Stress and burning out may be perceived as a mere occupational hazard for those working in tech, a survey from the anonymous employee message board app Blind reveals. From a pool of 11,000 employees at 30 of the largest tech companies, 57.16% admitted that they are currently suffering from a work related burnout. The interrogative, “Are you currently suffering from a work burnout?” was posed, but users could only respond with an unequivocal answer of either “Yes” or “No”.
While this format fails to show the intricacies of every employee’s experience, it does indicate that that the process of burning out is prevalent, insidious, and normalised in the toughest of tech cultures. Recent research shows that these relentless work environments breed and encourage unreasonably long hours, unattainable high levels of productivity and unfairly favour young people.
If high levels of stress are left unaddressed, they can lead to additional health complications, and exacerbate mental health issues. The American multinational personal finance company, Credit Karma, tops the list for the most employees suffering from a burnout, with 70.73% disclosing their discontent.
The company has since responded with a statement to the Business Insider: “In our most recent anonymous employee survey, more than 90% of employees told us that their workload was in line with or exceeded their expectations. We appreciate the efforts to bring this important issue to light but question the results as an accurate snapshot given the small sample and questionable methods used to identify a current employee of any of the companies mentioned.”
Other company culprits include Twitch, the video game streaming website, with 68.75% of employees feeling overworked, and Netflix securing the lowest percentage at just 38.89%. An astounding 25 companies out of the 30 with the most responses had an employee burnout rate of 50% or higher. This new research is certainly worrying, but not exactly surprising.
A survey conducted by Kronos Incorporated and Future Workplace found that 46% of HR leaders believe that employee burnout contributes to up to half of their annual workforce turnover. With a multitude of alarming studies and surveys concerned with work related burnouts in the tech world, it begs the question as to why working 9 to 5 continues to be frowned upon.
