Women are hitting the top of the corporate ladder only to find something waiting for them: exhaustion. According to a report published Tuesday by McKinsey and LeanIn.org, a nonprofit founded by Sheryl Sandberg, burnout among senior-level women is the highest it has been in the past five years. Around 60% of these women said they have frequently felt burned out at work in the past few months, compared with 50% of senior-level men, per numbers from the "Women in the Workplace" 2025 study.
I was 38, and the role - which oversaw standards, best practices, and technology for Amazon's 200+ site merchandisers - was the biggest of my life by far, one I'd been thrust into just three months after my arrival in Seattle and at Amazon. I was thrilled (and a bit terrified) by the size of the opportunity, and threw myself into it.
Pantone has officially called it: the prevailing mood for 2026 is exhaustion. This marks a sharp departure from recent years, when the annual announcement felt like a conversation happening in a different room. The world was navigating a pandemic hangover and digital burnout, while Pantone was prescribing electric purples for creativity and defiant magentas for bravery. Each choice, while commercially friendly, felt like a wellness influencer telling a tired person to simply manifest more energy.
According to a recent Glassdoor survey of more than 1,000 U.S. professionals, 68% of Gen Z respondents said they would not pursue management if it were not for the paycheck or the title. It may seem like younger workers lack ambition, but the reality is different. Gen Z is redefining professional success through career minimalism, choosing to treat their jobs as a source of stability while channeling ambition and creativity into pursuits outside traditional employment.
Not long ago, I sat at my desk staring at the little red dots scattered across my screen - notifications, unread messages, unfinished tasks, a dozen digital nudges demanding attention. I felt that familiar tightening in my chest, the quiet whisper: You're behind again. Behind who? Behind what? I hadn't stopped working; in fact, I'd been working most of the weekend. Yet somehow my computer, my email, and the constellation of apps around me had already sprinted several steps ahead.
I started there in November 2006, when there were only around 10,000 employees, and became an executive - the director of American media relations - in 2022. Google's amazing; I bleed Google colors. I loved the impact I was having, the future of opportunities I saw for myself, and the feedback I was getting as a leader. I'm also the breadwinner for my family.
Nobody embarks on a career in cyber security expecting an easy ride. It's widely recognised that protecting critical digital infrastructure is high-pressure and high-stakes work. For many of us, that's part of the buzz. Every day, we tackle complex challenges, address high-stakes problems, and (hopefully) make a real difference - but who will protect cyber professionals from the risk of burnout?
But you know what memory I don't have? My mother eating. She cooked. She served. She made sure everyone had seconds and thirds. She cleaned. She packed plates for folks to take home to their loved ones. She stood in that kitchen for hours (sometimes, days), making magic happen for anyone that she could. But I cannot recall a single moment when she sat down with a full plate of her own, enjoying the meal she had poured herself into.
A survey by the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) of more than 20,000 nursing staff found that 66% had worked when they should have been on sick leave, up from 49% in 2017. Just under two-thirds (65%) of respondents cited stress to be the biggest cause of illness, up from 50% in 2017. Seven out of 10 said they had worked in excess of their contracted hours at least once a week, with about half (52%) doing so unpaid.
My father's voice still rings in my mind: "Don't do a half-ass job." He meant to teach discipline and integrity, and I took it to heart. But somewhere along the way, that lesson evolved into a rule: If I wasn't giving everything, I wasn't enough. If I slowed down, I feared slipping. And so I kept accelerating, one foot pressed firmly on the gas, unsure how to ease off.
I spent several years of my career in the uncomfortable role of middle manager. On one side, I had executives asking me why my team couldn't "do more," and on the other side, my employees told me they were stretched too thin. It was an endless tug-of-war. I was both the enforcer of company expectations and the advocate for my team's needs. At times, my role felt at complete odds with itself. Executives push for efficiency and growth, while employees look for empathy and stability.
Daniel didn't look like a man falling apart. Pressed shirt. Polished watch. Phone buzzing every few minutes. Yet his hand trembled slightly as he reached for his coffee. "They said it was panic," he said, half whispering. "But it felt like dying." He had just left the ER after his second "heart attack that wasn't." On paper, he was the definition of success: a founder, husband, father. But inside, his mind was spinning at 200 miles per hour.
I was volunteering in raptor rescue, monitoring eagle nests as the busy season ramped up, juggling consulting work, supporting adoption placements, writing, creating. I was showing up fully in every space except the one I lived in: my body. And yet I refused to let go. I told myself it was just a busy season. That if I could push through, things would calm down. That my exhaustion was noble, temporary, necessary.
Everywhere I turn - podcasts, research calls, dinner conversations - people are talking about "toxic workplaces." The phrase has become ubiquitous; almost unavoidable. So I did what most researchers do when they're curious (or procrastinating): I Googled it. That led me to a chart showing the term's meteoric rise beginning in the early 2010s. The curve shoots upward like a fever.
She was embarking on a journey to do it all: a working mom, supporting her family with a career she loved. As track repairs tripled her commute time, things suddenly felt like they were falling apart. Instead of getting home in time to put her baby son to bed, Low found herself sobbing while breast pumping in an Amtrak bathroom.
I'm weird. I can be more open in some ways with audiences than I can in interpersonal relationships. Look, I've lived and learned over time. I've been a toxic person in my life. I'm not great at relationships. I used to do a joke where I think I'm about 85 percent woke and the other 15 percent I keep to myself.
Regulations such as the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority's (Apra's) CPS 230 standard have led organisations to become "really obsessed" with the 72-hour notification window following a data breach, according to Shannon Murphy, global security and risk strategist at Trend Micro.
In 2020, my feelings about my job as an auditor started to shift. The COVID-19 pandemic had me suddenly working from home, on nonstop Teams calls, and glued to my computer all day. Work felt more stressful than ever, and at the same time, my sense of purpose was gone. I was experiencing chronic migraines and extreme mood swings, and my hair was falling out in clumps. I knew I needed to make a change.
My first strike was January 28th, 2013, at 6:49 in the morning. It ended up being a cave in the middle of nowhere, and there was a handful of people there that they wanted us to take out.
A decade ago, fresh out of business school, I joined a tech company in my first business development role in Singapore. Within the first quarter, I had closed two quarters' worth of sales targets. But the environment was abusive. The CEO yelled regularly. Personal and sexist remarks were common, on body, appearance, even what women ate or wore. It was triggering. Having lived through a previous abusive situation, I found myself in constant flight-or-freeze mode.
