Quiet quitting is a terrible phrase, but bosses need to take it seriously

Quiet quitting has become a buzzword to describe unambitious workers, but it’s actually a reaction to toxic working environments. Learn why managers should take this work trend seriously.

Quiet quitting has become a buzzword to describe unambitious workers, but it’s actually a reaction to toxic working environments. Learn why managers should take this work trend seriously.

The phrase “quiet quitting” has exploded online as digital publications write articles about the growing trend of young adult workers who are leaving work at 5:00 pm, spending their weekends with family and friends, not answering emails after work hours, and refusing to overextend themselves for no extra compensation.

The concept — although not new — gain popularity after a Gen Z TikToker created a video where he said he recently learned about a new way to work. In the video, he told viewers the phrase “quiet quitting” meant that you were not “subscribing to the hustle-culture mentality that work has to be your life” and that “your worth as a person is not defined by your labor.”

Some media outlets like Fox News Business have called quiet quitting a terrible trend of workers doing less work. And billionaire investor and Shark Tank star Kevin O’Leary said workers who are quietly quitting are “losers.”

But quiet quitting doesn’t actually mean workers are doing the bare minimum or exploiting their employers for a paycheck. Instead, the opposite is true. Workers are reacting to years of feeling overworked, exploited, and mistreated by their bosses and companies. As a result, they are pushing back by doing their work and not doing extra work for their employers — unless they are fairly compensated.

@jareenimam Boss asks whether you’re quiet quitting @Jareen Imam #quietquitting #managingup #workculturematters #workplaceboundaries #betterjobs #WorldPrincessWeek #greenscreen ♬ Quirky - Oleg Kirilkov

I think one of the tragedies of the phrase quiet quitting is that it paints workers in a negative light. And because the name is a misnomer, there’s room for managers to make false assumptions about workers at a critical point in workplace culture, especially as some workers try to maintain their flexibility of working remotely. Additionally, the phrase helps perpetuate distrust between workers and bosses at a time when some companies are introducing productivity scores and surveillance tracking in order to monitor every minute of work their employees do.

I think the idea of quiet quitting, which is also similar to coasting, has resonated with so many people online, especially Millennial and Gen Z workers because many American workers are feeling tired, burned out, or mistreated by their employers. In fact, workers’ faith in whether their employers care about their well-being has dropped significantly since the pandemic. Only 24% of Americans believe their managers had their best interests in mind, according to a Gallup post released in March 2022.

When I was working as a media executive before and during the first year and a half of the pandemic, I put so much energy into my company and my career that I felt like I had sacrificed my physical and mental health. Even before the pandemic, I regularly came to work early and stayed late because that was the expectation my bosses had for me. I worked weekends and holidays and logged in at odd hours when there was breaking news because that’s what my bosses said I needed to do, and I did this with no additional compensation. I gave so much of my time to news companies and bosses who demanded I put journalism ahead of my life needs. And I did just that. In turn, I missed family gatherings, canceled holiday trips, soured my relationships with my friends and family, and ruined my health.

In the end, all I had was a job that made me feel lonely, stressed, anxious, and unhappy. I thought that all my sacrifices, especially during the pandemic, leading a global team to be more productive, innovative, and enterprising than ever before would help me get the recognition and promotion I thought I deserved. Instead, the opposite happened — I was ignored and left mentally and emotionally hurt by my superiors and my team. What happened to me, happens to a lot of American workers. We’re dangled a carrot by our employers, and in order to get it, we have to sacrifice so much of ourselves for the company. But we rarely get the carrot. 

@jareenimam Replying to @Engineered Sarcasm what does acting your wage mean? @Jareen Imam #workculturematters #workboundaries #quietquitting #betterjobs #AEJeansSoundOn #healthyworkplace #greenscreen ♬ Blue Blood - Heinz Kiessling & Various Artists

That sort of workplace stress is not sustainable, and it has left many American workers feeling disillusioned. That’s why there’s a growing number of workers who say they don’t see the logic in going above and beyond for an employer, especially when there is no guarantee of a payoff.

Ultimately, it’s easy to dismiss quiet quitting or coasting as employees being selfish or doing the bare minimum. But instead, I think this is an opportunity for workplaces to do better in more authentic ways, such as increasing pay, giving more vacation time and overtime, and creating policies that set better work and life boundaries.

Quiet quitting is a reaction to the years of abuse and exploitation that American workplaces have inflicted on their employees. Nowadays, employees don’t feel as enthusiastic about sacrificing their life for a company because it feels pointless, and oftentimes, it is. And that’s because they’ve either seen examples or have experienced themselves being passed up for promotions, raises, and recognition, despite their contributions to the company.

Elon Musk says that the world has a population problem and that if we don’t give birth to more people, we won’t have enough workers to work. But with how dispassionate people are feeling about their workplaces, especially as they see companies make record profits while their salaries are stagnant, I think we’re going to see more worker attrition. 

There are more ways to earn money online. It’s easier to start a business than ever before. Nowadays, people are more interested in hustling for themselves, and not for their employers.

If companies don’t start making real changes that respect workers’ time and personal lives, they will see the talent pool shrink.

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