Behind the Screens: A Qualitative Study of University Staff Well-Being in Distance Learning

This qualitative study investigates how academic and professional staff at a large distance-learning university understand and experience well-being within digitally mediated work environments. Qualitative data were generated from open-ended responses included in a mixed-methods survey completed by 840 staff. Reflexive thematic analysis was used to identify shared patterns of meaning across the data set, with analytic attention given to the researcher’s interpretive role in the construction of themes. Five interconnected themes were identified, capturing emotional strain and labour, workload and performance demands, organisational support and recognition, relational connection and isolation, and work–life balance and agency. Together, these themes show that staff well-being in distance-learning contexts emerges through the interaction of emotional, organisational, relational and individual factors. Participants’ accounts reflected both challenge and adaptation. While digitally mediated work was sometimes associated with flexibility and autonomy, staff more commonly described sustained workload pressures, blurred work–life boundaries, and ongoing emotional and performance demands. These conditions were not experienced as uniformly detrimental but as requiring continuous negotiation, highlighting variation in how well-being was understood and managed across roles. The findings emphasise the importance of psychosocial well-being for staff functioning in distance education and suggest that effective responses should extend beyond individual strategies to include organisational approaches to workload design, communication, recognition and relational support. By centring staff perspectives, this study contributes to South African and international research on well-being in digitally mediated higher education and offers contextually informed insights for institutional policy and management.