Why Are Your Bosses Sending You to a Resilience Workshop? To empower you, or to compensate for their bad leadership?

The Rise of Resilience Workshops In recent years, the concept of “resilience” has become a corporate buzzword. Everywhere you look, organizations are hosting workshops, webinars, and training sessions focused on teaching employees how to cope with stress, burnout, and uncertainty. Research by Deloitte even shows a growing investment in resilience and well-being programs across multiple industries. On the surface, this may seem like a natural evolution of workplace wellness: helping people manage challenges effectively.

However, beneath the good intentions lies a critical question that often goes unaddressed: Are these resilience programs genuinely aimed at empowering employees, or are they serving as a Band-Aid to compensate for flawed leadership and overloaded work systems?

Understanding the Real Issues

Systemic Stressors: One of the biggest challenges in modern workplaces is chronic overwork, fueled by blurred boundaries between work and personal life and a culture that often celebrates long hours. Sending employees to resilience workshops won’t make much of a difference if unrealistic deadlines, constant interruptions, and poor communication remain the norm.

Lack of Managerial Accountability: Sometimes, leadership teams promote resilience to deflect attention away from the organization’s internal problems—be it poor planning, disorganized structures, or inadequate staffing. If the root cause lies in management decisions, then the solution should involve leadership taking responsibility and addressing the systemic issues.

Cultural Norms: High-pressure cultures often reward “toughness” and see burnout as a badge of honor. Employees may even feel compelled to accept these conditions for fear of appearing weak. Resilience training, without culture change, can become just another way to say, “Cope better,” rather than, “Let’s change the environment.”

When Resilience Is Done Right True resilience isn’t about teaching people to withstand higher levels of stress without changing anything else. Instead, it’s a holistic approach that involves both personal skill-building and organizational transformation. Resilience training should complement—rather than replace—meaningful changes in how work is structured and managed.

Three Tips for Doing It Better

1. Address the Systemic Causes of Stress Conduct a thorough assessment of workloads, deadlines, and communication methods. Are employees regularly expected to do the work of two or three people? Is there a culture of back-to-back meetings that leaves no time to focus? Identify these pinch points and create action plans to mitigate them. What This Looks Like: A leadership team that actively removes bottlenecks, reprioritizes tasks, and sets realistic timelines, ensuring people aren’t drowning in tasks.
2. Cultivate Open Dialogue and Shared Responsibility Encourage honest conversations about challenges. This includes forums, town halls, or smaller group discussions where employees can voice concerns without fear of retaliation. Leaders who listen and act on feedback demonstrate that resilience isn’t just about employee endurance—it’s about an evolving, supportive system. What This Looks Like: Bi-weekly feedback sessions where teams collaborate with management to streamline projects and workflows, accompanied by follow-ups to track progress.
3. Combine Resilience Training with Leadership Development Resilience workshops should run parallel to programs that develop leadership skills like empathy, active listening, conflict resolution, and self-awareness. If managers are better equipped to lead and support, employees won’t need to “endure” so much in the first place. What This Looks Like: Ongoing training that helps leaders recognize their own stress triggers and fosters a workplace where everyone feels valued. Leaders model the behaviors they want to see, from balancing workloads to encouraging downtime.

A Note on Culture Change Transforming workplace culture isn’t a one-off event; it’s an ongoing process. Companies that genuinely care about resilience make incremental improvements—focusing on communication, workload management, and emotional well-being—so their employees don’t have to fight fires every day. This approach goes beyond a checkbox exercise; it creates an environment where people are genuinely empowered to do their best work and maintain their health.

Looking Beyond the Workshop If your organization is sending you to a resilience workshop, it’s worth reflecting on the larger context. Yes, resilience can be an incredible personal tool—it helps individuals navigate life’s obstacles more effectively. But if your workplace issues are systemic, resilience training alone won’t fix them. Leaders have a responsibility to create systems and cultures where burnout is the exception, not the rule.

The Bottom Line: Real resilience is built on mutual respect, clear communication, and a commitment to positive change at every level of the organization. It’s not just about employees absorbing stress; it’s about leaders and teams working together to reduce it.

Want to Drive True, Sustainable Change?

Here are three areas where I support teams and organizations seeking real transformation:

1. Authentic Leadership: Develop leaders who value transparency, foster trust, and hold themselves accountable for creating healthy work environments.
2. Innovative Success Strategies: Combine resilience practices with strategic planning and collaboration to sustain high performance without burning people out.
3. Customized Leadership Programs: Build tailored initiatives that align organizational values with everyday practices, ensuring resilience is part of a larger, coherent approach to well-being and performance.

We owe it to ourselves—and our teams—to look beyond superficial quick fixes. True resilience is about integrating personal development with meaningful organizational change. Let’s make resilience more than just a buzzword; let’s make it a cornerstone of a thriving, human-centric workplace.

Marcel Szenessy Storyteller, Trainer, Coach ?