Quiet Quitting: A New Term for an Old Response and What Managers Can Do About It
There is a new term being used in the workplace: quiet quitting. However, “quiet quitting” is a behavior that has existed since employment began. While a spectrum of behaviors can be labeled quiet quitting, such as those relating to motivation or unconscious actions due to burn-out, quiet quitting often refers to the employee’s doing the minimum necessary and frequently at the lowest acceptable level to avoid being fired. Original terms included slacking, social loafing, mailing it in, or phoning it in (Grant, 2022).
Economist Albert Hirschman argued in his book Exit, Voice, and Loyalty: Responses to Decline in Firms, Organizations, and States, that there are two responses to dissatisfaction: One exits or gives voice. That is, a person either leaves the system or stays and advocates for positive change from within the system. The choice is predicated upon loyalty. However, Hirschman did not see the third alternative: neglect.
Neglect occurs when a person cannot afford to walk away and also cannot risk speaking up. Neglect is the 1984 term for quiet quitting (Grant, 2022). Neglect happens when people feel dissatisfied and lack a sense of control, voice, or any hope that things will get better. Neglect often occurs after managers break trust with their employees, and they or the organization violates written expectations and social mores about how employees should be treated.
If employees are quiet quitting, the managers most likely are part of the problem. Employees, with few exceptions, come to work to do a good job and contribute to their organization; they are not there to perform poorly. However, when employees have abusive bosses, meaningless tasks, or performance systems that do not reward excellence, they become disengaged and stop caring.
Managers can reverse quiet quitting with no-cost remedies that include:
- Promoting work-life balance
- Providing for and acting on employee feedback on an ongoing basis
- Offering employees a voice in defining their job roles, tasks, and duties
- Creating a culture of learning
- Building a culture of trust and safety
- Focusing on developing a good manager and employee relationship
- Respecting diversity and embedding good practices into the workplace culture
- Respecting boundaries and being open to reevaluating expectations
- Providing employees support for mental health and self-care (Span)
People are willing to go the extra mile with respectful interaction, meaningful work, and generous pay and benefits packages. Managers need to pave the way to make that mile a smooth journey.
References
Grant, A. (2022). The Psychology of Quiet Quitting. Adam Grant Thinks Again.
Hirschman, A. (1970). Exit, Voice, and Loyalty: Responses to Decline in Firms, Organizations, and States. Harvard University Press.
Span, S. (2020). Quiet Quitting – it’s not that they’re lazy, they’re just over your sh#t! Tolero Solutions. https://tolerosolutions.com/quiet-quitting-its-not-that-theyre-lazy-theyre-just-over-your-sht/