What is impacting the young generation at the workplace?

It lives in the pit of the stomach of a 23-year-old marketing executive in Noida, refreshing her inbox, in the strained shoulders of a junior analyst in Mumbai who hasn’t taken a real weekend off in months, in the quiet resignation of a Bengaluru developer wondering how quickly relevance expires in an industry obsessed with speed.These weights do not announce themselves as burnout or breakdown. However, more often it shows up as restlessness, disengagement, and a persistent question that hums beneath the workday: Is this life supposed to feel like this? While the headlines have now and then labelled the young generation as “entitled” and “lazy.” Corporates have not pardoned them either. Brought up in a world regulated by AI, pandemic and whatnot, Gen Z has learnt to question the status quo and talk about issues their predecessors chose to be silent about.A recent Naukri’s report on The Gen Z work code: What drives, engages and retains them based on insights from over 23,000 Gen Z professionals across more than 80 industries, reads, on the surface, like a roadmap for employers. But look closer, and it is also a psychological portrait of a generation under pressure, negotiating mental health in offices that still reward endurance over equilibrium. Here are the top mental health concerns affecting Gen Z in the modern workplace.

Work-life balance: When absence becomes a mental health trigger

For half of Gen Z professionals, work-life balance is not a preference, it is the defining factor in accepting a job offer. Among those with five to eight years of experience, that number rises to 60%.This insistence is often misread as fragility. In reality, it is foresight. Gen Z entered the workforce during a pandemic that wiped off boundaries between office and home. Bedrooms became workstations. Evenings dissolved into follow-up calls. Over time, the absence of balance translated into chronic anxiety, sleep deprivation, and emotional fatigue. Mental health, for this generation, deteriorates not during crises but during endless, unprotected normalcy.

The slow burn of stagnation

Another mental health fault line runs through the idea of growth, or the lack of it. The report finds that 57% of Gen Z define career growth as learning new skills on the job, far ahead of promotions or pay hikes. This in itself is a striking finding. The young generation is not rushing toward monetary benefits but is rather prioritizing learning initiativesIn creative fields such as advertising and design, where this number touches 78%, stagnation feels existential. Skills are becoming obsolete, and relevance seems to be fragile. Without structured upskilling, anxiety becomes a constant ally.Skills date rapidly. Relevance is fragile. And without structured upskilling, anxiety becomes a constant companion. It is a survival instinct in an economy that punishes obsolescence without warning.

Recognition that doesn’t heal

Gen Z’s overwhelming preference for recognition through growth opportunities, 81%, reveals another emotional truth. Praise alone does little to soothe workplace anxiety.Words do not offset exhaustion. Compliments do not secure futures. What stabilises mental health, this generation suggests, is tangible investment: learning budgets, exposure, mentorship, and movement. Without these, appreciation rings hollow, sometimes even cynical.

Micromanagement: A quiet, persistent mental health stressor

Then there is micromanagement, still very much a villain, even if it does not top the list numerically. 16% percent of Gen Z identify micromanaging bosses as a major mental health stressor. The number may appear modest, but its impact is devastating. Constant oversight robs off autonomy, breeds self-doubt, and fuels anxiety, especially in a generation already battling imposter syndrome.Gen Z does not take micromanagement as controlling demeanour, but they feel distrustful. It communicates a lack of faith, and over time, that message imbibes inward. Mental health suffers not through dramatic confrontations, but through daily diminishment.

The human cost behind the data

What this report ultimately reveals is not a fragile generation, but a perceptive one, keenly aware of how work shapes mental well-being. Gen Z is not asking to work less. It is asking to work without losing itself.It wants boundaries that protect mental health, growth that quiets anxiety, recognition that builds confidence, and leadership that trusts rather than surveils.If workplaces fail to respond, the fallout will not be immediate. It will be slow: quiet quitting, emotional withdrawal, and a generation that learns to disengage as a form of self-preservation.The question is no longer whether Gen Z can adapt to work. It is whether work can evolve before mental health becomes the price of participation.