It’s become one of the biggest buzzwords to hit the business world in years. But besides an epidemic that Gallup suggests is affecting at least 50% of the US workforce, what is quiet quitting?
As work-life balance becomes more “work” than “life” and employees feel undervalued and underpaid, they’re mentally checking out from their jobs and quietly scaling back their efforts by doing just enough to get by without being fired. The bad news is that this trend is costing employers millions of dollars per year. The good news is that it’s mostly an engagement issue that can be remedied with the right leadership. Read on to learn how to identify quiet quitting and five ways to re-engage your workforce and keep quiet quitting to a minimum.
Before you read on, you might be interested this article outlining five initiatives to improve employee engagement – and this one about the benefits of increasing transparency in the workplace. Both of these can help in your efforts to increase employee engagement and stop quiet quitting.
3 Clues that an Employee is Quiet Quitting
Quiet quitting can be difficult to identify, but these three behaviors could be a clue that an employee has checked out.
1. Lack of enthusiasm and performance
Employees are only human and it’s normal for enthusiasm and performance to wax and wane based on their stress levels and what’s going on in their personal lives. However, a consistent lack of enthusiasm and productivity almost certainly indicates trouble. Look out for employees who are missing deadlines or not completing their assigned tasks, who never speak up or ask questions, or who seem completely disinterested in contributing to department or company goals. In extreme cases, formerly high-performing employees may do an about-face and deliver markedly less than in the past.
2. Poor teamwork and distancing themselves from other employees
Because quiet quitters only do the bare minimum, they aren’t good team players. This can manifest in poor collaboration or an unwillingness to take initiative or pull their weight on team initiatives. These employees might also distance themselves from colleagues and make little effort to build or maintain relationships with their teammates out of disinterest or fear of being “found out.”
3. Low engagement during meetings
At its core, quiet quitting is a lack of engagement. This can come across in meetings by the quiet quitter not listening or contributing to the discussion, showing up late to meetings – or even not showing up at all.
5 Ways to Stop Quiet Quitting in Its Tracks
While the proliferation of quiet quitting could make it seem like a runaway train, there are some tactics managers can use to reengage their employees and get everyone back to firing on all cylinders. Here are five things you can do to help reverse this trend.
1. Offer a competitive salary and flexibility
Let’s start with the most obvious solution. Many people quiet quit after they’ve decided to look for another job, and one of the chief reasons people decide to look for a new job is that they don’t feel that they’re being fairly compensated. It really comes down to respect. If an employer consistently promises a raise but never delivers or increases expectations and responsibilities over time without a corresponding pay increase, employees will eventually feel disrespected and that their efforts aren’t appreciated. Especially in the current economy, employers need to step up and pay a competitive wage that reflects the current labor market and living standards as well as each employee’s effort and results.
The rise of remote work during the recent lockdowns has given employees a taste of what work/life balance could (and should) look like – and they’re eager to hold onto that. Allowing remote or hybrid work with flexible hours is an excellent and low-cost way to improve work/life balance for employees while demonstrating that you trust them, care about their well-being, and value them as people. Not everyone’s internal clock aligns with the standard “9 to 5” – and a 2021 survey revealed that flexible working hours were the main driver of increased productivity while 64% of respondents said they were more likely to consider a job that allowed for flexible working hours vs. one that didn’t.
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2. Provide coaching and professional development opportunities
1:1 coaching sessions are an ideal way to build loyalty, increase motivation and accountability, and understand each employee’s wants and needs. Coaching opens the lines of communication and helps employees feel appreciated without feeling micromanaged. It also gives managers a better understanding of each employee’s strengths, weaknesses, motivation factors, and career goals.
This understanding makes it easier to use the right tools to coach each individual’s best performance and support their career development by giving them the right opportunities to grow, assume more responsibility, and take on more challenging tasks. Employees who feel valued and supported are more likely to remain loyal to their company, manager, and team – and are less likely to quiet quit.
Company-paid professional development opportunities are an excellent complement to ongoing coaching. This investment can build employees’ skills while demonstrating that the company wants them to excel and cares about keeping them on. Offering training opportunities with transferable skills that could be used in a higher position demonstrates a vested interest in each employee’s career progression and a significant investment in their future with the company.
3. Create clear career paths and promote from within
All of the coaching and training in the world is worth nothing if employees can’t see a clear benefit. Empty gestures benefit no one, but companies that create clear career paths and combine them with a “promote from within” policy give their employees something to work toward. Combining a solid coaching program and training opportunities with clear advancement potential is a winning combination for motivating employees in their daily work while discouraging quiet quitting. After all, where’s the motivation for someone to give their all year after year if they’re constantly passed over for promotions while watching the best jobs go to external hires?
4. Introduce gamification
According to research, adding gamification elements to the workplace can increase employee happiness by 89% – and 69% of employees say that they’d stay with their employer for more than three years if the company used gamification in its operations! Gamification appeals to employees’ needs for achievement, recognition, and rewards while adding an element of fun that creates an engaging, cooperative, supportive, and solution-oriented culture.
Check out this article to learn why gamification works and get six ideas to help you implement it in your daily operations.
5. Ask your employees "what's up?"
Sometimes the simplest approach is the best approach. If you want to know what your employees are thinking and feeling, why not go straight to the horse’s mouth and ask them as a group? Order in lunch and have an informal conversation about things like what they like and don’t like about their workplace, what they need in order to be successful, how they’d like to be recognized, and what benefits would make a difference to them.
People often feel safer sharing in a group setting instead of in a 1:1 meeting. Write questions on a board and give everyone time to write their responses on sticky notes, then group their responses under each question and use that as the basis of your discussion. This method preserves employees’ anonymity to some degree while providing the “safety in numbers” that can lead to an honest and productive discussion.
Plecto Can Help Stop Quiet Quitting
Plecto’s real-time KPI dashboards are an excellent foundation for 1:1 coaching sessions and for giving employees concrete goals to work toward while tracking their progress in a motivating and visual way. Plecto also provides built-in gamification features as well as leaderboards, instant notifications, points, and badges to help keep employees engaged and motivated in their daily work – even when they’re working remotely!
Sign up for a free 14-day trial and see how Plecto can help you motivate your employees and stop quiet quitting.
