Stress at work
Workplace stress: what employers can change beyond wellness perks
Workload is the stress employees name most. What the law asks of employers, why courses alone fall short, and the changes in demands and hours HR can make.
1h Protocols · October 30, 2026 · 11 min read
Most workplace stress comes from the work itself: too much of it, too little say over it, too little support. Employers in many countries must assess those risks and act on them, and courses or apps alone don't do that. The changes that reach the cause are in how work is planned, with a clear route for employees to raise a load they can't carry.
What causes most workplace stress?
Workload, first. In an Acas poll run by YouGov with 2,000 employed adults in Great Britain in 2019, 60% cited their workload as a cause of stress or anxiety at work, the most common answer. Only 43% said they would talk to their manager about it, while 72% thought it was a manager's role to recognize and address it (Acas, 2019).
Europe looks similar. In EU-OSHA's 2022 survey of over 27,000 workers in the EU, Iceland and Norway, close to one in two (46%) in the EU said they were exposed to severe time pressure or overload of work, and 18% to a lack of autonomy or influence over the pace of work (EU-OSHA, 2022). Worldwide, 40% of employees aged 15 and older told Gallup in 2025 that they had felt stress during a lot of the previous day (Gallup, 2026).
Britain's Health and Safety Executive groups the causes into six areas of work design for employers to manage: demands, control, support, relationships, role and change (HSE). Christina Maslach, the UC Berkeley psychologist, describes a similar list on the American Psychological Association's Speaking of Psychology podcast: the fit between the work and the worker on workload, control, reward, community, fairness and values. Workload comes to mind first, Maslach says, but the others sometimes matter more (APA, 2021, around 7:05 to 8:45, paraphrased from a machine transcript).
What are employers required to do?
It depends on the country. Since 2004, the EU social partners' framework agreement has said that once work-related stress is identified, the employer must act to prevent, eliminate or reduce it, with each country putting it into its own rules (Eurofound, 2004).
| Country | Employer duty on work stress | Right to disconnect |
|---|---|---|
| Great Britain | A legal duty to protect workers from stress by doing a risk assessment and acting on it (HSE) | Not checked yet |
| France | Assess risks and protect employees' physical and mental health, which includes work stress (INRS) | In the Labour Code since 2016, set in each company by collective agreement or an employer's charter (INRS) |
| Spain | Assess and prevent risks (Ley 31/1995); the national institute lists too much work among psychosocial risks (INSST) | A right to digital disconnection outside working time, since 2018 (LOPDGDD art. 88) |
| Portugal | Make sure psychosocial risk factors don't put employees' safety and health at risk (Lei 102/2009) | The employer must not contact employees in their rest time, except in force majeure, since 2022 (Lei 83/2021) |
| Italy | The risk assessment covers work-related stress (D.Lgs. 81/2008) | For smart workers (lavoro agile) (Legge 81/2017) |
| Germany | The risk assessment must cover psychological strain at work (ArbSchG § 5) | Not checked yet; employees have at least 11 hours' rest between working days (ArbZG § 5) |
| Brazil | Since 26 May 2026, psychosocial risks are part of risk management under the NR-1 rule (MTE) | A bill, still in progress in October 2026 (Senado) |
| United States | Not checked yet | Not checked yet |
Rules change: check the current text with your legal team.
Do wellness programs reduce stress at work?
Not on their own, as far as the evidence goes. William Fleming analyzed a survey of 46,336 UK workers at 233 organizations that had opted into a workplace health survey in 2017 and 2018. Workers who had taken part in relaxation classes, time-management courses, coaching, wellbeing apps and similar offers showed "no reliable difference in mental well-being" from those who hadn't, and those in stress-management training more often reported unrealistic time pressures (Fleming, 2024). It's one snapshot, and the author's reading is that those who were struggling were more likely to sign up, so it can't show the offers fail. Fleming's conclusion points elsewhere: changes to scheduling, management practices, resources, performance review or job design "appear more beneficial."
An older review of 90 evaluations agrees: approaches aimed only at the individual helped individuals but rarely the organization, while those that changed the work helped at both levels (LaMontagne et al., 2007). WHO's 2022 guidelines on mental health at work cover organizational interventions, manager training and worker training (WHO, 2022).
Maslach makes the same point from the other side. Organizations, Maslach says, tend to focus on what's wrong with the worker and how to help them cope, rather than on the job conditions that make up the other half of the mismatch (APA, 2021, around 13:08, paraphrased).
What can HR change?
Ask your workforce which of the six areas weighs most. Five changes reach the common ones.
- Make demands negotiable. Give teams a standing way to say "not now, by when" to a new request, and to trade one deadline for another. Acas suggests that when an employee is stressed by work, they agree with their employer what can be done to reduce it, with a date to review the plan (Acas).
- Give overload a safe route. With fewer than half of British employees willing to tell their manager, the route matters. The HSE tells workers to raise it early, while the employer can still help (HSE). Make sure saying so carries no penalty.
- Keep schedules predictable. Among US hourly workers in retail and food service, unstable and unpredictable schedules went with psychological distress and poor sleep, much more strongly than low pay did (Schneider and Harknett, 2019). It's a link, not proof of cause, but schedules are the employer's to set.
- Agree team rules for messages after hours. In a French study of 436 managers at one large company, plus 20 interviews, what worked best was agreed within the team: rotating cover for urgent messages let each member switch off without guilt (Morand et al., 2023). France's INRS reports that cutting server access at night backfired, and recommends a team discussion of workload and unspoken habits instead (INRS). See also focus at work and worry at work.
- Plan breaks in. A review of 22 samples of employees and students found that short breaks gave a small lift in energy and a small drop in tiredness (an effect of about 0.35 on a standard scale), though not a reliable change in output (Albulescu et al., 2022).
Measure in aggregate. Maslach warns against using surveys to single out individuals; the useful question is where strain shows up across the organization (APA, 2021, around 12:01 to 12:34, paraphrased).
Where a program fits
Changing the work is the employer's part. Each employee's own load is where a program can help. The 1h Protocol to Manage Everyday Stress is a practical education program for adults 18 and over, of about an hour, and the first chapter is free: each employee finds which of five patterns their stress follows and gets one first step. The full program puts their load on one page, drafts what they'd ask for about the demands others set, and plans the moment it all lands at once. They leave with a plan built from their own answers and fourteen days to try it, with short check-ins by email on days 1, 7, 14 and 30. It's new, so there's no outcome data on it yet. In the program's own words, it "helps with your part of the load. It doesn't replace changes at work."
The program's scope, in its words: "This is a wellness program about everyday stress from the load you carry at work, at home and in caring for others, not health care. It doesn't give medical advice, and it doesn't diagnose or treat anything. It isn't for burnout, anxiety disorders, depression or trauma." And: "If stress doesn't ease, or it starts getting in the way of your daily life, or what you're trying yourself isn't helping, see a doctor." Managers have no role in anyone's plan and never see it.
Companies buy program credits. One credit unlocks one full program for one employee; the company decides who gets how many credits, and each employee chooses their programs. Our team works with HR to choose which programs to highlight, prepare the launch and review participation and the anonymous results. Your dashboard shows who has joined and each employee's credits, so you can manage them; everything else is anonymous totals for groups of five or more, never anyone's programs, answers, progress or plan. Pair a small pilot with the checklist: request a quote, or see the programs. For individuals, our guides to how to manage stress and how to say no at work go further.
Frequently asked questions
What causes most workplace stress?
Workload comes first in the surveys cited here: it was the most common answer (60%) in a 2019 Acas poll of 2,000 British employees. The HSE adds control, support, relationships, role and change.
What are employers required to do about work stress?
In Great Britain, France, Spain, Italy and Germany, employers must assess work risks, and that covers stress or psychological strain. Portugal requires that psychosocial risks don't harm employees, and Brazil added them to its NR-1 rule in 2026. Check the current rules for your country with your legal team.
Do wellness programs reduce stress at work?
On their own, the evidence is weak: in a survey of over 46,000 UK workers, participants were no better off on average. Changes to the work rate higher in reviews.
Should we have a right-to-disconnect policy?
In France, Spain and Portugal the law already provides one, and in Italy it covers smart workers. Anywhere, team agreements on reply times and urgent cover worked best in a French study of managers.
How does the program work for a company?
One credit unlocks one full program for one employee. The dashboard shows who has joined and their credits; everything else is anonymous totals for groups of five or more.
Sources
This article draws on polls and surveys from Acas, EU-OSHA and Gallup, guidance from the UK's HSE and Acas and France's INRS, laws and official pages from seven countries and the EU, a survey of UK workers, a systematic review of job-stress evaluations, WHO's guidelines, studies of work schedules, connectivity and breaks, and a podcast interview with Christina Maslach.
- Acas, Stress and anxiety at work: personal or cultural? (YouGov poll of 2,000 employed adults in Great Britain, 2019)
- EU-OSHA, Flash Eurobarometer OSH Pulse (telephone survey, 27,250 interviews in the EU, Iceland and Norway, 2022)
- Gallup, State of the Global Workplace 2026 (world survey of employed adults aged 15 and older, 2025 data)
- HSE, Work-related stress and how to manage it (UK regulator guidance for employers, 2024)
- HSE, Help for workers on stress at work (UK regulator guidance for workers, 2024)
- Acas, Supporting workers with work-related stress (UK public guidance, 2025)
- Why we're burned out and what to do about it, with Christina Maslach (podcast episode, Speaking of Psychology, APA, 2021)
- Fleming, Employee well-being outcomes from individual-level mental health interventions (cross-sectional survey, 46,336 UK workers, Industrial Relations Journal, 2024)
- LaMontagne et al., A systematic review of the job-stress intervention evaluation literature (systematic review of 90 evaluations, 2007; abstract only)
- WHO, Guidelines on mental health at work (WHO guideline, 2022)
- Eurofound, Social partners sign work-related stress agreement (EU agency article, 2004)
- INRS, Stress au travail, réglementation and Droit à la déconnexion (French national institute for safety at work, in French, 2023 and 2026)
- Ley 31/1995 de Prevención de Riesgos Laborales, INSST, Riesgos psicosociales and LOPDGDD art. 88 (Spain, in Spanish)
- Lei 102/2009 and Lei 83/2021 (Portugal, in Portuguese)
- D.Lgs. 81/2008 and Legge 81/2017 (Italy, in Italian)
- Arbeitsschutzgesetz § 5 and Arbeitszeitgesetz § 5 (Germany, in German)
- MTE, Perguntas e respostas GRO/PGR, NR-1 and Senado Federal, PL 5281/2025 (Brazil, in Portuguese, 2026)
- Schneider and Harknett, Routine work-schedule instability and worker well-being (survey of US hourly service workers, American Sociological Review, 2019)
- Morand et al., Digital overconnectivity at work (questionnaire of 436 managers and 20 interviews at one French company, Le Travail Humain, 2023)
- INRS, Hyperconnexion, surconnexion (expert interview, in French, 2022)
- Albulescu et al., Micro-breaks meta-analysis (systematic review and meta-analysis, 22 samples of employees and students, PLOS ONE, 2022)
