By Rich Bond
Ever since the “quiet quitting” meme went viral on TikTok, the media have glommed onto the topic with articles in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Yahoo! Finance, CNN, NPR, Detroit Free Press, and more. There is no actual agreement on what quiet quitting really is. Most articles talk about workers who show up at work to collect a paycheck but have basically checked out mentally and emotionally. These employees just do their jobs and refuse to demonstrate any desire to take initiative or go “above and beyond” their basic position description. They say the hustle mentality is unsustainable.
I don’t know why this phenomenon seems to be “new.” It’s not.
In my opinion, most people say they have X years of experience. But in reality, they have a year of experience X times. In other words, they have partially quit.
Companies are somewhat responsible for this situation, as many do a poor job of reviewing employee performance or rewarding contributions.
If you own or run a company, you know you can’t afford to quietly quit, or you will be out of business quickly. But what are you doing to ensure that you hire people with X years of genuine experience, where the candidate can demonstrate that they have made quantified accomplishments? People like that are gems and much more likely to contribute to your bottom line.
