Australian AI Adoption Stalls While Burnout Soars: What Marketers Can Learn from Asana’s 2025 Report

Tom Willis -

While global headlines continue to buzz about AI's transformative promise, a new report reveals that many Australian businesses are still stuck at the starting line. According to Asana’s State of AI at Work: Australia 2025 Report, AI adoption has stalled nationwide, with just 14% of organisations scaling AI across operations — and the cost isn’t just missed innovation. Employee burnout is surging to unprecedented levels.

For marketers navigating today’s fast-paced digital world, the findings offer both a cautionary tale and a blueprint for using AI more meaningfully.

The AI Adoption Gap: Hype vs Reality

Despite near-universal hype around artificial intelligence, most Australian workplaces have yet to go beyond early trials. While 71% of executives are now using AI weekly, only 32% of individual contributors do the same. That gap signals a significant disconnect between leadership enthusiasm and frontline implementation.

AI usage among workers has plateaued at 46%—virtually unchanged from 2024. And with 86% of organisations still in the exploratory phase, Australia risks falling behind markets that are embedding AI into workflows at scale.

“As excitement around AI grows, organisations are struggling to move beyond isolated use cases,” said Lindsay Buydos, Asana’s General Manager for APAC and Japan. “Without a clear strategy, AI simply adds more complexity.”

Burnout Hits Breaking Point

If underwhelming AI adoption isn’t enough, Asana’s report highlights a more urgent crisis: burnout. A staggering 81% of Australian knowledge workers reported experiencing burnout in the past year, while 76% cited unmanageable workloads in the last six months.

Workers now spend an average of:

  • 9 hours/week in unproductive meetings (up from 8 in 2024)
  • 10 hours/week switching between collaboration tools (up from 6)
  • 12 hours/week searching for information (up from 9)

These inefficiencies point to a broken system — one not yet designed to support AI or reduce human strain. For marketing teams constantly expected to deliver more with less, this operational friction can severely limit creativity and performance.

The Four Productivity Taxes Holding Teams Back

The report introduces four key "taxes" that are sapping productivity across Australian organisations:

  1. Connectivity Tax – Siloed tools and teams lead to duplicated work and misalignment.
  2. Velocity Tax – Bottlenecks and outdated systems slow progress.
  3. Resilience Tax – Rigid workflows leave organisations ill-equipped to adapt.
  4. Capacity Tax – Overload and distractions erode focus and energy.

For marketers, these challenges sound familiar. Fragmented martech stacks, slow content approvals, and endless meetings can feel like business as usual. But they don’t have to be.

AI Scalers Are Breaking the Mold

Not all organisations are stuck. Asana’s report identifies a growing group of “AI scalers” — 14% of surveyed organisations that have successfully deployed AI across multiple workflows. These leaders are seeing tangible benefits, including:

  • 22% fewer employees dreading meetings
  • 13% reduction in digital exhaustion
  • 12% lower rates of burnout
  • 13% more time allocated to strategic thinking

Their secret? A coordinated, thoughtful approach to AI.

“AI success isn’t just about tools—it’s about systems,” said Buydos. “AI scalers redesign how work flows before automating. They invest in collaboration, standardise tech stacks, and protect teams from burnout by eliminating low-value work.”

What This Means for Australian Marketers

For marketing leaders, the takeaway is clear: AI can’t fix broken processes — but it can accelerate great ones.

The report underscores the importance of building a coordination layer before introducing AI. Marketers should focus on simplifying workflows, consolidating tools, and identifying where automation can unlock time for high-impact work like strategy, creativity, and storytelling.

With nearly three in four workers favouring a standardised set of collaboration tools, now is the time to cut through complexity — not add to it.