R U OK? Day · Thursday 10 September 2026
Four Steps, One Conversation
You don’t need to be a counsellor and you don’t need the right words. You need to notice, ask, and stay in touch afterwards. Here is the framework, and the numbers to call when a conversation needs to go further.
The R U OK? conversation framework
Ask R U OK?
Be relaxed, friendly and concerned. Mention the specific change you’ve noticed rather than asking in the abstract.
“You haven’t been at the Friday catch-ups lately — how are you going?”
Listen with an open mind
Take what they say seriously. Don’t interrupt, don’t rush it, and don’t jump to fixing. Let the silence sit.
“That sounds like a lot. How long has it been like that?”
Encourage action
Ask what has helped before. If they’ve felt down for more than two weeks, encourage them to speak to their GP or a professional.
“What’s helped when you’ve felt like this before?”
Check in
Put a reminder in your diary. Following up a fortnight later is what separates a nice moment from actual support.
“I’ve been thinking about our chat — how have you been since?”
What the industry’s own data says
Changes worth noticing in a colleague
- Gone quiet in channels they were always active in
- Skipping PD days, team calls or industry events they used to attend
- Uncharacteristically short or irritable over email
- Files slipping in a way that isn’t like them
- Working every night and every weekend, indefinitely
- Talking about the job with flatness or resignation
- Drinking more, sleeping less, mentioning either in passing
- Withdrawing after a clawback, a lost deal or a complaint
None of these means someone is unwell. Each is a reason to ask.
Where to send someone — or call yourself
All free. All confidential. The first four are available 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
The one thing to take from today
Broking is a job where people work alone, absorb other people’s financial fear all day, and can have income taken back months after they earned it. That combination is hard on anyone. You are not being intrusive by asking a colleague how they’re travelling — and the check-in a fortnight later matters more than the question itself.
Sources: R U OK? (ruok.org.au) for the conversation framework, campaign date and the “9 in 10” figure; service names, numbers and hours from R U OK?’s Find Help directory and healthdirect Australia; broker figures from FBAA polling and CoreData research for the FBAA, as reported by Australian Broker and Mortgage Professional Australia in February and October 2025. Helpline details current at the time of writing.
R U OK? Day · Thursday 10 September 2026
How to Ask a Broker Who’s Struggling — and What to Do With the Answer
Broking is a job where you work alone, absorb other people’s financial fear all day, and can have money taken back six months after you earned it. Today is a reasonable day to check on the people around you. Here’s how to do it properly — and where to point someone who needs more than a chat.
R U OK? Day falls today, Thursday 10 September. The campaign’s message this year is “If you’re thinking it, Ask R U OK? Any Day” — which is a polite way of saying that a single day in September was never the point.
It is easy to be cynical about awareness days. A yellow poster in the kitchen, a morning tea, a LinkedIn post, and back to the pipeline. Fair enough. But there is a version of this that is genuinely useful, and it costs almost nothing: noticing that someone in your orbit has gone quiet, and asking them about it.
This industry has some specific reasons to take that seriously.
Why this industry, specifically
Most brokers are small business operators. A large share work alone or in very small teams. There is no floor of colleagues to debrief with after a bad call, no manager who notices you’ve been off for a fortnight, and often no one who sees your day at all.
On top of that, the work itself is emotionally heavy in a way that rarely gets named. Brokers sit with people at the most financially frightening moments of their lives: the declined application, the valuation that came in short, the client who has lost a job midway through a purchase, the couple separating and trying to work out who keeps the house. You absorb all of that, professionally and calmly, several times a day, and then you go and do the next appointment.
Then there is the structure of the income. Commission is variable, it arrives on someone else’s timetable, and — uniquely — it can be taken back. A clawback lands months after the work was done, after the money has been spent on the mortgage and the school fees, for a decision the client made and the broker often could not have prevented. It is a financial event, but it is also a psychological one, and brokers describe it in those terms.
You spend all day being the calm one in the room for other people’s money problems. There is rarely anyone doing that for you.
Add the always-on expectation — clients texting at 9pm, agents calling on Sunday — and a compliance load that has grown steadily, and you have a job that is genuinely demanding. That is not a complaint. It is context for why checking in on each other matters more here than the average industry.
What the industry’s own numbers say
The broking sector has actually surveyed itself on this, and the picture is mixed rather than bleak.
Research conducted by CoreData for the Finance Brokers Association of Australia, reported in February 2025, found that 80% of brokers had been affected by a clawback in the preceding year, and that close to half of those surveyed had lost more than $10,000 each. Peter White, the FBAA’s Managing Director, described the findings as “real human consequences” — and brokers quoted in that research used words like “depression” and “a constant worry in my mind.”
The FBAA’s bi-monthly member polling, reported in October 2025, found 71% of brokers were satisfied in their job, but that 54% had considered leaving the industry at least once, with work-related stress and financial strain among the reasons given. Younger brokers reported higher stress and less workplace support than their older colleagues.
Earlier polling from the same series — fieldwork in late May 2025, 100 members — found improvement: 51% reported no mental or physical stress over the previous six months, up from 38% two months earlier, and the share who felt unsupported in managing stress had fallen from 62% in March to 25% in May.
Two honest caveats. These are small, self-selecting industry polls rather than clinical research, and the most recent of them is now close to a year old. Treat them as a signal about the shape of the problem, not a measurement of it. But the signal is consistent: a meaningful share of brokers are carrying more than they let on, and a meaningful share don’t feel supported in it.
What to actually look for
You are not diagnosing anyone. You are noticing change. The useful signal is almost always a shift from how that particular person normally is, sustained over a couple of weeks:
- They’ve gone quiet in a group chat or channel where they were always vocal
- They’ve stopped coming to PD days, team calls or events they used to enjoy
- They’re uncharacteristically short, flat or irritable
- Their files are slipping in a way that isn’t like them
- They’re working every night and every weekend with no end point in sight
- They talk about the job with resignation rather than frustration — frustration is engagement, flatness often isn’t
- They mention drinking more or sleeping badly, in passing, as a joke
- They’ve withdrawn after a specific hit: a clawback, a lost referral relationship, a complaint
None of these means someone is unwell. Every one of them is a reasonable prompt to ask.
The four steps, in broker language
R U OK? sets out a four-step framework. It is deliberately simple, because the barrier for most people isn’t knowledge — it’s the fear of saying the wrong thing.
Ask R U OK?
R U OK?’s guidance is to “be relaxed, friendly and concerned in your approach,” and to mention the specific behaviour you’ve noticed rather than asking in the abstract. “How are you?” gets “yeah, good, busy.” Naming the thing you’ve observed gets an actual answer.
Listen with an open mind
“Take what they say seriously and don’t interrupt or rush the conversation.” This is the step brokers find hardest, because the entire professional instinct is to solve. Resist it. You are not structuring a deal. Let there be silence — people often say the real thing in the pause after the first answer.
Encourage action
Ask what has helped them before rather than prescribing. R U OK? suggests that if someone has felt “really down for more than 2 weeks,” encourage them to see a health professional. Offering something concrete — “want me to sit with you while you book the GP?” — converts far better than “you should talk to someone.”
Check in
“Pop a reminder in your diary to call them in a couple of weeks.” This is the step almost everyone skips, and it is the one that turns a nice moment into actual support. You already run a CRM with follow-up tasks. Use the same discipline on the people you work with.
Openings that work better than “how are you?”
- You haven’t been on the Monday call for a few weeks — everything alright?
- You’ve seemed pretty flat since that file fell over. How are you actually going?
- I noticed you’re still sending emails at 11pm most nights. Is it just busy, or is it more than that?
- That clawback would have stung. How did you go with it?
- You don’t have to talk about it. But I’ve noticed, and I’m around.
What not to do
Common missteps
- Don’t lead with solutions. “Have you tried the gym?” lands as dismissal, even when it’s well meant.
- Don’t make it about you. A brief “I’ve been there too” builds trust; a ten-minute story about your worst year takes the conversation away from them.
- Don’t do it in a group setting. Not in the team chat, not in front of the office, not in the two minutes before a call starts.
- Don’t push if they’re not ready. “No worries — the offer stands” leaves the door open. Pressure closes it.
- Don’t promise absolute confidentiality. If you become worried about someone’s safety, you may need to involve others. Say “I’ll keep this between us as far as I can” rather than a promise you might have to break.
- Don’t treat one conversation as the job done. The follow-up is the substance.
If you’re the one who isn’t OK
Worth saying plainly, because a lot of people read an article like this thinking about colleagues and skip past the part that applies to them.
Struggling with this job is not evidence that you are bad at it. The stressors described above are structural — they are features of how broking works, not personal failings. Brokers with great books and long careers hit walls. It is extremely common, and it is treatable.
Two things are worth knowing. First, a GP is a completely normal starting point — you can ask about a Mental Health Treatment Plan, which can give you access to Medicare-subsidised sessions with a psychologist. You do not need to be in crisis to make that appointment. Second, many aggregators and licensees offer an Employee Assistance Program, which is typically free, confidential, not reported back to your employer, and often extends to family members. A lot of brokers have one available and have never checked. It’s worth two minutes to find out whether yours does.
You would not tell a client to just push through a problem they’d been carrying for six months. Extend yourself the same professional courtesy.
Seven things that genuinely help
Not a wellness listicle. These are specific to how broking actually works.
- Put a stated edge on availability. A response window in your email signature and voicemail — “I reply to messages between 8am and 6pm weekdays” — does more than willpower. Clients calibrate to what you publish. Most are entirely reasonable when told.
- Treat the clawback buffer as a business decision. Holding a portion of upfront commission in a separate account until the clawback period passes turns a future shock into an expected cost. It doesn’t remove the sting, but it removes the financial emergency sitting underneath it.
- Have someone to debrief the bad file with. The isolation is what makes everything else worse. One peer you can call after a hard appointment — not to solve it, just to say it out loud — is the single highest-value thing on this list.
- Book the GP before you need one. Having an existing relationship with a doctor who knows you makes the harder conversation dramatically easier to start later.
- Find out today whether you have an EAP. Check with your aggregator or licensee. Free, confidential, usually available immediately.
- Protect one fixed thing in the week. One non-negotiable commitment that isn’t work and isn’t moved for a settlement. Recurring beats occasional; the point is that something in your week is not contingent on the pipeline.
- Watch the “after settlement” loop. “I’ll rest after this one settles” is fine once. If you’ve said it every month for a year, the rest is never coming, and that pattern is worth naming out loud to someone.
Where to get help
Free, confidential support
You do not need to be in crisis to call any of these. They are also there for people who are worried about someone else and want advice on how to help.
R U OK? also publishes free conversation guides, posters and workplace resources at ruok.org.au — genuinely useful if you run a team and want something better than a morning tea.
Key takeaways
- R U OK? Day is today, 10 September 2026, and the campaign’s own message is that the question works on any day — not just this one.
- Broking carries specific pressures: working alone, absorbing clients’ financial distress, and income that can be clawed back months after it’s earned.
- Industry polling from 2025 found 54% of brokers had considered leaving at least once, and 80% had been hit by a clawback in the prior year — small self-selecting samples, but a consistent signal.
- The framework is four steps: ask, listen, encourage action, check in. The check-in a fortnight later is the part most people skip and the part that matters most.
- A GP is a normal starting point, and many aggregators offer a free, confidential EAP that brokers never think to use.
Common questions
What if I ask and they say “I’m fine” when they’re clearly not?
That’s a normal first response and it isn’t a failure. Most people deflect the first time, particularly at work. You can gently leave the door open — “fair enough, but I’m around if that changes” — and then follow up a week or two later. Being asked twice tells someone you actually meant it. The follow-up is often when the real conversation happens.
I’m worried I’ll make it worse by raising it.
This is the most common reason people say nothing, and the evidence points the other way. R U OK? reports that nine in ten people who were asked “are you OK?” felt grateful, cared about and supported. You don’t need the perfect words. Asking clumsily and genuinely is considerably better than saying nothing carefully.
They’re a competitor, not a colleague. Is it my place?
Broking is a small industry and most brokers know the people writing loans in their patch. Competing for the same clients doesn’t disqualify you from noticing that someone has dropped off the map. Plenty of the most valued check-ins come from people who had no obligation to make them.
What if it’s serious and beyond what I can handle?
It very well might be, and that’s not your responsibility to carry alone. Your job is to stay with them in the moment, take it seriously, and help them connect with someone qualified — a GP, or one of the services listed above. If you believe someone’s life is in immediate danger, call 000. You can also call Lifeline on 13 11 14 yourself for advice on how to support someone else.
Does an EAP get reported back to my aggregator?
Employee Assistance Programs are generally confidential, with the employer receiving only aggregate usage data rather than anything identifying. Arrangements vary between providers, so if that matters to you, ask the provider directly about their confidentiality policy before your first session — they’re used to the question.
We’re a small industry
Broking runs on relationships — with clients, referrers, BDMs, and with each other. That’s usually discussed as a commercial asset. Today it’s worth thinking of it as something else: a network of people who are in a position to notice when one of their own is struggling.
You don’t need training. You need to notice someone has gone quiet, ask them about it properly, listen without trying to fix it, and put a reminder in your diary to circle back in a fortnight. That’s it. That’s the whole thing.
Ask someone today. Then ask them again in two weeks, when the posters have come down.
If anything in this article has raised difficulties for you, support is available. Lifeline is on 13 11 14 and Beyond Blue is on 1300 22 4636, both free and available 24/7.
Sources: R U OK? (ruok.org.au) for the R U OK? Day 2026 date, the campaign message, the four-step conversation framework and accompanying guidance, and the “nine in ten” figure; support service names, numbers and hours from R U OK?’s Find Help directory and healthdirect Australia. Broker figures: CoreData research for the Finance Brokers Association of Australia as reported by Australian Broker (February 2025); FBAA bi-monthly member polling as reported by Mortgage Professional Australia (July and October 2025), including a poll of 100 members with fieldwork from 26–29 May 2025. Helpline numbers and hours were current at the time of writing; check the relevant service’s website for the latest details.
Breaking news for modern brokers
Lender policy, regulator moves and market data — read for what it changes on your files.
Broker Tool · Conversation Planner
Plan the conversation
Three questions about someone you’ve been thinking about. It gives you an opening line, what to listen for, and when to follow up. It is not an assessment of anyone’s mental health — just help getting the first sentence out.
Free conversation guides and workplace resources from R U OK?
Disclaimer: This article is for general information and professional development purposes only. It is not medical, psychological, legal or financial advice, and it is not a substitute for care from a qualified health professional. If you are concerned about your mental health or someone else's, please speak to your GP or contact one of the services listed above. Lifeline is available on 13 11 14 and Beyond Blue on 1300 22 4636, 24/7. In an emergency, call 000. Support service details were current at the time of publication.
