What the usual meaning of "high performance" is costing you

There’s a quiet tension in corporate environments challenging some long-held norms. The people doing the most hours have traditionally been the ones called the best performers. And the people holding boundaries around their time are often passed over for promotion.

That signal has been sent for decades across Australian workplaces, and at our recent panel event in Sydney, Jo Cairns, Chief People Officer at Team Global Express, demonstrated that signal in action. Jo described a talent review where a leader had identified top performers based on the hours they worked and their weekend availability.

"There was a recalibration needed,” Jo said. “We need to be really clear on the outcomes people need to deliver. Not the way they deliver it."

What's happening generationally?

The workforce most organisations are now managing has different expectations about this than previous generations did, which is shown in current data

According to Deloitte's 2025 Gen Z and Millennial Survey, 52% of Gen Zs and 46% of millennials have left a job because it lacked purpose. Work-life balance ranked as the top career goal for both generations, above both financial independence and senior leadership.

Deloitte's research also found that 44% of Gen Zs and 40% of millennials have turned down an employer or assignment because of insufficient support for employee wellbeing or work-life balance.

The rate of Gen Zs and millennials agreeing that employers are taking mental health seriously rose by 9% and 6% respectively between 2024 and 2026. Comfort in speaking with a manager about mental health has reached 82% for Gen Zs and 76% for millennials.

That shift matters for how organisations define and reward performance. Younger workers are increasingly willing to name when something is unsustainable and increasingly willing to leave when it isn’t addressed.

What's the cost of getting it wrong?

Australian burnout rates sit at 43%, up 17% in a single year, according to the AIHS State of Workplace Burnout 2025 report. Deloitte Access Economics estimates poor workplace mental health costs Australian businesses approximately $39 billion annually, a significant component of which is turnover from unsustainable cultures.

Danielle Odd, Director of Wellbeing, Health and Safety at PwC, put it plainly at the event:

"You come to PwC to work hard, for a good solid crack at your career. But we shouldn't exhaust people in the process."

Danielle described working with PwC's internal legal team on the issue of long hours normalised over years, with little structured recovery. Their agreed approach is to acknowledge the demands while challenging the model.

Are some industries and organisations ahead of others?

Yes, but most are still catching up. A 2024 survey of media, marketing and creative professionals found that 51% of business leaders were unaware of recent psychosocial hazards legislation.

Professional services, banking, and large logistics businesses tend to be further ahead, driven partly by regulatory pressure and partly by the visibility of the problem in their workforces. Dave Burroughs, Principal Psychologist at Australian Psychology Services and Chief Mental Health Officer at Westpac, was candid at the event:

"It’s very rare to find an organisation I'd say is at a high level of maturity."

Smaller organisations, and those in male-dominated industries with a physical safety heritage, often have more ground to cover, particularly in separating high performance from endurance.

What does a better model look like?

Margherita Maini, Managing Director of Culture, Leadership and Talent at PwC, described embedding the conversation into annual goal-setting:

"Let's not just say, 'What are you working on this year?' Let's talk about what a really good achievement looks like and ask, ‘How are you looking after yourself to do that work?’"

Integrating performance and wellbeing in the same conversation is where organisations making genuine progress have landed. It requires leaders willing to ask the question, and a definition of high performance that rewards output, quality, and sustainability over hours logged.

If you'd like to think through what this looks like in your organisation, reach out to The Next Step.