Thoughts on QUIET QUITTING

Having observed humanity, I'm not even remotely surprised that people do this, that it's becoming more common, or that a term has sprung up to describe (and well nigh justify) it.

In case you hadn't known my age or level of nerdiness, I use terms like "well nigh" in casual conversation. > 50 (partial lie: yup, > 50, but I'd say that at 15, too).

Still, I don't get it. If you're Oskar Schindler or (as he tried to paint the picture) Werner Heisenberg, then sure: Drag your feet so that nothing gets done. But if there's nothing morally reprehensible about your work, you'll express your discontent with your departure. Keep putting in the time and effort (even if it lags a bit ... and especially if instead of simply slacking you're less focused because of time spent job hunting), then when the opportunity presents itself make your way to greener pastures.

But JFC, ... golden rule. If you're unhappy with your job, you'd probably prefer having enough money and a secure enough position to be able to hire others. ... Oh, wait: You'd want to hire people to act as tools and defraud you?

Some tenured profs who are no longer research active still only teach one course per semester, and avoid their service duties. Since they've taught their course many times, there is no prep time. They can effectively work 4-5 hours per week at huge salary. Admin loves to try to crack down on it, but without too much success.

Not how it works at these jobs. Most retail/food jobs do not offer the opportunity to move up. Maybe to something like “shift lead” where your responsibilities double but hey, now you make 11 an hour instead of 10. My first job payed $7.25 an hour, we were constantly called in when we weren’t scheduled to work, and the pay raise rate was $0.50 every 9 months, independent of performance.

Ive found much more success in jobs where your pay is directly influenced by performance. I’ve made 30k in one summer doing significantly less work than I ever had to do in my $7-$12 an hour jobs.

I’ll say it again, giving your 100% effort at a job that won’t reward you for it is just you being taken advantage of. It’s those taking advantage of you that are pushing the narrative that it’s “tough” and “shows good work ethic”. I’d personally rather put my toughness and work ethic into the things that will actually impact my life by doing so.

Bust your balls at tasks you hate and be stressed and tired all the time? Or just get through the day, doing more interesting stuff when you aren't busy? To me the choice is obvious. If I don't move up when its time for a new manager or whatever and nothing is tying me down, I'll just move on to somewhere I'll use my skills and education to get paid more.

The giving incentives thing is an interesting idea. It works when the incentives are worth it. My employer tries this, but the incentives are usually bust your butt for a whole year and you get a bonus worth less than working a weekend of overtime. I'd rather relax and just give up one weekend and come out slightly ahead.

In places that could give incentives to everyone or most, they are often so easy to obtain, that people who phone them in will still get them. In places where only a few can get them, they are usually so few that only the gunner go getters will get them and most will see it as not worth the effort and not try harder. In the latter case, getting one is often being in the right place at the right time.

I have a job that is often like that. I prefer it to a job where I'm always busy. The latter type seems to be stressful - no matter how hard you work and much you do, there is always more. The former is a tiny bit rewarding - you finished your work, now your reward is browsing reddit for the next 5 hours because you have to be here 8 to get your pay. If you can never finish the work or at best, only at the last minute, why even bother working harder or faster at it.

I once worked as a substitute teacher. If you asked if you could help more when the teacher you subbed for had a planning period, the school put you to filing. If you sat in the classroom and read a book, you got paid just the same. There was no performance evaluation, contract, person watching either way. This early 20s experience taught me a lot about effort at work.

Quiet Quitting is just lack of ambition and laziness rebranded. 60% of my employees suffer from this affliction. They do the bare minimum. They aren't fooling anyone in management and will be the first to go if there is a slowdown.

Interesting, my first job paid a quarter over minimum wage. The amount of ball busting they expected for a quarter an hour raise was more than any job I've had since, including presently where I make over 5x as much. The people who worked in that position for long times were those who goofed around in school and failed to get an education while also not having any skill set. The place never got more than barely competent employees because it was a revolving door of people at their first job, kids home from college, etc. This was a job I worked part time during my senior year of high school because I needed spending money for college (weird situation where tuition and room & board were paid for but I wouldn't have a red cent for anything else). By the time I left after a few months, other than the managers, I only recognized one person who was there when I started.

Of course we have quiet quitting. thats what unions are for

-No we will not teach through the pandemic even though the risks are minimal to our age groups. We refuse to show up to work and will strong arm the government to shut down schools because we dont want to go ABOVE AND BEYOND our duty.

every public education teachers union in this country has been quiet quitting for decades. teachers on tenure that cant be fired, teachers striking over issues...very few have any sense of going above whats asked of them (only whats spelled out in their union contracts).

Just a new name for something that has always existed. It is the new thing to write a story about because someone started a trend on social media talking about it. In any given company 20% of workers do 80% of the work. Good companies know this and compensate accordingly. Bad companies don’t and slowly lose top performers until they go out of business.

57. I'm retired now but throughout my career at a well known trucking/logistics company my motto was "If the minimum wasn't good enough it wouldn't be the minimum". It served me well.

Considering the percentage of value siphoned from gross earnings by executives and shareholders, those executives are all damned lucky that they can find wage slaves to exploit at all, as opposed to workers who would demand fair wages, a seat at the table and full benefits.

Low wages that have stagnated since the 1970s, meager benefits, no pensions, the knowledge that tomorrow the company might just drag you to the door and drop you to the curb, increasing 'gig' and 'contract' work, endless stories in the trade rags about corporations finding ways to 'cut labor' to save a buck, I could go on.

The US economy as a whole treats people as problems to be dealt with, and treats workers as if they are reviled, instead of them being the most important focus, the entire point of society in the first place. No wonder workers endeavor to find ways to stick it to not only 'the man' but to society as a whole.

The oligarchic US economy doesn't deserve motivated, high quality labor when it treats that labor with contempt.

Or phoning it in.

But this quiet quitting goes both ways.
Sometimes employers give up on employees and stop trying with them. Stop motivating them. Don’t best utilize their strengths. Give minimal or no raises.
They hope the employee will quit, because it’s easier when they quit than it is to fire them.

You get these apathetic working relationships where the employee isn’t trying and the employer doesn’t care.

This has been and continues to be crystal clear to Gen Xers since the 80s.

That's exactly the point. There is more to life than work.

Retired person here.

It is interesting how the definition of Quiet Quitting quickly changed from being a hard working employee who finally decides that enough is enough and decided to give just a solid days work for a solid days pay, to: slackers, time wasters, retired on the job, unambitious etc.

It's as if the initial concept was too difficult to face, hard working employees who are burnt out. Making it slackers etc. makes it far easier to blame the victim.

I can give you an example of a Quiet Quitter and the exact moment he decided he had had enough. This manager had a long and successful career with the company and had done all the usual 'beyond the call of duty' stuff: stayed late, worked weekends all without overtime pay, travelled at short notice, missed birthdays anniversaries, graduations etc. because of company work. He was highly respected and a mentor to many junior employees.

The breaking point came one Christmas. The company had promised a new pre-production prototype would be delivered to the customer by the end of the year. Christmas came and, as usual, the company was late. This guy was asked to work from Boxing Day to New Year to get the prototype out of the door. He worked with eight hourly employees working 15 or 16 hour days. The hourly guys (unionised) had a choice of how they were paid: triple overtime or double overtime plus time off in lieu. This guy was paid nothing - his time was considered to be 'donated time'.

They got the prototype onto the truck at about 11:00pm News Year Eve. He estimates that he was at the plant for about 100 hours those days plus he had put in about another 50 hours unpaid overtime in the weeks before Christmas pushing things along. The Vice-President decided his devotion merited a special award: The company gave him a $500 bonus - equivalent to just over $3 an hour.

From that point on he stopped working unpaid overtime, taking work home, etc. He was no longer available to travel at short notice. He still did an excellent job at work, only now it stopped at 5:00pm.

^ this basically encapsulates my feelings about the whole thing.

I work mostly with Boomers that have essentially given up on learning new technology, on top of a half ass work ethic to begin with.

and yes, before you assume I'm shifting the blame to worthless boomers (only a little bit) in particular or workers in general, I agree that this manufactured thing seems driven by employers' fear of a workforce that currently has the upper hand following COVID and working from home.

This is definitely the time to be asking for raises and maximizing what benefits you can. And for those of us who are showing up and getting the job done this whole 'quiet quitting' hubbub can actually work to our benefit.

Wait a minute. There is a MASSIVE distinction that needs to be made here. That distinction is A) doing honest, good work during normal/regular work hours vs. B) coming in early, staying late, working weekends, etc.

As a human, you should always do A no matter what. Do it right or don’t do it at all. That’s a matter of personal honor.

however…

B is a very different animal and depends on the situation. Generally speaking, you only do B unless you have decided for yourself (taking a hard, critical and realistic look) that it’s worth it to you. Sometimes yes, sometimes no. It depends on the situation.

That’s how I see it.