WHY MID-LEVEL LEADERS ARE BURNING OUT

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We are hearing more about burnout, which is a good thing. But we still tend to talk about it as though it lands the same way for everyone.

It does not. Burnout is not a one-size-fits-all issue.

A recent Harvard Business Review article argues that burnout looks different at different levels of the organisation. What stood out most to me was its description of managers carrying ‘responsibility without authority’. That phrase captures the reality for so many mid-level leaders right now.

They are expected to sell or champion a strategy they had no part in shaping. They are pushed hard from above on org strategy, delivery, targets, metrics and speed.

They are squeezed from below by the emotional toll on teams who are being asked to do more with less, absorb constant change, and somehow stay engaged through it all.

This is the impossible role I have been speaking about for some time now.

These leaders are expected to create and hold alignment, lift morale, manage performance, buffer frustration, and deliver results, often without the authority to change the conditions creating the pressure.

The HBR article makes the broader point that burnout is generally not simply about individual capacity. It is also about the way work is designed, decisions are made, and priorities are set. Misalignment, confusion and competing demands do real damage over time.

We see that clearly in the middle. When senior leaders create the strategy and frontline teams carry the distress, the manager in the middle becomes the translator, the shock absorber and the emotional container.

That is a heavy load. And if we are honest, many mid-level leaders are carrying it without enough support, enough influence, or enough room to say what is true.

This is why so many of them feel exhausted even when they still care deeply. It is why some look disengaged when they are actually overloaded. It is why ‘performance conversations’ can start to sound hollow when the people having them are under performance strain themselves.

We hear the answers lie in recognising the role has become unreasonably difficult in many organisations. That means clearer priorities, better communication, greater involvement in shaping the work they are being asked to sell.

The reality is that this can feel like a bridge too far (even though the psychosocial hazards legislation pretty much demands it).

Because when mid-level leaders are forced to carry pressure from both directions for too long, the whole system starts to fray. And until we name the impossible role for what it is, we will keep asking leaders to absorb more than any role was designed to hold.

What is becoming clear is that the workload is the compounding issue for this mid-level leaders’ burnout. The primary issue is coming from the emotional toll of balancing the expectations of the business and the caring for their team’s wellbeing.

Let’s start there, with the EQ skills to hold the team’s emotional response to the overwhelm without taking it on board themselves. The rest will follow.

If this sounds familiar in your organisation, you are not imagining it.

We have reached the point where it is now cheaper to fix the problem than to ignore it. Let’s have a conversation and I can show you the solution to what is now the primary cause of their burnout.