South African chief information security officers (CISOs) are facing mounting pressure as rising cyber threats, limited budgets and skills shortages converge, increasing the risk of burnout across security teams.
Heino Gevers, senior director for technical support at Mimecast, says local security leaders are operating in an environment marked by escalating attack volumes and growing board-level expectations, while resources remain constrained.
According to Gevers, the increasing sophistication of machine-driven attacks has compounded operational strain, with security teams spending significant time managing false positives and triaging alerts. In some cases, as much as 40% of analysts’ time is spent investigating alerts that ultimately prove to be benign.
Attempts to address these pressures by adding additional point solutions have, in some organisations, led to further complexity. Each new tool introduces additional dashboards, alerts and integration requirements, contributing to operational fragmentation rather than reducing workload.
International research reflects similar challenges. Gartner has reported that 62% of security leaders have experienced burnout at least once, with 44% reporting multiple instances. More than a third said they faced unrealistic expectations from their organisations.
AI both accelerates and alleviates pressure
Artificial intelligence is playing a dual role in the current cyber environment. On one hand, generative AI and automation tools are being used by threat actors to increase the speed and sophistication of attacks. On the other hand, AI is increasingly viewed as one of the few scalable mechanisms available to security teams that cannot expand headcount in line with threat growth.
Gevers argues that AI can reduce cognitive overload by automating routine triage and correlating signals across email, collaboration platforms and other security tools. He says this can help reduce alert noise and streamline decision-making.
He cautions, however, that technology alone will not resolve burnout. Organisations need to treat team wellbeing as a strategic consideration, tracking retention, skills development and workload alongside traditional metrics such as incident response times.
In the South African context, where budgets are constrained, Gevers notes that building in-house AI solutions can take 18 to 24 months before delivering value. As a result, some organisations may look to partner-driven platforms that integrate into existing communication and collaboration systems rather than attempting to develop bespoke systems from scratch.
The broader challenge for local security teams, he says, is balancing the use of automation to scale operations while ensuring that human decision-makers are not overwhelmed by complexity and constant high-pressure environments.
As AI adoption accelerates across the cybersecurity landscape, the extent to which organisations deploy it to reduce, rather than intensify, operational strain may determine whether burnout becomes entrenched or begins to ease.
