The Australian HR Institute published findings from the Global Leadership Wellbeing Survey last week. It tracks the happiness of leaders — and it isn’t telling a good story.
There is an unbroken, ten-year decline. A decade of consistent, measurable deterioration in the felt wellbeing of leaders across a dataset of more than 9,600 people. The dimensions measured include Happiness, Working Well, Living Well, and Life Satisfaction — with Life Satisfaction falling the fastest.
These are not people who are struggling in obvious ways. They’re employed, capable, getting on with it. And quietly, steadily, feeling worse about their lives.
From the people I speak with, the relentlessness of work is a real factor — the sense that it never quite stops, that there’s always more. And alongside that, the illusion of connectivity: always online, never really connected.
When everything you could ever need is a few clicks away — where is the meaning?
What I find interesting is that this can’t be explained away as a COVID hangover. This research spans before, during, and after that period. The decline was already underway.
So I’m genuinely curious
- what do you think is driving it?
- What has been your experience?
Nigel