“More engaged employees perform better.”
It’s the line that turns up in almost everything written about employee engagement, and organisations have taken the message to heart. They invest in programmes, platforms and apps designed to keep their people feeling connected and engaged. But in doing so, are we quietly building an “always on” culture?
Too much of a good thing
As the old saying goes, you can have too much of a good thing. Engagement has a dark side: over-engagement. It’s being so invested in your work that you stop doing the things that look after you. Sometimes that’s a conscious choice, and sometimes it creeps up without us noticing.
If you love what you do and your role aligns with your personal values, it’s easy to overdo it without realising. We’ve all seen the out-of-office that reads something like: “I’m on annual leave, but here’s my personal mobile, personal email, hotel name and room number in case anything’s urgent. If you need me, I’m there!”
It’s well meant. But it’s also a sign that someone hasn’t really switched off, and it sends a message to everyone else about what’s expected.
Sometimes the pressure comes from the organisation itself. Think of the app that pings you with company updates late at night, or the email from a senior leader with the footer: “I am sending this at a time that works for me, but please feel free to respond at a time that works for you.” It’s a kind gesture, but when the message comes from the top, is there still an unspoken expectation of a reply? Most of us know the answer.
Why it hits differently for HR
This matters for every employee, but it lands a little differently for HR professionals. As the champions of employee engagement, there’s an unspoken expectation that we’ll be the most engaged people in the building. We have to practise what we preach, right? We hold space for everyone else through restructures, conflict, grief and crisis, often with very little space held for us.
The data shows how stretched the profession is. The HR Mental Wellbeing Report 2026 from Ultimate Resilience, produced with Everywhen, surveyed 1,447 HR professionals between 23 January and 28 February 2026 and paints a stark picture:
- 44% meet the threshold for clinically significant depression, compared with 18% of adults in Great Britain reporting moderate to severe depressive symptoms.
- 40% meet the threshold for clinically significant anxiety, which the report’s authors describe as more than double the rate in the general population.
- 62% are very likely to be experiencing burnout, with a further 12% at risk.
- 90% reported feeling tired or having little energy in the previous fortnight.
- 38% are thinking about leaving the profession altogether.
For the third year running, excessive workload was the most cited source of stress. Only 13% said they feel well supported with their own mental wellbeing at work, a figure unchanged from 2025.
Perhaps the most telling figure is this one: only 24% had used employee benefits to support their own mental wellbeing, the same kind of support HR teams spend so much time promoting to everyone else.
So if the people championing engagement and wellbeing are among the most stretched, how are we supposed to keep championing it? And how do we do so in a way that doesn’t tip into over-engagement?
What we can do
Here are four places to start:
- Be a role model. Set boundaries and stick to them. Take your leave properly, without the room number in your out-of-office. Your team will take their cue from what you do far more than from what you say.
- Distribute work evenly. It’s tempting to keep handing work to your high performers because you know it’ll get done. But they’re often the most engaged and the least likely to say no, which makes them the most at risk.
- Look out for the signs of burnout. Watch for fatigue, more frequent sickness and a loss of enthusiasm, in your team and in yourself. Burnout rarely arrives overnight. It builds quietly.
- Use the support you signpost. If your organisation offers wellbeing benefits, an EAP or supervision, use it yourself. Support is consistently linked to better outcomes in the report: among those who felt very supported, just 7% were thinking of leaving HR, compared with 66% of those who felt not at all supported.
Finding the balance
Employee engagement is a great thing for organisations, and for the people in them. But like most good things, it needs balance. An engaged workforce should be connected and motivated, not one that’s never quite allowed to switch off. And that starts with the people profession leading the charge.
Building a career in HR? Explore CIPD Level 3, 5 and 7 courses at Avado and find the level that fits where you are now.
If you or someone in your team is struggling, Samaritans is free to call on 116 123.
Sources: The HR Mental Wellbeing Report 2026, Ultimate Resilience in partnership with Everywhen (pages 3, 4, 13, 21), surveyed 23 January to 28 February 2026; ONS, Public opinions and social trends, Great Britain: April 2025.
