The Numbers
Burnout in enterprise tech hit 58% in late 2025, according to Eagle Hill Consulting's November survey of U.S. workers. That's higher than the cross-industry average of 55%, yet tech simultaneously leads all sectors in employee engagement at 78%.
The disconnect matters. High engagement with high burnout suggests the problem isn't culture or motivation - it's execution.
What's Driving It
Workload tops the list at 47-48%, followed by poor leadership (40%), understaffing (37%), and lack of recognition (32% - doubled from 2024). For distributed engineering teams, the pattern intensifies: remote and hybrid workers report 57-61% burnout rates compared to 45% for on-site staff.
Gen Z (66%) and Millennials (58%) are hit hardest. More experienced workers cite different triggers: leadership failures and job security concerns rather than pure workload.
On-call rotations amplify the problem for SRE and infrastructure teams, where irregular incident response disrupts recovery time.
The Cost
Productivity drops 18-20% among burned-out employees. Engagement falls by a third. Turnover intentions double. Absenteeism runs 3x higher.
U.S. enterprises lose $322 billion annually to burnout-related productivity loss and replacement costs. Yet 70% of workers say their employers do too little about it.
What Doesn't Work
Flexibility and recognition programs show limited impact in tech specifically. The sector already offers above-average benefits. The issue isn't perks - it's workload management and leadership capability.
Half of managers attribute burnout equally to work issues and personal factors, yet nearly half ignore direct requests for help. The gap between awareness and action is clear.
Watch This
UK HR leaders now rank burnout as 2026's top business risk (46%). As distributed teams become permanent, organizations that haven't solved on-call scheduling, incident response workflows, and sustainable sprint planning will see the impact in their retention numbers.
The pattern is already visible: burnt-out employees are 63% more likely to take sick days and twice as likely to job hunt. Tech's engagement advantage won't hold if the operational fundamentals don't improve.