The working world is said to have been hit by an epidemic of laziness. Burnt-out young people no longer want to lift a finger at their "extra" jobs
Quiet quitting, a phenomenon that is most often translated in Czech as "quiet resignation" (because it is not really quitting), is supposedly an alternative to complete resignation. And what does that mean in practical terms? One goes to work, but does only the bare essentials and refuses to do anything beyond one's basic job duties or to become more involved in any way. No overtime, no early arrivals to work, and no attendance at meetings and meetings that are not strictly mandatory. Actually, that doesn't sound very dramatic. After all, people do what they are supposed to do. But the truth is that a workforce that is engaged and can (and wants to) go the extra mile is a major competitive advantage for many companies. Not to mention the fact that many jobs are relatively vaguely defined by the employment contract and the employee is actually expected to adapt to the needs of the job. However, even this model has its "BUTs"
Work is not your life...
It is the slogan that "work is not our life" that is considered to be the origin of a certain "quiet quitter movement" that started to take more visible shape on the basis of a thematic post on TikTok. However, its roots are said to be more in China, where the (now censored) hashtag #tangping, which translates to "lie down on the ground", was long used to protest against the culture of overtime. In any case, quiet quitting is supposedly a reaction of younger generations in particular (namely Generation Z and X) to the current situation in the labour market - young people are tired of being in the labour market and feel that they are not recognised or rewarded for the extra hours they work. They therefore want to combat burnout and promote the concept of work-life balance. The question, however, is where exactly this mind-set leads.
According to workplace relations expert Pattie Ehsaei, while the strategy of performing only necessary work tasks may work for some, those who adopt this work mode will have to forget about success. "Quiet quitting means doing the bare essentials expected of you at work and settling for mediocrity. Promotions and pay rises are for those whose level of effort is going somewhere, not those who are doing the bare minimum," she summarised.
Are people really "lemming lazy"?
The fact that people don't want to work beyond the call of duty may seem like a problem, of course. However, it is also a problem that the younger generations of workers in particular simply have different priorities in life, which cannot quite be blamed on them. What is most problematic, however, is the fact that one of the primary bases for those who believe that people are massively losing interest in work is a study in which American workers are surveyed annually about how committed they are to their jobs.
The truth is that between 2010 and 2020, by contrast, employee work engagement has been steadily increasing - and while it's down slightly in 2022, it's still higher than in any year between 2000 and 2014. So what is now being called quiet quitting is actually a term for an otherwise familiar fact until recently referred to as "I have a job". Thus, the decline in work productivity in 2022 is more likely to be attributable to a pandemic (as a result of which a number of people have lost or had to change jobs, and so it is not surprising that their productivity and enthusiasm in new and unfamiliar jobs has declined) than to a sudden epidemic of laziness.
And what does this imply? It seems that the whole "quiet quitting" thing is simply a trend like any other, an attempt to give a trendy label to something that has long existed, while providing a new clear label. And this will suit senior managers more than anyone else, as it will provide them with a very easy explanation of why their teams are not working. After all, it is easier to blame the situation on lazy employees than to try to think that the fault might lie in the effectiveness of the team leadership or the labour market setup as a whole.
