The answer: both.
Have you ever realized your extra efforts weren’t paying off, so you stopped going above and beyond? If so, you’ve already experienced quiet quitting.
Quiet quitting is not new; it has just been given an attention-attracting name and has been getting increasing attention, especially on TikTok. This is not surprising with the higher number of employees who are disengaged in their work. Multiple recent studies show that globally only one-third of employees feel engaged at work. That means that 67% of employees are disengaged!
A disengaged workforce has serious consequences. Disengaged employees are more likely to be absent and have decreased productivity, lower job satisfaction, and increased turnover intentions.
I’ve read multiple articles talking about the increase in quiet quitting and how it is a way for employees to take back control of their life and find balance. I don’t disagree with this idea, but most of the articles stop there and don’t go on to talk about what this means for managers and leaders.
Quiet Quitting for Balance
Quiet quitting is when an employee intentionally reduces their productivity at work. This is different from presenteeism, where injury or illness is the cause for being present but not as productive. With quite quitting, an employee (for any number of reasons) feels like the ROI on their efforts is out of balance. In other words, they may have been going above and beyond, and it isn’t getting them anything, often including recognition.
I will admit that there were times in my career when I quiet quit.
My internal motivation wasn’t enough to keep me engaged and going above and beyond when the only result of my efforts was even higher performance expectations. Early in my career, I watched as lower performers received the same raise and were promoted alongside me. It was demoralizing and made it harder to see why I should continue to put in so much effort, so I stopped doing things at a high level and started doing the bare minimum.
This gave me some relief and prevented me from burning out for a time. It also provided me the time I needed to figure out what I wanted and needed at work. Luckily, while contemplating my future, things changed at the office, and I could return to my previous high performance with proper recognition and better balance.
When employees face a toxic (or unsupportive) workplace culture, they may feel that the only way to survive is to quiet quit.
Quiet Quitting is a Leadership Red Flag
Society places an unhealthy premium on productivity and overachieving in the workplace. Leaders who buy into this can come to set “above and beyond” as the bar for standard performance (even unconsciously). This is unhealthy and damaging to your company’s productivity and staff retention efforts in the long term.
Studies have shown that employees who feel valued and have a sense of belonging are up to 6X more likely to be engaged in their work. When employees are engaged, they have higher productivity, increased organizational commitment, and experience elevated job satisfaction. This means they are less likely to adopt quiet quitting behaviors.
When productivity is falling, whether in an individual or across the department/company, it means that managers and leaders need to start listening more and working on collaborative solutions.
How to Prevent Quiet Quitting
Many employees who quiet quit are doing so because they are burned out and feel unsupported to have life-work balance. The current job market and shortage of workers in many companies are leading to longer hours and more work for many employees. It’s exacerbated in companies with a burnout culture (e.g., overly high expectations for productivity without proper resources and support). This can be difficult to change, so what can you do to prevent employees from feeling like they need to quiet quit?
Here are four things you can do as a leader to help your employees maintain engagement.
Shift Your Leadership Mindset
When your leadership mindset revolves around creating profits, you are likely to miss the human element of working. Decades of research have shown that putting people first leads to higher profits. Happy employees make happy customers, and happy customers are loyal customers. That’s a bit of an oversimplification of multiple complex topics, but you get the idea.
People-centric leadership is what is needed in the workplace to keep employees from quiet quitting (and actual quitting). Remember, employees who feel valued and and have a sense of belonging are more likely to maintain their productivity.
Encourage and Model Life-Work Balance
It’s critical to lead by example. Many employees only feel safe creating life-work balance if they see their leaders modeling that behavior, and creating balance is how you avoid burnout, one of the causes of quiet quitting.
This can be easier said than done, but a good start is not to eat lunch at your desk while working. It can be very tempting with so much on your plate (pun intended) to not take a break for lunch. I was guilty of this for many years, even while telling employees they needed to leave their desks for lunch. When I started modeling the behavior, more staff started doing the same.
Develop Your Awareness
There are three types of awareness that leaders need to develop to be successful, self-awareness, others awareness, and organizational awareness. Developing any of these can help you identify and prevent quiet quitting, but without developing your self-awareness, you limit your ability to create the other types.
You also understand how your behaviors impact others when you become more self-aware. Self-aware leaders are more likely to communicate better with and support others. When you know yourself, you are less likely to unintentionally demotivate your employees because you are more conscious of your words and actions.
Connect Employees to the Big Picture
Many people want to feel like they are making a meaningful contribution to something bigger than themselves. Still, countless companies don’t take the step of connecting employees’ performance goals to the larger picture of the company’s strategic plan. When leaders show employees how their goals roll up to support larger initiatives, it provides motivation to stay engaged. It also shows employees that their goals were thoughtfully considered.
Making the connection for them is just the starting point. Once you have set up the goals, ensure that you regularly report to the employees on how their efforts are making an impact. A once-a-year performance review or general report at a company meeting isn’t enough to help employees feel valued; they need to hear it directly as results are produced. Celebrating little wins keeps the motivation going.
If you suspect you have quiet quitting happening in your company or your engagement surveys ratings are falling, it’s critical to center the voices of your staff if you want to find a solution. Listen to them and believe what they tell you, even if it isn’t your experience at work. Work collaboratively with them to establish an environment where people can thrive.
When you take a people-centric approach, everybody wins.
