Disengagement crisis puts Singapore’s productivity at risk

Burnout, poor leadership, and digital fatigue threaten the country’s high-performance reputation.

A wave of employee disengagement and burnout is threatening Singapore’s status as a high-performance business hub, experts warn. Gallup’s 2025 State of the Workplace report ranks Singapore second-lowest in employee engagement across Southeast Asia, with 61% of employees reporting burnout and rising stress levels.

“This is not just a workforce issue—it’s a national productivity risk,” said Kanika Singh, Regional Director at Gallup. “It’s very hard to find engaged teams run by disengaged managers. If manager engagement continues to decline, the productivity of organisations and economies will be at risk.”

Gallup estimates Singapore loses S$73.6 billion annually in productivity due to low engagement. Singh added, “We need managers who can detect burnout early and systemic listening tools to identify if employees are truly thriving.”

Jaslyin Qiyu, Managing Director at Mad About Marketing Consulting, pointed to three compounding factors: digital transformation fatigue, generational workforce friction, and a leadership capability gap. “COVID accelerated digital change, but we now have mixed digital fluency across generations,” she said. “That’s creating mismatched expectations and fragmented work cultures.”

Qiyu also flagged growing anxiety over job security, AI disruption, and inflexible return-to-office mandates as major stressors. “People are being stretched across multiple portfolios or forced to choose between career stability and family,” she said. “These pressures are unsustainable.”

The long-standing push for speed and productivity, without equal attention to culture and wellbeing, is now backfiring. “This is the right time for companies to prioritise people and culture,” said Qiyu. “If we adopt AI blindly without training and context, we risk turning our workforce into executors instead of innovators.”

For Singh, the way forward lies in systemic change. “We need to move from reactive to preventive workplace strategies—just like we do in healthcare,” she said. “Addressing burnout at the root is not just a moral imperative; it’s a strategic one.”