combat) that intense feeling of overwhelm.
As a LinkedIn Top Voice and a very public keynote speaker who’s learned to grow in the spotlight on my own terms, I’m not the best at pretending to be an extrovert for any extended period of time—it’s too tiring! Instead, I’ve found success by setting clear boundaries both online and offline, especially with growing my personal brand. It’s how I stay true to my brand and avoid the dreaded burnout. And guess what? You can do the same. You’ve probably tried a few personal branding tips that didn’t work as well for you as an introvert, because they possibly felt too “extroverted” for your style.
Here are my real-life strategies grounded in my own experience and ones that I feature in my new book “Personal Branding for Introverts.” These are the ideas that let me recharge properly while building a real, lasting brand.
Overcoming Overwhelm With Boundaries
As an introvert, you’re likely to think more deeply and be more overwhelmed during events, big meetings or conferences, and that takes a lot of energy. Performing personal branding steps like making content, networking, or being active online can be really tiring for you (and me).
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1. Establish Clear Boundaries Between Work and Personal Life
While organizing my own work week, I think of this quote by Stephen Covey: “The key is not to prioritize what’s on your schedule, but to schedule your priorities.” Focus on what is the most important work task for your week and use an energy-first approach to encourage your own balance and focus. Consider the following strategies:
Match Work Hours with Your Energy: Prioritize the times of day when your energy and focus are highest. For example, if you are wide awake and alert in the morning, try scheduling meetings between 9 a.m. and 12 p.m. rather than later in the day. These morning (or afternoon) hours are your core focus times and should be protected.
Designate Time for Focused Work: Save specific blocks of time for your best uninterrupted, quiet work. Lessen the general distractions around you by limiting your email inbox and message time.
Create A Habit For Your Work Day End: Start an ongoing ritual or task that marks the end of your work hours. This might include taking a comforting walk, writing in your journal or blog, or simply turning off your social or Slack notifications for a bit. These cues help reinforce the boundary between work and personal time, allowing your mind to transition and recharge.
2. Rethink your Endless Meetings
Ever hear of the office saying “This could have been an email?” Not every meeting needs an in-person chat. If you’re able (and allowed to) express your thoughts in an email or message, do that. Fewer live meetings means more energy for focused work. Group similar meetings together on the same day or days if possible so there’s less distractions. That way, the rest of your schedule stays more open and quiet.
Also, leave time between meetings. At least 15 minutes and a quick walk outside or inside the office will help you reset. Back-to-back calls can wear you down quickly and harm your focus.
3. Strategically Manage Your Digital Energy
I’ve watched many introverted professionals experience burnout from attempting to maintain a constant presence across multiple platforms. Focusing your energy on one or two channels leads to being able to deep-dive more into those spaces, and introverts excel in being thorough thinkers.
Try these energy-saving tactics:
Pick One Platform: Focus your energy on one or two social media platforms where your target audience is active. This platform should also be where you feel comfortable and capable of maintaining a presence that won’t fizzle out in a month.
Batch Content Creation: Create a “bank” of posts by setting aside dedicated time once a week or month to write, record, or design your content.This method lowers the pressure to be constantly working on new ideas and allows you breathing room for more thoughtful, consistent content creation.
Determine Your Response Times: Find and segment out specific time blocks for responding to all of your messages or comments across social media platforms, such as 30 minutes every Tuesday at 11am. It’s helpful to do this so you’re less distracted by a ton of notifications at work. As your audience grows over time, this method will help you maintain balance and sustainability.
4. Prioritize Rest and Recharging
Throughout the day, I intentionally give myself short breaks. A walk to feel the sunlight and get some vitamin D. A few deep breaths away from sitting in front of my screens. These pauses allow me to reset mentally and clear my head.. I treat alone time as part of my daily rhythm. Reading. Writing. Walking. Or just sitting quietly. These deliberate time pauses replenishes my energy while keeping me grounded.
Persistent fatigue, lessened focus or the need to hide from everyone (social anxiety, anyone?) can be a clear and early indicator of burnout at work. Instead of ignoring these signals, consider them thoughtful invitations from your body to begin to slow down and rest before you fully burn out.
Establishing and maintaining boundaries is crucial to growing a personal brand as an introvert and will stop overwhelm and burnout before they spiral out of control. Boundaries are wonderful tools that enable your brand to grow consistently and in a healthy way. You do not need to be everywhere online or offline or constantly available. Instead, focus your energy and attention on being present during specific blocks of time that you choose. Your audience will recognize the intentionality—and so will you.
This article originally appeared in Inc.’s sister publication, Fast Company.
Fast Company is the world’s leading business media brand, with an editorial focus on innovation in technology, leadership, world changing ideas, creativity, and design. Written for and about the most progressive business leaders, Fast Company inspires readers to think expansively, lead with purpose, embrace change, and shape the future of business.
Taking a second job is nothing particularly new, but having to take on extra duties when you’re already working a full time role is no easy task. Yet that’s exactly what three in 10 of the full-time workers surveyed by Seattle-based Resume Templates said they planned to do this year to help cover the extra expenses that the holiday season brings (perhaps worsened this year by tariffs and inflation). And over a third of workers already working full-time said that they’re already working other gigs to earn extra income.
In essence, this means a majority of the 1,000 full-time workers in the survey were concerned enough about living costs at the end of 2025 that they’re taking on extra work.
Of these people, about half are raising more money by taking on extra hours at their existing employer. Other workers have taken on work at delivery services, joined ride-share companies, taken up seasonal jobs in stores, or were freelancing HRDive notes. Others took traditional “pocket money” roles like pet sitting and babysitting, while others tried earning income from social media.
The report notes that more people say it’s going to be harder to afford holiday expenses this year than last year, with some 61 percent feeling this way, and about a third of people are planning to spend less on gifts, holiday decorations and travel this year than in 2024. About three in 10 people say that the loss of government benefits like SNAP or assistance with insurance are partly to blame for their financial issues.
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So far you may be thinking that this data merely supports evidence that the economy and the job market are in trouble, but that there’s not much relevance for your company. But there’s one piece of data in the report that will give you concern: over a third of people taking on more work, 39 percent in fact, say that this necessity already has or probably will damage their productivity on their existing full time role. While this makes sense (everybody only has so much energy and time to give, and a full time job is already demanding) this has immediate knock-on effects for their employers who could see a trickle-down impact on the company productivity and profitability.
In the report Julia Toothacre, chief career strategist at Resume Templates, writes that workers who take on extra duties “need to stay mindful of their energy and mental health” because “overworking can quickly lead to burnout, fatigue, and declining performance in both their main job and side work.” Toothacre also suggests that workers may need to scale back productivity to “a sustainable level,” and that “doing ‘enough’ to meet expectations, rather than constantly overperforming, might be the healthiest choice.” This advice, while sensible from an overworked, underpaid frontline employee point of view is clearly not going to please employers who may be relying on their workers being fired up and ready to tackle, say, a busy retail season.
Earlier this year a report said that a growing share of the workforce was “secretly” working second jobs, with perhaps up to 5 percent of the tech workforce pulling off this feat. The new report, meanwhile, backs up a study from June this year that said a similar shockingly high percentage of workers were going to seek additional duties to make ends meet — with economic woes tied to uncertainty, uncommunicative employers, and unhappiness in the workplace playing a role.
What can you do about this in your company?
It depends on your official stance on second jobs: banning workers from taking on extra work means that if they find themselves forced into an economic corner because the income they earn from you isn’t enough, they may simply quit for better paying roles elsewhere. If you tolerate workers taking on second roles, then a savvy leader may boost opportunities like flexible working schedules: the data suggests that workers are going to be taking on second jobs anyway, so if you’re their primary employer doing the most you can to ensure they’re not burned out seems smart, since it may protect their productivity.
Wearable tech continues to be one of the Next Big Things in technology innovation, thanks to what many experts expect to be the replacement for the humble smartphone—AR and VR headsets, as well as other AI-powered devices. But wearables like fitness monitors and smartwatches are already part of some workplaces as a useful tool for monitoring employees — providing data on everything from performance to employee well-being. But this sometimes controversial data collection carries some risks, as a new report highlights.
A team of management researchers from the U.K.’s University of Surrey recently did a meta-analysis of previous studies on the benefits and risks of using wearable worker monitoring tech. They found that most workplaces that have deployed wearable tech are using them to track employees’ well-being and health data. The devices were helpful for accurately tracking “sleep quality, stress markers, physical activity, and even team dynamics,” science news site Phys.org reported. That, which aligns with some of the ways devices like FitBits and Apple Watches are promoted.
But the way some businesses roll out these devices is problematic the researchers said, since many of these efforts aren’t fully transparent and leave employees guessing about what personal data is being collected by their companies and why it’s being gathered. Meanwhile, many businesses have inconsistent policies for analyzing collected employee data, and they may even store it insecurely. This behavior risks making workers feel insecure and suffering the effects of “invasive surveillance,” Phys.org says. That level of explicit oversight can harm workplace culture.
When used properly, these wearables, many of which are commercial off-the-shelf products, can warn HR departments in real time about potential problems. One good example is their potential to spot “rising stress before burnout or to safety hazards before accidents,” wrote Dr. Sebastiano Massaro, a neuroscience lecturer and co-author of the study.
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But unless companies have “robust methodological and ethical guardrails,” there’s a risk of blurring the lines between “science and pseudoscience, between real support and dangerous surveillance,” Massaro worries. In their best uses, wearables can “help create safer, healthier, and more responsive and productive workplaces” he thinks. Done badly, they could “normalize unnecessary monitoring and paradoxically increase workplace stress rather than reduce it.”
Recently, Amazon revealed it was developing smart glasses (a little like Meta’s recently unveiled AR glasses) the company said will help its delivery drivers “identify hazards, seamlessly navigate to customers’ doorsteps, and improve customer deliveries.” The goggles sound like powerful tech, melding “AI-powered sensing capabilities and computer vision” with cameras and a display so a driver can see “everything from navigation details to hazards to delivery tasks,” as well as spotting the right packages in their truck at a delivery address. It’s plausible that these devices could speed up deliveries—a form of 21st century optimization that’s akin to a business efficiency decision that means UPS delivery trucks almost never turn left.
But Amazon’s product announcement immediately triggered ethical and privacy worries, both about the drivers’ well-being and about data collected outside the trucks, when drivers are at a delivery location, for example. Amazon, after all, has repeatedly been in the news over the way it surveils its workforce, including landing a 32-million euro fine ($36 million) in France in 2024 for doing so excessively.
How can you best apply this research for your own company?
Offering your workers wearable tech can be presented positively — the devices have a certain social cachet, and if they help workers monitor their health and fitness for their own purposes (as well as for more workplace-directed reasons, like monitoring stress levels) then they can be seen as an attractive workplace perk. The data they collect can, if used responsibly, also help you avoid complex health issues like burnout.
But if you do deploy tech like this, it’s important to be open and transparent about what data is being collected, and what for, and also to be rigorous in protecting sensitive employee medical data. Otherwise you risk harming employee well-being and your company’s reputation.
What can you do to reduce burnout in your own life, and in your organization? The World Health Organization defined burnout as a workplace syndrome more than six years ago. It first included burnout in its catalog of workplace ills more than 30 years ago. Yet after all this time, we’re no closer to solving it.
“If we’re all having the same problem, why has no one figured it out yet?” An HR leader put that question to stress expert Paula Davis at a recent event, she writes in a piece for Psychology Today. In the piece, she takes a fascinating deep dive into what causes burnout and how to prevent it. Burnout isn’t a wellness problem to be solved with meditation and exercise classes, she explains, it’s a structural issue. Management needs to address it a strategic level. Her whole article is well worth reading. But in particular, she calls out one primary cause that she says is the most common.
An unsustainable workload
“You consistently have too much to do, and you feel like you’re treading water and at any moment you might sink,” Davis writes. “This is by far the biggest driver of burnout I see across industries.”
I think there’s a very simple, very deep-rooted reason. It’s how we define our jobs. We think of the parameters of a job in terms of the work that must be done. For example, a northeastern sales director might define that job as being responsible for all sales in that region. But what if you defined it instead as being responsible for as much of the northeastern sales as you can manage during a 40-hour work week?
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It’s a radical concept, I realize. It runs counter to how jobs are defined pretty much everywhere. That’s especially true for startups, where both founders and employees routinely work extra-long hours, especially during the earliest days. But while that may be normal, it’s ultimately not sustainable. This may be why most startup employees report that working at their job is bad for their mental health.
Company founders are often happy to work extra-long hours in the startups that they love. But ultimately, that isn’t great for them either. Research shows that if you push yourself beyond the boundaries of a normal workload, your productivity and effectiveness will suffer. Worse, your judgment will too, because burnout can actually damage your brain. It can affect your cognitive function and your judgment. That may explain why we often see very smart, high-profile entrepreneurs from Travis Kalanick to Elon Musk make some bone-headed moves.
Limiting time at work will make you more productive
I’ve learned from interviews with thousands of high-powered founders and other executives, as well as from my own work life, that setting limits on how much you work will actually make you more successful, not less. That’s because it forces you to be ruthless in eliminating anything that takes up your time but doesn’t move you toward your goals. You become much more efficient during your work hours, in part because you’re less exhausted and better able to focus. Working reasonable hours allows for things like better sleep, better nutrition, more exercise, and more time with loved ones. Research shows that all these things will make you healthier and happier, which in turn will make you a better boss and generally better at your job.
This is why I propose the 1-2-48 Rule, a simple method to put reasonable boundaries around your work time. To follow the rule, make sure to take at least one day completely away from work out of every week, at least two weeks’ vacation every year, and avoid working more than 48 hours in any week. Research supports setting these limits as a way to preserve your productivity, as well as your happiness and health.
In these days of widespread layoffs, everyone is supposed to “do more with less.” Managers who are stretched thin themselves pile work that would have been done by laid-off employees onto their remaining work force. Those remaining employees, fearful of losing their own jobs, may feel they have no choice but to accept the extra work.
But it ultimately doesn’t work to expect your employees, or yourself, to complete more and more tasks just because there’s no one else to do them, and they seem to need doing. Putting guardrails around your work time won’t just help you avoid burnout before it happens, it will also help you see what’s truly essential and what isn’t.
The opinions expressed here by Inc.com columnists are their own, not those of Inc.com.
Here’s a roundup of answers to three questions from readers.
1. How to mentor a very timid employee
I’d love some advice about how to help out a very timid staff member, let’s call her Jane. Jane and I have 1-1 weekly professional development meetings where I can offer support, mentorship, and advice. She is not my direct report and we don’t work in the same department so our workflows never cross; our company culture is that each senior staff member (i.e., me) has regular mentoring meetings with some junior employees.
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Jane is very, very timid. She doesn’t feel like she can advocate for herself in her own team, and she doesn’t push back when she’s given unachievable deadlines. If she knows she can’t meet a deadline, she tries to anyway because she doesn’t want to say no to her team leader. This results in Capital S stress for her, and a missed deadline for the team.
Recently, Jane ended up crying in my office, totally overwhelmed by her workload, and feeling like she’s not able to do anything about it. I investigated with her team leader, Kate, who told me that Jane always produces brilliant work, even if it’s sometimes after a deadline. Her team has nothing but positive feedback about Jane’s work ethic, even though it seems like she often works overtime to try and meet a deadline (something else that causes her stress). All in all, it seems to me like a supportive team environment. Kate and I are peers, and I know for a fact that she is an incredibly supportive leader who would not react badly to Jane speaking up at the right time.
Kate and I have tried for months now to give Jane some ways to help her communicate to her team members when she’s struggling, and how/when to speak up when she’s given a deadline that she knows is unachievable. The problem is that Jane is so timid that she refuses to actually carry out any of the ideas that we discuss in our meetings. She just says that she “doesn’t think she can say that to Kate.” Jane’s stress levels are getting worse, and I’m at a loss with what to try next.
Green responds:
Well … you can try giving her specific language, role-playing it with her, and setting specific plans that you then check back about (“you were going to say X to Kate at your 4 p.m. meeting — did you? why not? so what next?”). You can also name the pattern for Jane — “We’ve worked on this for months but you haven’t implemented any of the ideas we’ve come up with. What do you think would really help?”
But if you’ve already tried those things, I think it’s likely that you can’t fix this. Mostly it needs to come from Jane herself, although Kate is also better positioned to fix it if she wants to.
Ideally Kate needs to ask Jane some probing questions about her workload and take a fresh look at it herself, check in on Jane’s progress toward deadlines earlier in the process, and give her explicit instructions about how she wants her to handle it when something is in danger of going off-track. Is your role one where it would be appropriate to suggest those ideas to Kate or even set up a meeting for the three of you, or are you really just supposed to be coaching Jane behind the scenes?
It’s also possible Jane mostly just wants a place where she can vent. If that’s the case, it’s useful for you to know that so you aren’t racking your brain for a way to move her to action.
2. I gossiped and upset my coworker
I was talking with a manager in another department when she expressed frustration with one of her employees — not that much, just that she is dealing with a lot. Soon after, I saw an ad for that person’s position posted, and I talked about it with a coworker in my department. I came in Monday to a full-blown rumor mill situation with that employee thinking they were being fired and their manager upset that I had talked about it! I take full responsibility; I was the one who spoke about it and that’s on me, regardless of who spread it afterwards. I apologized to the employee and their manager and said I truly didn’t mean to upset them and am so sorry they had to deal with it.
I’m not a gossiping person! I mostly stick to myself, but I made a poor choice and hurt someone. How do I let my colleague and the hurt employee know that this won’t be a pattern without completely walling myself off from everyone?
Green responds:
I know this isn’t a satisfying answer, but now that you’ve apologized, the only real way to show it is by demonstrating it through how you operate and that takes time. Going forward, be scrupulously professional and discreet and you should be able to repair any reputation damage.
But also … that manager who shared her frustration with you about the employee? That was a bigger breach than anything you did. She’s the one who had the real responsibility for discretion. Yes, you shouldn’t have shared what you heard, but she shouldn’t have said it to you in the first place. If she’s the person who chastised you, I hope she acknowledged her own responsibility as well. (On top of that, if she’s already advertising someone’s position when they don’t know they’re going to be replaced, there are bigger problems here — although it’s not clear if that’s what the ad was.)
3. Is pushy networking the new norm for college students?
I’m curious about some interactions I’ve had with a student from my alma mater who has been contacting me for networking and “advice.” I’ve always been more than happy to pay it forward for students from my school and do networking coffees and have helped them with recommendations and getting internships before, as I work in a somewhat difficult to enter public policy field, but I’ve been thrown for a loop with this latest student.
We met up once and the student used the whole time to talk about himself and all the people he knew in the city where I’m located and didn’t ask me questions, but I still gave him the usual advice I give students. I was not impressed, but this student has sent me several emails over the past year to “update me” on his GPA, where he was moving, his extracurricular activities, etc. At one point I didn’t respond quickly enough and he messaged me on LinkedIn saying he’d been trying to contact me and hadn’t heard back.
Is this the new norm for college students now? I understand things are very difficult for those graduating right now. I’ve been polite in my responses, but don’t feel like I need to respond to every email, and I’m curious how you would handle it.
Green responds:
Nah, this isn’t a new norm. This is just one obnoxious guy!
There is advice out there for people to stay in touch with those they’ve networked with, and for early-career networkers to let people who helped them know how things are going as time goes by. Maybe that’s what’s he’s doing. But the level of pushiness is all him.
His “I haven’t heard back from you” message actually gives you a good opening — you could respond to that and say, “Glad to hear you’re doing well. I’m swamped these days and behind on correspondence. Best of luck in whatever comes next for you!” And then give yourself permission to stop replying to future messages if it’s not a relationship you want to maintain.
Someone could argue it’s better to be straight with him (“You’re coming across as demanding more of my time when you didn’t make good use of our meeting last year”), but I don’t think that’s a burden you need to take on. It’s not on you to explain to him why his approach is wrong, although you certainly could if you wanted to.
I caught my employee skipping work to nap at home when she said she was meeting with a potential client. It was total happenstance; I happened to meet the potential client at a social event that night. When I asked my employee the next day why the client had no idea who I was or what our company did, the truth came out: she hadn’t met with anyone, she’d gone home to take a break and a nap. She apologized for lying, but said she’d been feeling burned out and was struggling with seasonal depression. She is my top performer and best employee all around, and we are coming off of our busy season, so a little burnout is understandable. She volunteered that she had done something similar twice before in her six-year career with us, but I don’t know if I can trust her accounting of it — we were in a meeting about her lying, after all.
I can’t quite determine how big of an issue this is. She lied about the meeting and who it was with, and she was likely prepared to lie about how it went, if I hadn’t caught her before we had a chance to debrief. We meet with a lot of potential clients, many of whom never pan out, so I don’t know how I can trust her going forward when she says she has one of these meetings. But, on the other hand, she is consistently our best performer and doesn’t just meet her goals — she exceeds them. If she’s able to do that while occasionally taking siestas, is it really my business? But if she’s lying about where she is … Ugh, this is the loop I’ve been in for two days. Help!
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(Perhaps helpful: we have good, but not exceptional, PTO. It’s not a culture where people take much time off, though I frequently encourage my team to take as much time as they need. This employee takes time off for doctors appointments and vacations, so I know she’s aware of the policy.)
Green responds:
I think the reason you feel stuck is because you need to have another conversation with your employee in order to fully understand the situation. Since she’s your top performer, it’s worth taking the time to fully understand what happened and why. Why did she lie about having a meeting rather than just taking a few hours off to go home? What’s going on that made her feel “I’m under the weather and heading out early today,” wasn’t an option, and that concocting a highly specific lie about a prospective client was a better choice?
Because this wasn’t just a vague lie (not that that would be okay either). This was “I am meeting with Specific Person X from Specific Company Y” and I suspect you’re right that she would have lied about how it went if she hadn’t been caught — which means that she would have given you false client data! If she told you the person wasn’t interested, that’s a prospective client you’d then presumably cross off your list. That’s a big deal.
So what’s going on? Did she lie because your work culture made her feel she couldn’t get the break she needed any other way? Is she out of PTO or saving it for a health need down the road? Or does she not see lying as a big deal as long as no one finds out about it?
Each of those requires a different response from you. If the culture around PTO is what caused this, this is a sign that you’ve got some serious work to do on this aspect of the culture, considering what it drove your best performer to. If it’s a PTO scarcity issue, then it’s worth looking at whether there’s other support you can offer her (either with time off or with workload) so she can take care of herself and not burn out.
Those might sound like overly soft responses to a serious trust violation — but context matters. If something in your culture is driving your best employee to this, or if she’s struggling personally, you want to address what’s really going on. That doesn’t mean you’d give the lying a complete pass; you wouldn’t. You’d still have a serious conversation about how this has affected your ability to take her at her word, and what that means in practical terms. (For example, at least for a while you probably need to do more verifying and spot-checking of things you previously trusted her on implicitly.) But when you’re dealing with someone who’s been outstanding up until now, you should factor in context too, not use a black-and-white, no-nuances approach.
On the other hand, if she doesn’t think casual lying is a big deal, that means that she’s probably been less than straight with you other times too, beyond the times she just confessed to, and she’ll probably do it again when it makes her life easier, and she might be cutting other corners you don’t know about. And if that’s the case, you’ve got to take a fresh look at your entire assessment of her approach to work.
But I don’t think you can sort through this without a better understanding of how she ended up here.
Workplace safety is very much in the news at the moment, thanks to reports about “bad doors” and weak ergonomic design in workspaces, the threat of heat-related injuries at work, and AI’s role in boosting safety on the job. But a new study sheds a different and slightly worrying light on the topic, which may cause you to rethink your workplace safety and education programs. The report, from Colorado-based small business insurer Pie Insurance, shows that there are wide gaps between what employers think about certain key safety issues, and how their employees view those same risks.
The insurer noted in its 2025 Small Business Employee Voice on Workplace Safety Report that both staff and leaders agree that around half of all workplace injuries can be prevented. Still, more than two-thirds of employee respondents said they remain concerned about safety at work, industry news site InsuranceBusinessMag notes. Fully 58 percent have actually witnessed workplace injuries happening in the last year, and 43 percent say they’ve sometimes felt pressured by their companies to work in conditions that were actually unsafe. This may be a “it’s an emergency get it done, we need this now,” leadership mentality, or it may be a sign of deeper disregard for safety matters — but the fact that over four in 10 of all workers surveyed feel like this is concerning.
One main area where employees and workers disagree on workplace safety is mental health. Pie’s report says that mental health has become the leading workplace safety worry among workers: 32 percent of those surveyed identified it as the top issue. This may surprise some, since “safety” has been traditionally a word connected with physical injury risks — Pie’s survey supports this, with 20 percent of respondents calling it their top concern, while 9 percent rated environmental issues at the top and 4 percent chose equipment safety.
Where workers and employers disagree is shown most clearly in how each group envisions support systems for mental health issues. Fully 91 percent of employers say they’re confident about support, but just 62 percent of employees agree. The matter is of serious concern to workers, though, with 36 percent saying that work stresses carry over to impact their personal lives, affecting their motivation, anxieties and sleep.
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Pie’s study also found a disconnect between how employees feel about reporting safety issues — 17 percent of respondents said they didn’t feel comfortable doing it. Of these people, over one in three feel this way because they worry their company will retaliate, a third feel like it would make them seem like a “difficult” worker, and 31 percent simply don’t report because they feel like it would result in zero mitigation actions by their employer.
Another gap exists over training on workplace safety, with 63 percent of surveyed employers saying they offer properly formatted training, but just 29 percent of workers say they get regular safety training and fully 28 percent said they’ve never had any.
What’s your big takeaway from this? You may, after all, think that you’re properly in tune with your workers when it comes to safety, and there may even be a pretty large number posted next to that “days since last accident:” sign.
The fact is that you and your staff may not be singing from the same sheet music. Pie’s data suggests that gaps between employee and employer attitudes are much more common than you think.
InsuranceBusinessMag points out another issue that may arise from this disconnect: data show smaller and medium-size companies are “increasingly expanding into higher-risk work to remain profitable.” As they do this, workplace safety risks and costs and, as a result, insurance issues will multiply, spotlighting workplace safety.
It might be time to revisit your workplace safety protocols, run a training session with your staff, and promise them that if they report issues they spot there will be no reprisals. Addressing workplace mental health could also be a priority, and that’s something you can affect by checking and modifying company culture. Offering perks like flexible working or hybrid work solutions, and even getting training yourself on how to spot and help your worker’s mental health problems are good first steps.
There used to be a lot of jokes about the terrible nature of doctors’ handwriting, until much of the process of seeing a physician was digitized, improving things no end for both doctors and patients. But consulting a medical expert still involves a whole lot of note-taking, and that’s an increasing burden for many healthcare workers, from physicians to clerical staff. A new report says things are changing yet again, however, and a new generation of digital tools is improving the way health care workers make notes. The new innovations are powered by AI, and even if your business has nothing to do with practicing medicine, there are lessons here for your company.
The study, led by a research group from the Yale School of Medicine, cited previous reports that showed over half of a clinician’s typical workday gets consumed dealing with electronic health records, leaving just a quarter of the day for direct time with patients. Documentation time has been trending upwards too, which has been linked to burnout, depleted efforts at work and more staff thinking of quitting, industry news site MedicalXPress reports.
But when medical professionals used what’s described as an ambient AI scribe platform — a system that unobtrusively takes part in a patient consultation, capturing the audio of the conversation and then transcribing it via specialized AI models into notes for the clinician to review later — things were very different.
Between the nearly 200 participants in the investigation, most of them attending physicians, the proportion of doctors reporting feelings that qualified as burnout fell from nearly 52 percent at the start to just under 39 percent after 30 days.
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That’s a dramatic downward shift. The study measured how the AI tool, which the researchers pointedly did not identify, was helping, and showed it was lowering the cognitive burden of the physicians, easing up the amount of time eaten up by working on documentation, decreasing the effort the professionals felt they had to deliver at work, and lowering their mental demands. The time needed per week in “after hours” moments to complete documentation also fell by nearly one hour, reducing pressure still further. Overall the report suggests this leads to doctors having more energy to give the proper attention to patients’ concerns, and frees them up for more urgent care access.
This is, of course, just one single use case for AI tools. And it’s easy to see how having a reliable automatic note-taking system could dramatically change the working day of a typical frontline health care worker. Freeing up time needed to write things down would easily translate into more face-time with patients, and as long as the overall pressure on a typical physician to achieve a certain workload doesn’t go up because of this extra time, then the risk of burnout would be reduced.
How does this impact your company, though?
It’s a giant thumbs-up for the benefits of AI technology. In this case, as the Yale report says, it’s specialized tools “that can produce professional appearing text,” which are “taught to listen, instantaneously transcribe, assimilate, and assemble a document, with fine-tuning by human training.”
The study shows that in the right setting, using exactly the right tools, AI can achieve some of the big promises that AI evangelists make. Instead of threatening to take over people’s jobs, AI proponents argue that it can take on mundane tasks on behalf of a worker, thus freeing up staff to do more frontline, more productive tasks. The Yale report, for example, says AI scribes allowed doctors “more time for meaningful work and professional well-being.”
This means that for your office, tools other than an AI scribe may prove useful and could genuinely reduce workloads and burnout risks for your staff. Choosing AI tools in a careful, considered way is important, however, and upskilling and training staff on the correct use of the technology is likely a key for this process to work properly. Many reports say organizations are failing to do this when they roll out AI systems.
In late 2024 experts predicted that in early 2025, employee engagement would be a key driver for success in a period when many expected rapid business growth. Engagement is an important measure of how “bought in” workers are to the company they’re working for: more engaged workers just go that little bit further, which ultimately contributes to driving up revenues and profits.
But by April a Gallup survey was showing that employee engagement scores had dropped globally, to the point that U.S. and Canadian engagement had declined to levels more typical of Latin America. The study found disaffection was starting at the top, noting that the “primary cause for the global decline in engagement,” was a “drop in managers’ engagement,” and pointing out that “no other worker category experienced as significant a decline in engagement as the world’s managers.”
Now a new survey adds a fascinating wrinkle, showing that nearly half of leaders (46 percent) would actually quit their top-tier roles if it meant that they would actually feel more engaged at work. In other words, they’d give up their title in order to feel more valued, productive, or perhaps more part of a team. Does this mean the allure of management-grade perks is fading? And what does it mean for your company?
That data, from Norwegian learning platform Kahoot!, is startling. Just 47 percent of UK and U.S. company leaders surveyed said they were “fully engaged,” and this is a dramatic contrast to the views of their teams, with 79 percent of the leaders believing their teams would see them as “energized.” Worse, the report notes that 34 percent of leaders said they felt burned out on a daily basis, or at least several times a week, and 22 percent — over one in five — said they felt “emotionally disconnected” from their teams “often” or “always” during the previous six months, HCAMag reported. This will likely play into the way they interact with their teams, since workers inevitably can pick up on the subtle emotional undercurrents behind managers’ actions, and this could easily demotivate front-line workers.
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The study found, somewhat bleakly, that the leading causes of managerial burnout included “emotional exhaustion from trying to motivate disengaged employees,” along with having to cope with “nonstop change” and the persistent old saw, “economic uncertainty.” Mainly middle managers said they had concerns about “feeling invisible or undervalued by executive leadership.” The major culprits behind leadership burnout included “juggling engagement with too many other priorities,” with 48 percent of those surveyed agreeing with this, even as 48 percent highlighted pressures of responding to employee apathy, and 28 percent cited problems with continuously trying to get Gen-Z workers engaged.
The new survey also found possible causes of this sagging sense of connection, noting that 57 percent of the leaders surveyed hadn’t received “extensive” training on how to reengage disengaged teams, and just 17 percent said their company always backed them up by providing effective team motivation tools.
More interestingly, and offering a potential insight into some of the ill-advised pushes to get workers to return to the office, the study also found one in four leaders said they’re not “confident” about leading hybrid or remote teams, so that many “improvise at a time when alignment mattered most.” This confidence gap is, of course, going to add to leadership stress — particularly as data show that hybrid and remote working models really are here to stay, and can even be more productive under some circumstances.
As to what would turn things around for leaders, the survey showed 58 percent of leaders looking for more energy, creativity or fun in daily tasks. Meanwhile 52 percent wanted to grow their own skills, resonating with a recent report that showed managers feel simply too busy in day-to-day tasks, such as arranging training for their subordinates, to do their own training or seek mentorship.
All told, the report paints a picture of sort of workplace spiral. where employee engagement is suffering, leading to stressed-out, overburdened management and leadership who are losing touch with the joy of work. The top-down disaffection then fuels wider employee disengagement, reducing team effectiveness.
What can you take away from this for your company? You may, after all, be feeling in good spirits about your leadership duties, and of the opinion your workers are cheery and as engaged as they can be with their jobs.
Engagement is a somewhat abstract measure of your workplace culture and employees’ emotional states. Thus it’s possible that everything seems to be ticking along happily on the surface, but key managers and even others on your leadership team are quietly “cracking” under stresses they’re not voicing aloud. Savvy leaders would know to seek help if they’re feeling overburdened or disengaged with their job, and also to check in regularly with their managers and workers to see how they’re feeling — under a no-blame banner.
Employers are on the same page about the issues plaguing their workforce.
A new survey from Illinois-based risk management outfit Gallagher looked at what’s worrying the country’s employers in 2025, and you might see your own concerns reflected in the list, since it lines up with many of the social, technological and political winds blowing across the U.S. right now.
1. Worker retention
After the perennial concerns of raking in reliable revenues and sales, employee retention is the top issue on the minds of over 4,000 leaders surveyed by Gallagher, reflecting workers’ changing ideas about what constitutes a “career,” and as the pressures at work force some people to look for greener pastures.
Some of these changes are driven by the way Gen-Z thinks differently about the workplace, of course, and as the generation currently entering the workforce in ever-greater numbers, they may help set the trends. Gen-Z workers are known for valuing their mental health and work-life balance more than previous generations, and are rejecting traditional work culture norms — including being willing to ditch a job over issues like the Sunday Scaries.
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2. Burnout
Meanwhile, social, economic and job-market instability, in addition to sweeping political changes, are adding to the pressure that the typical worker experiences. Which is likely why Gallagher’s data shows 67 percent of employers — more than two in every three — are also highly concerned about the mental health of their workers, HRDive reports.
Stress and burnout issues can have long-term impacts on worker morale, efficiency and engagement (possibly tempting some workers to quit) and ultimately this will impact a company’s profits. Yet the data show that while employers are deeply worried about these issues, they’re not stepping up with solutions: only 24 percent give mental health training to managers, leaders or HR teams — who are, according to other reports, deeply stressed out themselves. Also, less than half of employers say their leadership teams are “well-equipped” to refer stressed-out staff to mental health services. This, the report says, is a “critical gap” in worker support.
3. DEI
The third non-financial issue on employers’ minds is related to inclusion and diversity. This might be surprising, given the Trump administration’s pressure against DEI, but it seems that corporate America thinks very differently: 74 percent of employers say they’re implementing diversity and inclusion initiatives this year. While larger employees are more likely to follow this path than smaller ones (84 percent of large organizations) fully 67 percent of small companies are intent on pursuing inclusion and diversity—the report says they view it as a “stabilizing force during economic uncertainty.” Conscious of political background, perhaps, the report says companies are “refocusing their efforts,” even though the fundamental ideas remain.
One interesting aspect of inclusion Gallagher noted in its report is the role of buzzy AI tech. Employers are “leveraging it to reduce bias in recruitment, tailor engagement practices and support equitable decision-making,” the survey found. But, as with the issues in mental health training, few employers are stepping up with appropriate training for D&I: just 24 percent train workers by “embedding inclusive behaviors into their daily role.”
Meanwhile D&I plans continue to offer significant benefits, which may explain their ongoing enthusiasm. The report says companies investing in these plans are “best positioned to attract and retain top talent,” since they “not only build trust but also foster resilience for long-term success,” as do concerted efforts to boost worker engagement, and supply wellbeing support.
What companies can do
What can you take away from this list of worries? You may, after all, have very different top concerns in mind after surviving through most of 2025.
Primarily, it means you should probably reinforce your company’s efforts to retain staff in the long term, deal with their stresses before they reach burnout levels, and follow your own path on DEI (even if you call the plan something different.) The Gallagher report shows these are strong worry-driving trends across American industry, and thus may be affecting your staff even if you’re unaware of the problem.
Also, reinforcing your staff training may be a good idea: Gallagher’s data did, after all, show how corporate training in DEI and mental health matters is lagging behind, even as these worries unsettle employers across the country.
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
It’s an almost daily occurrence: It’s 2:37 a.m., and while staring at your laptop, you’re wondering to yourself if your current coffee consumption has changed course and has gone from a habit to a full-blown personality trait. The investor call tomorrow looms heavily, and your inbox has become a minefield while your “to-do” list has begun to grow to the point it’s developing its own gravitational pull.
Have you guessed it yet? Yep, welcome to being an entrepreneur, where the highs are exhilarating but infrequent, and the lows are humbling and an almost daily occurrence, now to where the pressure is relentless.
Being an entrepreneur isn’t for everyone. Building a business is hard, but it’s a privilege and an adventure with great rewards that requires a strong, sustainable mental fortitude to last the emotional marathons — because there’s no sprinting a marathon. Those founders who “make it” aren’t just labeled as talented or lucky; rather, they’re resilient. These founders have found the secret sauce; they’ve learned through the ups and downs that protecting their mental health, adapting under extreme pressures and keeping going is absurdly tough.
Entrepreneurship inherently comes with its own stress profile. Financial uncertainty is consistently identified as one of the most stressful burdens an entrepreneur deals with, especially early on. Couple that with the ongoing leadership isolation effect and the reality that your decisions could potentially make-or-break the company, piles on. Add in one more layer called “hustle culture,” and you’ve now somehow turned isolation and exhaustion into a competitive sport, complete with its own LinkedIn medals to showcase, “Sleeps Less Than You.”
Resilience in this aspect isn’t just a word; it’s the definition of not ignoring stress or toughing it out until you absolutely break. It’s feeling like Mike Tyson going 13 rounds, taking the punch, adapting and continuing to push forward without losing sight of the ultimate goal and bigger picture. The American Psychological Association continually correlates resilience to making better decisions, higher performance and more effective leadership — all of which are non-negotiables for an entrepreneur trying to stabilize and survive turbulence.
Building resilience through mental health practices
Here’s the good thing, though: Resilience is learned. It’s a skill that can be picked up and trained for in the same way some professional runners train for a big 10K — only the running mainly takes place mentally in your head (and occasionally between back-to-back meetings).
1. Mindset shifts:
Remember that setbacks as an entrepreneur aren’t career-ending; they’re really just expensive learning opportunities, sort of like paying tuition for a real-life MBA you didn’t realize you’ve signed up for. The challenges you take on and reframing them into data points versus failures can be all you need for a momentum builder that keeps the panic at bay.
2. Mind-body maintenance:
Remembering that your brain is an essential part of your body is crucial; treating it accordingly goes a long way. Be sure to build in exercise, even if just a simple walk, mindfulness and rhythmic breathing techniques can help regulate stress and improve cognitive ability. Numerous neuroscience studies showcase how regular mindfulness practice has the ability to reshape the brain, shaping it to handle curveballs more effectively, practice it, live it and turn it into a routine.
3. Support networks:
This should be as clear as day. Find the Alfred to your Batman. Having a person there you trust to help support your path. Whether it’s a mentor, peer group or personal coach, it can make the difference in putting things into perspective, solving problems faster and just reminding you that you’re not alone in the trenches.
4. Boundaries and recovery:
Thinking downtime is laziness is a waste of your energy; it’s preventive maintenance that you should embrace. Would you run your car engine 24/7, low on oil? Of course not, unless you like paying for repair bills. Your brain is no different. Ensuring you schedule whitespace, dedicated time to reflect on your current state, use it to create something non-business related or just zone out staring at a wall without guilt — it’s what you need it to be.
As an entrepreneur, the pressure is inevitable from various angles. The way you accept it, face it and come through with a response when it arrives doesn’t have to add to your stress, especially on a Monday right before a critical investor pitch. Those entrepreneurs who endure and thrive are not the ones who are tallying the most hours in the day; they’re the ones who have understood that mental health isn’t just “self-care” and have built systems to protect their mental health and solidify their resilience.
So take it by the horns, treat your mental health like your financials, monitoring them, investing in them and pivoting before a small problem becomes a major crisis. Because with this game, being resilient isn’t just about being able to survive the storm; it’s the ability to dance in the rain, and preferably with a cup of coffee that now isn’t doubling as your personality.
It’s an almost daily occurrence: It’s 2:37 a.m., and while staring at your laptop, you’re wondering to yourself if your current coffee consumption has changed course and has gone from a habit to a full-blown personality trait. The investor call tomorrow looms heavily, and your inbox has become a minefield while your “to-do” list has begun to grow to the point it’s developing its own gravitational pull.
Have you guessed it yet? Yep, welcome to being an entrepreneur, where the highs are exhilarating but infrequent, and the lows are humbling and an almost daily occurrence, now to where the pressure is relentless.
Being an entrepreneur isn’t for everyone. Building a business is hard, but it’s a privilege and an adventure with great rewards that requires a strong, sustainable mental fortitude to last the emotional marathons — because there’s no sprinting a marathon. Those founders who “make it” aren’t just labeled as talented or lucky; rather, they’re resilient. These founders have found the secret sauce; they’ve learned through the ups and downs that protecting their mental health, adapting under extreme pressures and keeping going is absurdly tough.
Return to office (RTO) mandates aren’t popular, as report after report shows. Whether they are announced in a my way or the highway style, like Amazon’s Andy Jassy or JPMorgan’s Jamie Dimon, or with less bluster. Some research shows RTOs are not effective tools for boosting productivity, and that plenty of workers are finding ways to skirt the policy.
Now a new report suggests that the gap between RTO mandates and employee compliance remains because many managers may be so burnt out that they’re completely uninterested in forcing their staff to follow controversial and deeply unpopular company rules. It could be that over-stressed managers are driving this so-called “hushed hybrid” office culture, Fortunesuggests.
Support for this conclusion comes from a survey by Flex Index, which describes itself as a platform for analyzing flexible workplace habits. Among 14,000 companies it looked at, increasing numbers of RTO mandates drove required in-office time up by 12 percent since early 2024, meaning staff have gone from an average expected office attendance rate of 2.57 days a week to 2.87. That may sound modest, but remember this includes companies that remain fully remote. Regardless of what the RTO rules say, actual attendance has not risen at the same rate. Over the same period while in-office time expectations rose 12 percent, actual attendance only rose by 1 percentage point, to 3 percent.
Brian Elliott, CEO of Work Forward, which publishes the Flex Index, told Fortune that some workers can get away with ignoring leadership demands that they spend more time in the office in person with practical arguments supporting more flexible arrangements. For example, managing online meetings with multiple staff members across multiple time zones remains challenging in any setting — so staying at home on a day like that wouldn’t make a difference to productivity.
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And, given high levels of management burnout and disengagement, employees may be more likely to get away with this sort of trick more often than you may expect. “If I’m the manager and I’ve got a solid performer and they’re coming in two or three days a week, but not five, I’m not going to fire them,” Elliott said. That’s because as long as someone is “delivering the goods and getting their work done,” managers who are under severe pressure themselves may simply decide that compliance with certain policies is lower on the list of priorities.
Anecdotally, Elliott’s thinking makes sense: reports show that executive burnout remains a serious issue in U.S. workplaces, with a survey in March reporting some 72 percent of workplace leaders report feeling burned out. Given the trend toward flatter business structures with fewer middle managers, led by big tech firms like Meta and Microsoft, it’s entirely plausible that stressed-out middle managers, overburdened with work and worried about the threat technology like AI represents to their own jobs, would simply ignore the exact amount of time that key workers spend in the office, even if it violates RTO rules that have been sent down from upper management.
Why should you care about this?
It’s another signal that RTO rules sometimes just don’t make good business sense. If you expect your managers to enforce an unpopular new rule, you might be adding to their already high stress levels while also genereating resentment from the employees that report to them. That’s a recipe for increasing the chance your strict RTO policy might simply be ignored by the people who are supposed to enforce it.
If your company is requiring people to spend more time in the office, then perhaps the way to make your policy work is with encouragement and perks: Flex Index’s data show that if you try stamping your foot, you might just end up being ignored, and, possibly, hurting your workforce’s perception of your leadership.
Also, there’s an underlying data point here: managers may be burning out under your leadership, and it’s possible you may not have noticed. It might be time for a pep talk, and honest chats about work burdens and stresses.
Tech leaders have consistently warned that AI is already as good as entry-level workers and that it could halve white-collar jobs by 2030. In fact, a “first-of-its-kind” Stanford University study has warned that the new technology is already having “significant and disproportionate impact” on Gen Z.
So it’s no wonder they’re eyeing up jobs in healthcare which offer low unemployment rates, the potential to earn over $200,000, and is unlikely to be replaced with robotic doctors and nurses anytime soon.
But there’s one thing they should know before filling out medical school applications: pursuing job security doesn’t necessarily guarantee job satisfaction.
That’s because recent research from shift work platform Deputy, which surveyed 1.28 million users, ranks doctors, paramedics, and even chiropractors as the unhappiest workers.
In fact, doctors’ offices and medical clinics recorded the highest levels of dissatisfaction, with nearly 38% of respondents saying they’re unhappy in their jobs. Chiropractors and staff in critical and emergency services weren’t far behind. And if you include animal health roles, 4 out of the 5 worst jobs for happiness in the UK right now are in healthcare.
Despite healthcare’s reputation for meaningful work, these roles are often more likely than most to leave workers burned out and ground down by long hours and high stakes.
“Staffing shortages, emotional strain, unpredictable rosters, and an ageing population are cited as key contributors to declining morale,” the report highlighted.
Top 10 unhappiest industry sectors, per the research
Doctors Office/Medical Clinic – 37.84%
Animal Health – 17.95%
Chiropractors – 12.93%
Critical & Emergency Services – 12.05%
Call Centres – 12.00%
Catering – 8.60%
Delivery and Postal Services – 6.97%
Care Facilities – 6.22%
Cleaning Services – 5.80%
Private Services (Chefs, Gardeners etc) – 5.62%
Gen Z may be happier in hospitality jobs
What’s perhaps most surprising is that jobs many recent grads might have once looked down on—like fast food or waitressing roles—are emerging as a safer bet for a more satisfying career.
Hospitality fared well in Deputy’s study, making up half of the 10 happiest job sectors, despite the sector’s reputation for high stress, unsociable hours, and low pay.
Hospitality jobs dominated the happiness rankings. Sit-down restaurant staff (89.7%), fast food and cashier restaurant workers (82.9%), food pop-up teams (82.5%), and café or coffee shop employees (82%) all reported some of the highest job satisfaction scores of any sector.
Florists, childcare workers and cleaners also reported notably high levels of job contentment.
What makes these roles so satisfying? The report suggests it’s less about pay or prestige, and more about the day-to-day experience: “These roles may benefit from clearer routines, manageable workloads, and stronger team camaraderie, highlighting the emotional value of operational structure and positive workplace culture.”
Although probably not at the top of most graduates’ dream career list, separate data also show that wage growth for bartenders and baristas is outpacing that of desk workers.
Top 10 happiest industry sectors, per the research
What if the very hormone designed to help you survive is actually the reason you’re struggling to thrive?
My mother relentlessly saved and sacrificed so that she could enjoy her life in retirement. But two years into retirement, she was diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer’s.
Here’s what I’ve learned since becoming a Functional Diagnostic Nutrition Practitioner: she didn’t just “get” Alzheimer’s two years after retirement. It was building and building for years before that. She was making it worse with lifestyle choices: the over-exercising that women in their 40s and 50s often do, eating trans fats during the low-fat craze of the 80s and 90s.
Had I known what I know now, her outcome might have been different.
This is why I’m passionate about functional health. This is why thousands of practitioners are learning to identify and address the root causes of dysfunction before they become disease. If we can reach people in that gray space (when things are out of balance but before they become diagnosable conditions), we can change their trajectory. We can save lives.
As functional health practitioners, we see it every day: clients who’ve tried everything, followed every protocol, cleaned up their diet, and taken all the right supplements, yet they’re still stuck in that frustrating place of “I’m okay, but I’m not great.”
The missing piece? Understanding cortisol and its profound impact on every system in the body.
If you’ve ever wondered why some clients get amazing results while others plateau, or why you yourself might be experiencing symptoms that doctors dismiss as “normal aging,” this deep dive into cortisol will change everything.
What Is Wellness, Really?
Before we dive into cortisol, let’s get clear on what we’re actually working toward. At FDN, we don’t believe in “fine” or “okay.” We believe in abundant vitality.
Picture this as a spectrum:
The Right Side (The Medical Model): Symptoms → Sickness → Disease → Death
The Middle (Neutral Health): No symptoms, but no energy either. This is the “I’m fine, I guess” zone where most people live.
The Left Side (True Wellness): High energy, optimal function, metabolic fire, abundant vitality, joy for life.
Here’s the thing: neutral health equals a neutral life. When you’re operating from “I’m okay, I don’t have any complaints,” you’re not building empires, writing books, raising joyful kids, or showing up as your best self in relationships.
Good health, abundant vitality, is your birthright. It’s not just for the lucky few.
The Body’s Incredible Healing Power (And What’s Limiting It)
Your body is a self-healing machine. You know this because when you get a cut, it heals. When you break a bone, it mends. When you catch a cold, you recover.
But this healing ability isn’t infinite. If it were, we’d never age or die.
So what’s the difference between what your body can heal and what it can’t?
It’s a savings versus spending problem.
Think of your body as having a bank account called “Vital Reserve.” This is your innate intelligence: your body’s natural ability to function at 100% and fix imbalances before they become problems.
Where do you spend this precious currency? On your environment.
This has always been the case. Our paleolithic ancestors spent their Vital Reserve on not knowing if food would be available, dealing with harsh weather, avoiding predators, and navigating tribal conflicts.
Today? We spend it on mental-emotional stress, environmental toxins, and poor lifestyle habits that are constantly draining our account.
The main spender of Vital Reserve is stress.
The Modern Stress Problem: It’s Not What You Think
When most people think of stress, they picture this: work deadlines, traffic, relationship conflicts, financial pressure. And yes, these mental-emotional stressors are huge.
But there are two other categories most people completely miss:
Physical Stressors:
Sitting too long
Blue light exposure from screens
Too much coffee
Not exercising enough (or exercising too much)
Needing wine to fall asleep
Poor sleep quality
Environmental Stressors:
Depleted soils
EMF exposure
Chemicals in food, water, and air
Toxins our paleolithic ancestors never encountered
Plus, there’s the existential stress of modern life: What’s my purpose? How do I make my life meaningful when I’ll likely be forgotten in 100 years?
All of these are constantly withdrawing from your Vital Reserve account.
Meet Cortisol: Your Body’s “Energy on Credit” System
Cortisol is your primary stress hormone, and it’s actually designed to help you survive. When your environment throws stressors at you, cortisol says, “We need to put internal spending on hold and take all available resources to deal with this external threat.”
Cortisol breaks the body down for quick energy. We call this “catabolic.”
Why would your body have a mechanism for breaking itself down? Because sometimes you need energy RIGHT NOW. When your boss says, “This project is actually due in 30 minutes,” you can’t drive to the store, buy food, cook it, eat it, digest it, and then produce energy. You need quick fuel immediately.
So cortisol reaches for easy-to-break-down tissues like cartilage, tendons, connective tissue, and muscle, converting them to blood sugar.
Here’s the kicker: Cortisol is also a natural painkiller and anti-inflammatory. It masks the damage it’s doing, which is why it makes you feel amazing in the moment: clear thinking, quick reactions, pain-free movement.
Think of cortisol as your body’s credit card. You’re borrowing energy now and promising to pay it back later through rest, recovery, and healing.
When “Energy on Credit” Becomes a Problem
Throughout history, humans dealt with stress that was intense but occasional and short-lived. A wild animal attack, a natural disaster, a tribal conflict: these were serious but temporary.
Take a moment to think about this: Does this describe the stress in your life?
For most of us, stress is intense, constant, and never-ending. We wake up stressed, work stressed, drive home stressed, and lie in bed stressed about tomorrow’s stress.
This creates what we call “catabolic debt”: you’re constantly running up charges on your cortisol credit card without ever paying it back.
Chronic stress is not within our biological design.
Consider this: Anthropological studies show paleolithic humans worked only 15-20 hours per week. How many of you work only 15-20 hours per week? (And remember, “work” includes housework, childcare, and all the other responsibilities that don’t stop when you leave the office.)
They lived in close communities with cooperative resource sharing and had each other’s backs. Think about your own life: Do you know your neighbors? If you do, would they really have your back if things got serious?
Most of us are duplicating resources instead of sharing them. We’re all figuring out our own childcare, making our own meals, maintaining our own everything. There’s no interdependence, no shared load.
The cost of modern life is enormous:
70-80% of doctor visits are for stress-related illnesses
People with high anxiety are 4-5 times more likely to die from heart attack or stroke
Stress contributes to 50% of all illnesses
The Stress Response Curve: Your Roadmap to Understanding Where You Are
This is where it gets really interesting. Understanding this curve will change how you see your health (and your clients’ health) forever.
We all start in the green zone: Homeostasis. When you experience occasional stressors, cortisol and adrenaline spike, you handle the situation, then return to baseline to rest and repair.
But when stress becomes chronic, you move into the orange zone: Acute Stress. You’re constantly producing cortisol and adrenaline, never returning to homeostasis.
Here’s the thing: on your way up this curve, you feel AMAZING. Remember when you could pull all-nighters and still ace exams? When you could eat junk food without consequences? When you had laser focus for 12-16 hours straight?
That’s the acute phase. You’re running on cortisol, and it feels like superpowers.
Then you hit Peak Production. Your body says, “We’ve put way too much on the cortisol credit card. We have to cut back.”
Now you fall into the Compensatory Phase. Your cortisol numbers might look normal to a doctor, but the distribution is all wrong. Maybe you have too much in the morning and crash by afternoon, or you spike at night and can’t sleep.
Plus, you have a relativity problem. You’re used to feeling like Superman from the acute phase, so normal cortisol levels feel terrible by comparison.
Continue down this path, and you reach the Exhaustive Phase. Like a phone on low battery mode, everything still works but at 30% capacity and not for long. You’re devoting everything to just getting through the day.
The Hidden Cost: What Happens to Your Body’s Core Systems
At FDN, we focus on six foundational systems that chronic stress systematically shuts down. We call them the H-I-D-D-E-N systems, and understanding what happens to each one under chronic stress is crucial for practitioners:
H – Hormones DHEA is your anabolic hormone: the one responsible for building you back up after cortisol breaks you down. This is how you pay off your cortisol credit card. But when stress is constant, DHEA steps back and says, “I’ll come back when it’s safe to focus internally, but right now we need to keep spending on the environment.” DHEA becomes chronically low, which means your healing potential becomes chronically low.
Then sex hormones get the message: “We don’t have enough resources to fund fertility right now.” Sex hormones plummet, taking motivation and joy for life with them. This is when you get to that neutral state where you’re thinking, “I have dreams I want to pursue, but it’s just too much effort. I’ll just watch Netflix instead.”
I – Immune Your immune system is expensive to run. Under chronic stress, it says, “I cost a ton of money, so I’m going to operate at 30% capacity and not for very long.” Now you’re getting sick often, it takes forever to heal, you can’t shake that cough, and if anyone around you is sick, you know you’re going down.
D – Digestion Digestion costs a lot of energy to function properly. When you’re spending everything on stress, digestion goes into low-power mode. Now you’re only digesting at 30% capacity. Even if you’re eating the cleanest diet in the world, you can’t use it. You’re not getting the building blocks to repair or the nutrients your body needs to power metabolic functions at full capacity.
D – Detoxification Detoxification is another huge system that’s expensive to run. When your body’s bank account is overdrawn from cortisol debt, detox says, “I don’t have enough money to find these toxins, bind them up, and effectively remove them. So I’ll put them in storage instead.” Your body shoves toxins into fat cells, brain tissue, and bones, creating a toxic backlog that makes you feel slow, gives you acne, throws off digestion, and impairs hormone production.
E – Energy Production Your mitochondria can’t function optimally when all resources are diverted to stress response. This leads to that “tired but wired” feeling where you’re exhausted but can’t actually rest.
N – Nervous System Sleep, mood, and cognitive function all suffer. This is where we see the brain fog, insomnia, anxiety, and depression that so many people struggle with.
The fundamental principle of FDN: These systems don’t operate in isolation. You can’t just say, “Oh, you have classic hormone symptoms, so let’s run a hormone test.” You miss immunity, digestion, detoxification: all the other systems contributing to what we call “Metabolic Chaos.”
This is why the “take this supplement for that symptom” approach rarely works long-term. You’re not dealing with isolated problems: you’re dealing with systemic dysfunction where multiple systems are compromised simultaneously.
Real-Life Case Studies: The Stress Curve in Action
Let’s look at three real clients to see how this plays out. As FDN practitioners, we use what we call “clinical correlation,” which means we never look at lab numbers in isolation. We always consider how someone feels alongside their test results.
Case Study 1: Adam – The Acute Phase Crash
Profile: 35-year-old male, broker at a mid-size investment firm, former athlete still crushing CrossFit workouts
Symptoms: Weight gain, trouble concentrating, loss of muscle mass despite rigorous workouts, headaches
Doctor’s Assessment: “Your results are unremarkable. This is normal aging.”
Lab Results:
Cortisol sum: 9 (acute phase)
Four-point pattern: Way too high in morning, drops low at noon, crashes severely in afternoon, bounces back up at night
The Reality: How do we know Adam isn’t on the left side of the stress curve going up into acute phase? His symptoms tell us everything. If he were on the way up, he’d feel amazing and wouldn’t be in our office. Instead, he’s on the right side coming down from peak production.
His cortisol pattern explains everything: sky-high morning cortisol makes him feel wired and anxious, the afternoon crash leaves him unable to concentrate (not ideal for an investment broker), and the nighttime spike disrupts his sleep.
Even though his DHEA looks “normal,” when we compare it to his cortisol level of 9, he’s clearly catabolic dominant. He’s breaking down faster than he’s building up, which explains why his intense CrossFit sessions aren’t building muscle: they’re just adding more stress to an already overloaded system.
The Reality: Caitlyn’s cortisol sum looks normal, but the distribution is completely dysfunctional. She can barely drag herself out of bed in the morning, crashes hard in the afternoon (imagine trying to accurately record legal proceedings when your cortisol is plummeting), and lies awake at night because her cortisol spikes just when it should be lowest.
She also has a relativity problem. When she was in the acute phase, she felt like Superman. Now that she’s in compensatory with “normal” cortisol levels, she feels terrible by comparison. Her DHEA is low, confirming she’s still in catabolic debt despite the lower cortisol numbers.
Case Study 3: Maggie – The Exhaustive Phase Crisis
Profile: 43-year-old chef at a popular five-star restaurant, diagnosed with hypothyroid
Symptoms: Weight gain in hips and belly, trouble keeping up at work, depression, irregular menstrual cycle
Lifestyle: Working 60+ hours per week, consistently sleeping only 5 hours per night
Medical Status: Seeing a counselor, considering antidepressant medication
Lab Results:
Cortisol sum: 3.1 (exhaustive phase)
Four-point pattern: Way too low in morning, drops low at noon, slight bounce in afternoon, drops again at night
DHEA: Very low
Clinical correlation: Still catabolic dominant despite low cortisol
The Reality: Maggie’s body is operating like a phone on low battery mode: everything still works, but at 30% capacity and not for long. Her thyroid has downregulated because there’s literally not enough energy in the system to maintain normal function.
The depression isn’t just psychological: it’s physiological. Her body can’t afford to fund optimal brain function. Even though her cortisol is very low and her DHEA is very low, she’s still cortisol dominant and in catabolic debt.
This is why understanding the stress curve is so crucial. Three people, three different phases, three different approaches needed.
The Path Forward: Why Understanding Cortisol Changes Everything
Here’s why this matters for you as a health practitioner:
1. It explains why some clients plateau. If you’re not addressing the stress component, you’ll hit a ceiling on healing no matter how perfect the diet or supplement protocol.
2. It validates your clients’ experiences. When someone says, “I used to be able to handle so much more,” or “I don’t feel like myself anymore,” you now understand the physiology behind it.
3. It gives you a roadmap for intervention. Different phases require different approaches. Someone in the acute phase needs different support than someone in the exhaustive phase.
4. It highlights the importance of comprehensive testing. A single cortisol measurement tells you almost nothing. You need the full pattern plus clinical correlation.
The FDN Approach: Test, Don’t Guess
At FDN, we don’t just talk about stress: we measure it. We use what we call “clinical correlation,” which means we never look at lab numbers in isolation. We always consider how someone feels alongside their test results.
We look at:
Four-point cortisol patterns throughout the day (not just a single measurement)
DHEA levels and the cortisol-to-DHEA ratio
How stress is affecting all the H-I-D-D-E-N systems
The complete picture of metabolic chaos
Progress tracking with tools like the Metabolic Chaos Scorecard
Then we address it systematically through our DRESS protocol:
D – Diet: Personalized nutrition based on lab findings, not generic “healthy eating” advice
R – Rest: Sleep optimization and recovery strategies tailored to your stress phase
E – Exercise: Right-sized movement for your current capacity (over-exercise is just as harmful as under-exercise)
S – Stress Reduction: Targeted techniques for your specific stressors: mental/emotional, physical, environmental, and lifestyle factors
S – Supplementation: Targeted support based on actual lab results, not guesswork
This isn’t about generic protocols. It’s about understanding exactly where someone is on the stress curve and what their body needs to heal.
Key Takeaways for Health Practitioners
Cortisol isn’t the enemy. A lot of people talk about cortisol as if it’s the villain—commercials make it sound like cortisol just makes you “old and fat.” That’s not what cortisol does. Cortisol is a vital hormone for navigating stress. The problem is chronic stress disrupting its natural rhythm.
Understanding the stress curve is diagnostic gold. It explains why clients feel the way they do and gives you a framework for intervention. Different phases require different approaches.
Clinical correlation is everything. You can’t just look at lab numbers in isolation. A cortisol sum of 5 might be “normal” to a doctor, but if your client feels terrible and the distribution is dysregulated, that tells you the real story.
You can’t ignore stress and expect lasting results. No matter how perfect your diet protocol or how targeted your supplements, chronic stress will cap healing potential. There’s a ceiling you’ll never break through if you don’t address the stress component.
The body’s systems are interconnected. You can’t just “fix hormones” without addressing how stress is affecting immunity, digestion, detoxification, and all the other H-I-D-D-E-N systems. This is why comprehensive testing and systematic protocols are crucial.
Metabolic Chaos requires a systematic approach. When multiple systems are compromised simultaneously, you need a framework like DRESS that addresses all aspects of healing, not just isolated symptoms.
Your Next Steps
If you’re ready to master functional lab testing and learn how to identify and address cortisol dysregulation in your practice, FDN provides the training, community, and ongoing support you need.
Because here’s the truth: your clients deserve more than “fine.” They deserve abundant vitality. And you deserve the confidence that comes from knowing exactly how to help them achieve it.
When you understand cortisol (really understand it), you hold the key to unlocking transformation for every client who walks through your door.
Ready to become the practitioner who always knows what to do next?
The answer lies in data-driven functional health. The answer lies in understanding that robust health isn’t just about the absence of symptoms: it’s about the presence of vitality.
And it starts with the hormone you can’t ignore: cortisol.
Want to learn more about becoming a Functional Diagnostic Nutrition Practitioner?
Discover how our comprehensive training program gives you the tools to master cortisol testing, interpretation, and protocols that get results. Because when you know how to test, you never have to guess. View an indepth case study here.
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
We all love the idea of self-care, but seriously — who has the time? A younger, hungrier, success-at-any-cost version of me would be nodding my head reading that statement. The more established, experienced, post-pandemic version of me who sits here today knows that’s just an excuse.
Stress and busyness
We’re culturally indoctrinated to accept chronic stress as a part of our life cycle. During that pivotal phase of life from 20-50 years of age, we juggle college exams, the pressure to land a good-paying job, moving up the ladder, balancing career ambitions against the biological clock, starting a business, being a good leader, parent, partner and friend.
All of these pressure triggers are a natural part of life, right? Well, I can agree that they are a natural part of life, but these events don’t have to feel so stressful. They only feel that way because the foundation holding it all up isn’t as solid as it could — and should — be. Constructing and reinforcing that foundation can happen at any time, but the best time is right now.
Our business-first culture glorifies the external face of success while often disregarding the sacrifices it took to get there. The body that carries us, and the constantly revolving mind that fuels our great ideas, they require respite. The problem is that we don’t believe we can afford to pause with purpose and still be successful. That’s because we don’t know where to look for good examples.
In my work, I’ve had the pleasure of interviewing several women who are doing self-care right. Recently I spoke with Erica Diamond, a practiced professional who has helped countless women, including Arianna Huffington, prioritize their own well-being, first. Diamond practices yoga and meditation to calm her central nervous system. I spoke to Karena Dawn, an entrepreneur who built a fitness empire by encouraging women to work through generational trauma through movement. These are just a few of the women who are showing us a better way to function in a world where overwhelm is normalized.
Unlearning bad habits
Before adopting the self-care practices we see others emulating around us, there’s a deeper job to do. We have to unlearn the bad habits we’ve collected over a lifetime. This can especially be true for women, having learned from our mothers that taking care of others comes first.
If you could time travel and ask a housewife in the 1950s what her self-care routine was, she’d likely tell you, “It’s called Mother’s Day.” Incidentally, Anna Jarvis’ campaign to recognize Mother’s Day in the U.S. was funded by a department store owner. The business sector co-opted the holiday, and Jarvis spent the rest of her life railing against its commercialization.
The moral of the story is that when a holiday that was created to show appreciation for the most selfless people in our lives gets exploited as a business opportunity, then our cultural priorities deserve a second look. It’s time to take back taking care of ourselves.
Overwhelm is typically the entry point into a self-care journey. It’s the chronic fatigue, the inability to shut down, snapping at people for no reason. If you run a business then you know what it feels like. The good news is that you can incorporate practices that will bolster your ability to move through potential stressors with more grace, and with practice, avoid overwhelm altogether.
Stop making excuses: If you’re experiencing overwhelm, don’t wait to address it. This can lead to more serious problems down the road. Face it now and take one small action to address it.
Practice mindfulness: This is a fancy way of saying “be present.” Meditation has been scientifically proven to reduce stress levels, and it’s a common practice among burnout recoverees. Journaling is another great way to center yourself, and it’s helped me tremendously over the years.
Move more: Yoga, stretching, swimming, jogging and walking in nature are all effective ways of releasing pent-up overwhelm healthily. Studies show that once you get into a routine with movement, you’ll be better able to manage stressful events without succumbing to overwhelm.
From self-care shame to shameless self-care
The voices promoting our need for self-care have never been louder, and that’s a good thing. However, it also means that self-care has become a double-edged sword. We’re almost being shamed into it.
If you’re an entrepreneur and you’ve been interviewed, no doubt the “What’s your self-care routine?” question has been raised. Knowing what it takes to run a business, balance relationships and do and be all the things, it wouldn’t surprise me if half of us weren’t lying through our teeth about our self-care habits.
We have to really step back and look at how we plan our day. Time is currency, and being busy doesn’t mean we’re important or even doing important things. When we see the signs of burnout, start a conversation. We need to do a better job of supporting balanced lifestyles among our professional peers.
There are a billion methods, books, podcasts and workshops designed to help you adopt a self-care practice. The problem is that we’re all individuals, so there’s no perfect formula for the masses. Finding what works for you starts with unlearning the behaviors that don’t consider your well-being and reversing the cycle. Then, you just have to try on different self-care hats and see what fits.
If something works for a while, know that it might not work the same way in three years. Pivot, but don’t give up. Self-care isn’t a cookie-cutter thing. One size does not fit all. It’s personal, and it’s an ever-evolving, ever-integrative process. Start with what’s doable for you now. A solid self-care foundation that will help you live and work more sustainably starts with one achievable step at a time.
Parenting fatigue, also known as parental burnout is a mental health issue many parents experience. To define it simply; parenting fatigue is when the responsibilities of parenting add up and create excess stress that causes mental and physical health symptoms. This in turn makes it hard to continue the role of parenting. It can be a downward cycle where the more burnout you experience the more stress parenting causes which increases your fatigue. Parenting fatigue can happen to all parents and they do not have to be experiencing children who are having difficulties themselves. In John Gottman’s research, he found that two thirds of parents will experience a drop in their relationship quality within three years of bringing their baby home. This drop in relationship satisfaction can be due to the many types of parental burnout.
Causes of parenting fatigue
There are many causes of parenting fatigue and many unique situations with your children, your life factors, and other external factors. Some common causes are the stress and emotional strain parenting can cause. A big one is the actual fatigue becoming a parenting causes. When you bring a baby home your sleep patterns get disrupted and that continues throughout your young child’s life. When your kids get older and they have extra curricular activities that keep you out of the house later and eating dinner later it can cause general fatigue from long days and being out of the house for so long. Many parents who work full time and are also trying to balance their own activities like exercise or other hobbies and interests creates pressure to be home and present with their kids as much as possible. The guilt of doing things for yourself and possibly only seeing your child a few hours a day on weeknights can wear on you. I’ve worked with many parents who have breakdowns over the fact they can’t “do it all”. I have to be honest with them and share that no parent is able to work full time, keep their house clean, be there with their kids all the time, make time for themselves, and to nurture their relationship. It’s not physically possible to do this. This can be especially hard for single parents or those who are not co-parenting with a partner in the home, you absolutely cannot do it all alone.
Consequences of fatigue
All of these stressors that cause parental fatigue then leads to many mental and physical health issues. It’s well known that chronic stress affects our memory, you may become more forgetful and experience brain fog, especially when your sleep has been affected. This can also lead to symptoms of depression and anxiety; feeling like a failure leads to a low mood and worrying about not doing the best job can create an anxious cycle. Many parents can start experiencing isolation from friends and family when they worry about feeling judged or are too overwhelmed to reach out. Parents often feel shame when they can’t fulfill all expectations or make a mistake. They can experience guilt when they aren’t spending time with their kids. These symptoms can also cause issues in your relationship and can lead to more disagreements, less time together, and less desire and time for intimacy. It can also cause issues in your relationship with your children; the stress can lead to less patience with them which can create a barrier in closeness.
The importance of self care
The good thing is some of this burnout can be prevented with good self care. You have to take time for yourself to rest, get a break, and do the activities that recharge you to be there as a parent. The metaphor of putting on your own oxygen mask on an airplane first is very fitting for parents. You have to put on your own mask before helping your child with theirs. You need to take breaks from parenting to be a good one. You will be much better at handling the responsibility if you allow yourself to put you first. Hire a babysitter and take the offer from friends and family to watch the kids when possible. Counseling can also be a great tool in processing the emotions of parenting fatigue and a therapist can help you find the balance for self care. It’s also important to voice your feelings to your partner, remember you’ve signed up for this together and need to lean on each other when possible. Parenting fatigue can cause extra conflict that can expand outside of parenting topics. Couples counseling can help you navigate the extra stress together. It’s equally important to make time for your relationship where you get to step out of the parenting role into the romance role. It helps to make time for dates and quality time alone each day.
