By Jess Lorimer
The 2025 business landscape was challenging – and one of the ways it hit organisations hardest?
Retaining talent.
Specifically, retaining great permanent employees during restructuring periods and then having to ask them to add more to their job role, often outside their own area of expertise.
Sadly, this has led to over three quarters of workers in the UK feeling some degree of burnout and increased pressure due to holding multiple responsibilities and roles… and for companies in the UK, it’s led to a costly increase in stress and burnout related absences.
But what is the true cost of employee burnout to organisations across the UK?
Organisations around the UK know that employees across various disciplines are taking on more responsibility in their job role than their original job description stated. This increased responsibility has led to higher levels of burnout and in December 2024, the MHFA released reports to show that work-related mental health issues (including stress and burnout related to roles) was costing the UK economy £57.4 billion per year.
It’s a staggering statistic… but what does it mean in real-terms for organisations?
- Increased absence: Most employees suffering with burnout / role related stress are taking in excess of 22 days absence per year; a significant financial cost for organisations in a challenging economic climate.
- Decreased productivity: With the rise in ‘culture rot’ alongside burnout and role related stress, organisations are seeing a significant increase in presenteeism (lost productivity) with Deloitte estimating a cost of £24 billion to employers annually.
- Significant attrition in key talent groups: Organisations are being clearer than ever before to make the right hiring decisions (especially with the changes to the Employment Rights Bill) but companies who are hiring talented employees who experience burnout / role related stress are seeing key hires leaving – after the significant recruitment, absence and presenteeism related costs.
This stalls key projects, impacts future growth and makes hitting diversity goals even more difficult.
Essentially, it means that employees who are tasked with too much are burning out and costing organisations around the UK thousands of pounds in associated costs.
And whilst most organisations know (and are seeing the effects daily), it’s hard for leaders to stop tasking employees with additional workloads when:
- Strategic plans still need implementing – even if there are fewer employees to make it happen.
- Targets are higher than ever but also, more commercially important to achieve critical profit milestones.
- Employees want clear career progression and see taking on new tasks and responsibilities as critical to professional development, rather than understanding how additional workload is impacting their overall performance in their area of specialism.
Which is where outsourcing / hiring external suppliers can help…
Usually, the mere mention of hiring an external supplier generates a raised eyebrow and the immediate; ‘What’s the point in hiring an external consultant who’ll just give us the same advice but charge a lot more for it?!’ and honestly?
Times have changed.
Smart organisations around the UK have been outsourcing specialist areas of expertise for years – with incredibly successful results. The reality in hiring outsourced talent is that whilst organisations do pay additional costs for external coaches, consultants and trainers, they also benefit hugely from:
- Access to specialist skills / areas of expertise for specific project work that they don’t have in-house or that their in-house resources are too busy to focus on full time.
- Not having to pay the same employee related costs associated with permanent headcount – because with an external supplier, there aren’t any National Insurance, sick pay or company benefits package costs. Companies are simply paying them for the skills and experience they need – at the time it’s needed.
- Increased innovation from external suppliers who are bringing knowledge and experiences from all of the work that they do which helps companies to avoid operating in a vacuum (and brings best practice and fresh ideas to the table)
- The ability to have permanent staff focusing on core business functions that grow the business and bottom line, rather than developing niche areas of specialism that only benefit the organisation once.
And this all leads to companies retaining permanent employees who are able to be more productive by focusing on their core skill sets and generating higher profits as an organisation as a result. If your organisation is interested in looking at specialist providers who can add critical knowledge and support so that permanent staff can focus on their core skills, click here to see our range of specialist providers.
How can external suppliers add commercial value to organisations in 2026?
Previously, external suppliers have been seen as a ‘threat’ to permanent staff – which couldn’t be further from the truth. External suppliers should be brought into organisations where their specialist skill set is required (and where organisations don’t have the usual time available to ‘ramp up’ permanent employees.)
Unlike permanent staff, external suppliers like coaches, consultants, trainers and done-for-you service providers are there to provide specialist skills immediately so that organisations can see immediate benefit, transformation and commercial improvements.
This means that (good!) external providers are able to:
- Support organisations with diagnostics to understand the issue(s) that they’re facing in specific areas and suggest solutions that will have immediate commercial benefits.
- Add expertise and value on starting without any ‘ramp up’ period so that the organisation benefits from quicker results.
- Use specialist skills to support the commercial transformations that the organisation is looking to achieve.
- Provide advice and proactively support organisations to avoid obstacles by contributing based on their work within a variety of environments and experiences.
- Offboard and hand over completed projects to the designated permanent staff member so that the learning outcomes and commercial transformations are fully realised by the organisation.
What kind of external suppliers could your organisation benefit from using in 2026?
Historically, organisations have been used to seeing traditional consultants or fractional resources working on key programmes of work. But as the world has changed, so has the variety of external suppliers that organisations are able to benefit from.
Whilst it’s not an exhaustive list, the following examples show where external suppliers can add benefit to commercial projects / programmes of work.
- Executive Coaching: For leaders and top talent to increase performance, retention of key staff and support critical commercial targets.
- Marketing: Fractional marketing resources to support strategic initiatives and specialist implementation for key programmes of work.
- Finance: Using fractional finance resource to support commercial growth (including fundraising / raising investment) or training non-financial employees to understand core concepts to boost profit.
- Change / Transformation: Using consultants / speakers and trainers to provide specialist resource for major change / transformation programmes from scoping through to implementation.
- Leadership: Using leadership development experts to support new and existing leaders to learn new skills, adapt their leadership style, develop executive presence and support the retention of valued talent.
- Health and Wellness: Using coaches / consultants / trainers and speakers to develop awareness of key health conditions, give support and advice on reasonable adjustment policies and support organisations to meet legal requirements / obligations.
- Communications: Using fractional communications resources to support both internal and external communications initiatives.
- Culture: Using coaches / consultants and speakers to change behaviours, challenge perceptions and make critical culture changes that impact performance, inclusion and leadership.
- Talent Development: Using coaches / consultants to consult on career development pathways to meet critical staffing targets and inspire and motivate staff to take autonomy over their career goals.
(And if you’d like to check out our wide range of coaches, consultants, speakers, trainers and done-for-you service providers, you can look at our Directory here where we list the best external suppliers according to their skillsets and location)
So what are the top three reasons that organisations should be looking to use external suppliers in 2026?
If we look at how organisations need to operate in 2026 to ensure high levels of profit and avoiding the loss of top permanent talent through burnout and overwhelm… there are three key reasons that organisations hugely benefit from hiring external suppliers.
- Specialist skills: Bringing an external supplier in to fulfil a critical commercial need means that organisations are able to meet business objectives quickly and efficiently – and being able to remove the cost of external suppliers when the specialist skills are no longer needed / programme is complete.
- Benefitting from external perspectives: Organisations can avoid costly mistakes and obstacles by using specialist external providers who’ve worked across multiple environments and understand the potential hazards within their area of expertise. This is especially critical when considering that permanent staff are often expected to learn specialist skills alongside their day-to-day role and may not have the same awareness / exposure to potential obstacles that external suppliers will see and handle each day.
- Cost reduction: Using external suppliers is a great way for organisations to benefit from specialist skills without increasing permanent headcount costs or paying the associated benefits.
If your organisation is ready to bring fresh perspectives, best practice and support your permanent staff to focus on their core skills each day but needs specialists to support within key programmes of work? Click here to check out our Directory where you can find expert coaches, consultants, trainers, speakers and done-for-you service providers who work with organisations around the UK in a range of specialisms.
