“Quiet-Quitting” and the Age Divide

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First, it was the Great Resignation. Prompted by the sudden jolt of pandemic lockdowns, remote work, and social isolation, a tidal wave of workers quit their jobs. Nearly 72 million resigned from April 2021 through April 2022, that’s almost 4 million every month.         

Then it was the Great Reshuffling. Not everyone left the job market. Many were just ‘reshuffling’ – moving from one job to a better one. In July, there were 2 jobs available per job seeker. Though many workers were resigning, they did so to pursue more lucrative positions.

Quiet Quitting

Now, it’s Quiet-Quitting. As millions resigned and changed jobs, unprepared companies pushed additional responsibilities onto employees. This created longer workdays and tensions between workers and managers. Workers responded by dropping some of the tasks they thought were beyond the job description. They limited their workloads and did the bare minimum.   

To be clear, quiet quitters still do their jobs. However, they do not endorse the ‘work is life’ refrain and summarily reject the hustle culture of going above and beyond at work.

Failure of leadership

While quiet-quitting is often considered a way to avoid occupational burnout and attend to mental health and personal well-being, the phenomenon implicates poor leadership as well. 

In a recent report, Gallup discovered that 2/3 of managers were not engaged at work. Managers in fact experienced the sharpest drop in work engagement since the pandemic began. 

It’s therefore imperative that senior leaders act quickly. Managers need re-education about the post-pandemic workplace. They need the proper tools to succeed in the new environment. Then they can reach out to workers, improve their experiences, help establish suitable habits, and gather feedback to remedy growing concerns.

Younger employees

Gallup also found a significant deterioration in engagement among Gen Z and younger Millennials. During COVID, younger employees felt the most isolated. They felt disregarded by managers and perceived very limited career opportunities. As a result, young workers dropped more than 10 points in the share that strongly agreed that someone cared about them, someone encouraged their development, and that they had opportunities to grow and learn. The drop was even more pronounced among fully remote and hybrid young workers.   

Younger workers, more than any other age group, bore the negative consequences of pandemic lockdowns. Older employees, after years of daily, in-person, work had already been socialized to company culture. They were comfortable in their positions and better equipped to navigate workplace disruptions. 

By contrast, younger employees were unable to draw on years of in-person workplace learning. Those hired just before or during the pandemic missed out entirely on important socialization opportunities. Instead, new hires sat at home, isolated, piecing together sporadic emails about job expectations and corporate culture. In short, the absence of lengthy in-person workplace experiences can help explain young workers’ attraction to quiet-quitting. 

Nothing new

A significant portion of the workforce has always felt overwhelmed, fed up, and stressed out. Many withdraw, clocking in and out while getting the bare minimum accomplished. They prioritize other aspects of their lives but do not resign. They coast. 

Quiet quitting is nothing new.    

What is new is widespread, open discussion of the phenomenon – especially among younger generations. Perhaps this represents a broader shift in how young people approach their careers – rejecting long workdays and extra duties perceived as exceeding the job description. Given the dreadful economic and political realities faced by younger workers – a pandemic, deep political divisions, rising inflation, falling real wages, and unaffordable housing – sympathy may be the best response. 

Nevertheless, the buzz around quiet-quitting feels more like a brief pause – a short detour along a much longer career path. The extraordinary demand for labor will not continue. As demand fades, the leverage employees now enjoy… will disappear. The hard-working, dedicated employees – the hustlers – will have the edge.  Going above and beyond at work is how people get ahead. That’s never changed.

It’s therefore not a good idea to brag about quiet-quitting or post about quitting exploits on social media. Why sabotage a long-term career? Expect quiet-quitting to disappear from the headlines as quickly as it appeared.   

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