In the mid-2010s, the term “girl boss,” popularized by Nasty Gal founder Sophia Amoruso, was a form of women’s empowerment commemorating relentless drive. However, it also asked women to thrive in systems never built for them in mind—to lean in, work harder, and compete more fiercely, as if grit alone could overcome structural inequality. Many pursuing it found not empowerment, but exhaustion.
By the early 2020s, the girl-boss way began to encounter backlash. The pandemic exposed the unsustainable nature of always-on work and underscored how vital flexibility and remote options were for women’s well-being. In early 2025 alone, over 212,000 U.S. women left the workforce, citing inflexibility as a primary reason as companies began return-to-office mandates. At the leadership level, for every woman promoted, two stepped out. Half of working women (51 percent) now report feeling stressed, compared to 39% of men, illustrating a gender gap in workplace strain.
The problem is not women’s ambition; it’s the system’s design. Modern workplaces still reward 24/7 productivity and treat exhaustion as ambition. Success is measured by male-typical, hierarchical, zero-sum, winner-take-all systems which many women tend to avoid. These models don’t just disadvantage women, they put women’s health on the line. Zero-sum competition is a tightrope for many women, forcing them to choose between competing and risking social backlash, or disengaging and being sidelined.
The costs of these norms are not just social but physiological. Women report less desire to engage in direct competition, particularly against other women. Likewise, research shows that the mere thought of competing with a same-sex peer can trigger elevated stress responses and unhappiness. In these moments, women’s parasympathetic nervous systems show strain, and their cardiovascular systems become more dysregulated. Taken together, these findings reveal that workplaces driven by relentless competition and rigid hierarchies aren’t simply unfit for women, they’re unhealthy for them. Research shows that even simulated competitive settings can raise cortisol, the body’s stress hormone, signaling strain rather than motivation. Chronic activation of these stress systems is linked to myriad negative health outcomes, making this not just a workplace culture issue, but a health concern.
These pressures extend beyond stress to personal well-being. Workplace expectations punish women long before they have children (maybe-baby bias) and again after (the motherhood penalty). These challenges frequently converge in mid-career, when women are navigating career transitions and redefining life goals, forcing them to make trade-offs that compound their stress. Together, they make the idea of “having it all” nearly impossible.
In response, a generational shift is underway that is primarily female-centred. Women are no longer aspiring to “have it all” within rigid hierarchies. Instead, they’re redesigning the concept of success altogether. The rise of “lazy girl jobs,” “leaning out,” “slow living,” and “soft life” influencers marks a quiet revolution against hustle culture. Even “quiet quitting,” now embraced by 50% of workers, according to Gallup, reflects a collective refusal to equate worth with work.
Far from retreating, these women are rewriting the rules. Many are turning toward self-directed income and entrepreneurship, seeking flexibility, autonomy, and recognition outside the corporate system. As author Samhita Mukhopadhyay notes in The Myth of Making It (2024), this is not a retreat but a rebellion. It exposes the mismatch between how work is structured and what women need to thrive. If companies want to retain women, they must design work that supports balance, not burnout; collaboration, not competition; and health, not hustle.
Redesigning Structures to Prevent Burnout
- Lean On and Break Zero-Sum Systems. To ensure that women can girl boss without burnout, the system needs to change, not the women. First, workplaces must move beyond notions of the “ideal worker” and dismantle the zero-sum, winner-take-all competition that can be disastrous for health. When competition is framed as a battle for scarce rewards, women face both physiological stress and social backlash for engaging, thus creating a stress cycle. But when competition is collaborative (e.g. on behalf of someone or prosocial) these costs and differences disappear. In fact, women do not mind competitiveness in other women, and may even value it, as long as it’s not targeted toward them. Organizations can redesign advancement structures to reward collaboration, creating systems in which women can both lean in to their careers and lean on one another, not just sacrifice themselves by leaning in harder.
- Recognize Many Ways to Lead. Workplaces must make room for women’s definitions of leadership. As Rutgers Center for Women in Business (CWIB) research shows, many advancement programs fail because they ask women to succeed by adopting male archetypes of power and women often lead most effectively through relational authority such as coalition-building, trust, and collaboration. These are not “soft skills”; they are foundational forms of human intelligence and powerful strategies for driving performance and culture. Companies that recognize and elevate these leadership styles will not only retain more women but create healthier, higher-functioning organizations.
- Design Workplaces That Regulate, Not Burn Out. Organizations must design work that regulates rather than depletes. Stress is not just psychological; it is physiological. Workplaces that prize nonstop grind and competition deregulate the nervous system and become the catalyst to a generational shift, with Gen Z rejecting burnout as a badge of honor. True regulation means embedding flexibility and recovery as structural features, not perks. Flexible schedules, paid parental leave, and reentry programs must be standard, so employees don’t have to sacrifice health or personal life goals to stay on track.
Creating Sustainable Success
To retain women in the workforce, organizations must stop asking them to lean in more and instead build systems in which they can lean on one another and collaborate. Moving beyond zero-sum competition means creating workplaces that regulate stress, reward collaboration, and make work and life compatible, so individuals can pursue success that is not only sustainable but healthy.
