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South Africans are, by global standards, among one of the most stressed people at work. Gallup data shows that between 35% and 40% of South African workers experience stress daily ― among the highest rates globally ― a statistic that should reframe how employers think about wellness, not as a perk, but as a business imperative.
For years, workplace stress sat on the margins of the mental health conversation, overshadowed by more visible clinical concerns. Yet chronic, low-grade workplace stress ― the kind that builds quietly over months of financial pressure, long hours and job insecurity ― is now understood to be one of the most significant, and most neglected, drivers of poor mental health. Left unaddressed, it follows employees home and returns to work with them, leading to less focus, more errors, and eventually “presenteeism”, where someone is physically at their desk but functionally checked out. Over time, unresolved stress can tip into burnout.
New data from Lyra Southern Africa, a provider of employee assistance and workforce mental health programmes, suggests this burden falls unevenly. An analysis of 67,419 employee wellness programme cases from January 2025 to June 2026 found women account for nearly two-thirds (65%) of programme utilisation of 41,099 mental health-related cases, or roughly 75 managed daily.
Financial stress narrows an individual’s focus to immediate survival. — Siyasanga Kashe, executive for member solutions at Momentum Corporate
The trend is worsening. Women’s share of high-risk crisis cases rose from 53.8% in early 2025 to 58.8% by mid-2026, and stress now accounts for 48.3% of female mental health presentations, a figure projected to exceed half of all cases by late 2027. Among leadership, 43% of female executives report burnout, compared with 31% of men. The data shows this pressure peaks for women in their 30s and 40s, who are caught in a ‘sandwich generation’ squeeze ― simultaneously navigating career advancement, childcare and ageing parents.
“Our analysis indicates that mental health remains the single largest area of support requested by women, but what is becoming increasingly clear is that stress is driving a growing proportion of those requests,” says Dubekile Mugumbate, Lyra’s business intelligence and consulting manager. “The findings point to a broader shift away from traditional clinical conditions towards mounting workplace, financial and caregiving pressures.”
Perhaps most telling is when women seek help. Women account for 83% of assisted clinical referrals — cases where intervention only occurs once there is a problem. “The research reveals a clear business case for earlier intervention,” Mugumbate says. “When women only enter formal support pathways after experiencing severe fatigue, burnout or crisis, organisations are already carrying the cost through reduced productivity, disengagement, absenteeism and talent loss.”
Much of this pressure is financial in origin. As living costs climb and salaries fail to keep pace with inflation, employees arrive at work already carrying a psychological load that has little to do with the job, and everything to do with whether their income will stretch to month-end — what experts describe as an economic-stress-to-burnout pipeline and increasingly difficult for workers to escape by themselves.
“Financial stress narrows an individual’s focus to immediate survival,” says Siyasanga Kashe, executive for member solutions at Momentum Corporate. During periods of pressure, she says, employees often make short-term financial decisions — lowering retirement contributions or accessing savings early — without grasping the tax implications and long-term impact on compound interest. Before regulatory reforms like the two-pot retirement system, she says, some employees would resign specifically to access retirement funds, a decision that “can derail a lifetime of savings”.
A growing number of South African businesses are rethinking what a comprehensive benefits scheme needs to include. Mental health support increasingly sits at the centre of that shift, with progressive employers expanding access to counselling as a foundational benefit rather than an add-on. Given how closely workplace stress and financial anxiety are intertwined, financial wellbeing support is emerging as a natural extension of the same strategy.
Momentum Corporate, for instance, has focused on retirement benefit counselling and advice alongside solutions such as pension-backed home loans, flexible pay, debt counselling and emergency savings, designed to help employees manage short-term shocks without derailing long-term outcomes. Kashe notes that where digital counselling tools have been used consistently, preservation of retirement savings increased by 27% year-on-year.
Mugumbate says employers need to go further, prioritising proactive stress management, flexible working, manager training and access to practical support such as financial wellbeing resources and caregiving assistance. “The organisations that will be best positioned to attract, retain and support talent, particularly female talent, are those that recognise mental health as a workforce resilience issue, not simply a clinical one,” she says.
The lesson for employers is that wellness cannot be siloed. Mental health, financial stability and productivity are deeply interconnected, and addressing only one in isolation won’t move the needle on any of them. As Kashe puts it, “protection is a proof of care”. The businesses seeing real value from their benefits schemes are treating employee wellness as one connected system, rather than a set of disconnected line items in an HR budget.
