What Healthcare Can Learn From Retail About Burnout and Retention

When considering the people employed—the nurses, the providers, and the retail associates—both retail and healthcare are facing the same storm:

• Burnout is rampant.
• New systems and tools are being rolled out faster than teams can absorb.
• Workers feel voiceless, disconnected, and stretched thin.

In retail, change is constant—new tech, new promotions, new mandates. In healthcare? Same story, but add higher stakes and a growing shortage of providers. We’re on track for a 1M nurse shortage in 2026. And nearly 60% of new nurses leave the bedside within two years of practicing.

So what’s going wrong?

We’re designing solutions around people, not with them.

And in an age when it's easier than ever to launch new things, the problem is growing.

New software is in every roadmap. Compressed timelines and top-down rollouts make adoption harder. Employees are “included” in the change, but only through the checkbox of a sentiment survey. And workers—whether they wear scrubs or name tags—don’t feel heard.

• They don’t see the “why.”
• They don’t feel valued.
• They don’t trust the process.
• They can’t handle one more thing on their plate.

As a behavior design nerd, it's no surprise to me that these workforces are rejecting change—or opting out entirely.

Want your change to stick? Want to build solutions that elevate your workforce, rather than bury them? The solutions are the same in healthcare and in retail.

Here’s what works—and what we need more of:

1. Real inclusion as a habit, not a project. Co-creation isn’t a phase—it’s continuous. Invite people into the problem definition, not just the solution testing. Understand what their world looks like today, and what they need to be successful.
2. Clarity before rollout. Don’t just present the “what.” Start with the “why.” Show your work. Discuss openly how this might affect your people, and what you will do about it.
3. Test. Learn. Adjust. Experiments are powerful, and create room for change. There is even more power in saying “we got it wrong—and here’s what we’re going to do differently.” You get this context through conversation, above and beyond engagement surveys.
4. Build trust through consistency. Change management is not a one-and-done event. It’s ongoing, iterative, and human. Your team needs time, repetition, and rituals.