What is quiet quitting?
The term “quiet quitting” has become something of a buzzword of late. At the time of writing a quick Google search (other search engines are available) of the term yields “about 203,000,000 results”. The trend seems to have originated on social media platform TikTok. The idea is that rather than quitting your job entirely, you quit going above and beyond.
This might mean leaving the office at 5pm, rather than hanging around until 7pm in a bid to impress your boss. It might mean responding to a request to join a new project with the phrase “I don’t have capacity for that right now”. For some, it means skipping social functions which, whilst not strictly mandatory, have always been expected for those who wanted to impress the ‘higher-ups’.
The term is still developing and being consistently redefined. As the New York Times described it “For some, it was mentally checking out from work. For others, it became about not accepting additional work without additional pay.”
Your initial response to this trend might something along the lines of “lazy *expletive* youths with no *expletive* work ethic” and this is a semi-generational trend more prevalent amongst younger people. It could be considered Gen Z’s backlash to the #girlboss ‘hustle culture’ that has pervaded the working lives of their millennial colleagues.
However quiet quitting might not be just a young person’s game - the covid pandemic, with the rise of working from home, has substantially changed attitudes to work generally. First we had the “great resignation” – a term coined by Anthony Klotz in May 2021 and referred to a wave of people leaving employment (primarily in the USA, but the UK and Europe were also affected). The great resignation was attributed to burnout and to workers experiencing the freedom offered by homeworking, resulting in career changes. Quiet quitting might be a less extreme reaction to the exact same issue.
The concept of a quiet form of protest, doing no more than the bare minimum, has been around far longer than TikTok might suggest and has previously been known as “work-to-rule” action. It’s not entirely clear when this form of protest became prevalent but it seems to be around the mid-2000’s.
What’s the issue with quiet quitting?
For many employers, this trend is probably quite alarming. An employee who won’t consider doing anything outside of their job description, won’t work overtime, and won’t take on any additional responsibilities sounds like someone who is difficult to work with. Certainly a strict approach to ‘never going above and beyond’ might make it difficult to cope with increased demands on the business without taking on additional resources. I can also see how in a team one ‘quiet quitter’ might cause friction with those who are going above and beyond and see this as them picking up the slack for those who won’t.
On the other hand, if you’re consistently relying on employees going over and above the requirements and responsibilities of their role, working excessive hours, and doing so without additional remuneration, perhaps it is time to look at your business structure. Do you have so much work that more staff are required? Do the salaries you’re offering remain aligned with market rates? Are your managers effective?
I would also question whether “mentally checking out” is as bad as it sounds. Of course, there is a spectrum. Being so checked out that you don’t care about your job at all will probably only lead to sloppy work, mistakes and long- term issues. However ‘checking out’ enough to leave the job behind you when you leave for the day is probably a health attitude. According to the ONS “in 2020/21 there were an estimated 822,000 workers affected by work-related stress, depression or anxiety” and workplace stress accounts for 50% of workplace illnesses. If employees can ‘quietly quit’ and find a balance between getting the job done, without burning out, is there really a problem?
Dealing with Quiet Quitters
If you have an employee who is completely checked out, and is no longer performing in their role as a result, you might consider a performance improvement plan in accordance with your disciplinary policies. However, unfortunately for some businesses, employees cannot be punished or dismissed simply because they won’t go ‘above and beyond’.
Generally, the issue can be avoided by ensuring that your business is properly resourced (i.e. you have enough people to do the work) and your staff are well informed about the requirements of their role. I would suggest that every business should:
- Review your job descriptions – are your job descriptions adequate and up to date? Do all the required tasks of your business fall within someone’s job description, without leaving gaps for which someone would need to volunteer? Do they reflect the reality of your employees roles? If not, you might consider updating your job descriptions. If an employee is then not fulfilling their role, in accordance with their job description, you might have an argument to undertake disciplinary action.
- Consider your salaries – having reviewed your job descriptions, you might need to consider whether your staff are being appropriately remunerated for the job they’re actually doing, which may have evolved substantially from the role they were originally hired for. Much of the discontent amongst ‘quiet quitters’ is about being expected to carry out more work than they are being paid for.
- Speak to your employees – whilst it is not appropriate for a business to survive on the back of unpaid work carried out by its employees, every business will occasionally have exceptionally busy periods in which their staff might need to pitch in. Having a good relationship with your staff and communicating with them will help. They’re more likely to pitch in if they know their help is appreciated rather than expected and the situation is temporary – or if it’s not, that you’re looking for a longer term solution.
Ultimately, quiet quitting cannot really be prevented or punished, and it may time to look at the deeper issue if an employee doing everything that is required of them by their job description, and nothing more, is damaging to your business. If that is the case, it might be time to consider a cultural review or you may need a wider restructuring project. If you require assistance with these projects, we’re here to help.
If you have any queries regarding the issues raised in this article, or indeed any other employment related queries, please contact our expert Arvin Sandhu by email or on 01494 593 342 for further advice.