The Real Cause of HR Burnout is Hiding in Plain Sight

 Depending on where you are in life's journey, you may have already started to become aware of certain patterns. Thought patterns you find yourself repeating. Beliefs about yourself which look true. Emotional responses that you keep repeating, no matter how hard you try and can see how these play out in your day-to-day life in HR.

But when you’re experiencing HR burnout, it doesn’t look like it’s coming from those internal programmes.

It looks like it’s coming from your job!. From having to tell yet another person they’re at risk of redundancy. From dealing with a difficult colleague. From the pressure of needing to show up as a strong HR leader, even when you feel you have nothing left to give.

And while there may be real demands in your role, those demands are not the root cause of HR burnout.

What’s creating your reality — moment to moment to moment — is coming from the inside out. No exceptions.

HR Burnout: The Patterns Behind the Pressure

To truly prevent HR burnout, you have to understand what’s actually creating it.

"If you are not consciously creating it, you are unconsciously accepting it."

That quote captures everything.

Because most of what you feel, do, and react to isn’t conscious. It’s coming from conditioned patterns — the same thoughts, beliefs, behaviours — playing out over and over again.

95–98% of the time, your unconscious mind is running the show.

Unless you see those conditioned, habitual responses clearly, they continue to operate in the background. They drive how you feel. They shape your choices. They keep you stuck in a loop of HR burnout.

When I started to study Psychotherapy and Hypnotherapy, I was still working at the time as the Head of HR for British Airways Holidays. The more I learnt about the human psyche and started to raise my levels of consciousness and self-awareness,  the more I became aware of my emotional reactions in my day-to-day job role.

If I had a time machine, I would love to have been given this insight and wisdom; it would have changed the course of my HR career!

The Magic in Seeing What’s Been Hidden

Once you see a conditioned response in the form of a reaction, thought pattern, belief or behaviour, you can’t unsee it.  For me, it was the belief I needed to be seen to be perfect.

There is a kind of quiet power that comes from seeing what’s actually running the show.

And yes — it can feel uncomfortable. Like looking in the mirror and noticing something you didn’t want to admit was there.

But it’s also liberating. Because suddenly you realise:

• That belief that you’re not good enough? Just a thought pattern.

• That need to prove yourself constantly? A conditioned response.

• That burnout you keep circling back to? A symptom — not a life sentence.

A Personal Note: Pattern Spotting Is My Superpower

HR professionals often call themselves HR ninjas.

I’m a ninja too — but of a different kind.

After over 10,000 one-to-one sessions, I’ve developed the ability to hear the inner dialogue someone is running just through everyday language.

I can spot the belief systems underneath their responses. I can see the conditioning in the way they speak, think, and lead.

That’s not about being clever — it’s about being conscious.

And when you raise your own level of consciousness, you start operating from a whole new place.

HR Burnout Is a Signal — Not a Sentence

What if HR burnout isn’t the problem?

What if it’s a message from your conditioned self — letting you know it’s time to see more clearly?

When you start to raise your self-awareness, you start showing up differently. From a more empowered identity.

Because HR burnout doesn’t just come from your environment. It comes from within. And the more conscious you become, the more choices you have.

Next up in this HR Burnout series: The missing link in almost every HR training programme — nervous system regulation.

If you’re curious about what else could be driving your experience of HR burnout, head to the next step in this HR Burnout series!. And if this has resonated with you, please share it with someone else in HR who needs to see it.

Want to explore this more deeply for yourself or your team? Drop me a line at [email protected]