Quiet Quitting
You’ve probably heard the term ‘quiet quitting’.
It refers to when someone does what they have to in their role to be productive, but no more than that. They’re not openly causing trouble, nor are they necessarily looking to leave. But the enthusiasm is gone.
Gallup’s State of the Global Workplace 2023 Report shows that globally, most employees are quiet quitting. A huge 59% of people worldwide said they are not engaged at work.
What Does Quiet Quitting Mean?
- Feeling disconnected from their employer.
- More likely to be suffering from stress due to low engagement.
- At risk of burnout.
Here in the UK, it’s even worse. 72% of employees are quiet quitting but only 34% of employees are looking for a new job.
That’s a lot of disengaged people who are going to stay with you.
You can think of quiet quitting as an ‘attitude virus’. It can spread quickly with significant effects on other people’s performance, and produce a poor team culture. Worse, it can affect customer retention and business growth.
How to Tackle Disengagement in the Workplace
You obviously don’t want to point a finger at the quiet quitters. They’re doing their job role. So you can’t conflate this with underperformance, because it’s not.
Instead, you need to address the causes of quiet quitting by working out how to shape your culture so people are engaged and motivated again.
Of course, some things are out of your control as leaders:
- You can’t solve the cost of living crisis.
- You can’t enforce world peace.
- You can’t singlehandedly change an entire workplace culture overnight.
What you can do, though, as a senior leader, is focus on your influence, because leaders can solve many of the workplace issues that lead to quiet quitting.
Why Leaders are Important in the Campaign Against Quiet Quitting
Leaders have a ripple effect. What you say and do is magnified because of your position. You have visibility. So leaders with leadership skills are key.
- Do all your leaders have the skill to:
- Ensure employees understand what they need to do?
- Get buy-in on why each person and their role matter?
- Build strong relationships with and between team members?
- Offer both high support and high challenge to energise people?
- Give meaningful feedback?
- Offer recognition and praise?
- Coach and guide their team towards high performance?
If the answer to any of these is no, you’ve identified a leadership skills gap.
But instead of looking at this as a failure, your best route is to view it as a great opportunity to turn things around significantly in your business.
Leadership development is always a sound investment.
Why?
Because if you get more of your people engaged and ultra-productive, innovative, and committed, you’ll have happy staff in a healthy business culture – and this will probably increase revenue as well! A win-win.
But first, as a leader, you have to take a step back and not think that quiet quitting indicates lazy employees. On the other hand, it is a challenge of leadership and engagement, and needs addressing!
Keystone Can Help Re-energise Quiet Quitters
At Keystone, we work with organisations to equip leaders with the skills to re-energise their teams and turn disengagement into commitment. As your partner, we plan to meet your unique needs with bespoke, high-impact training that lasts.
So, if you’d like to explore how others are tackling this quiet-quitting challenge – or share what’s working in your context – we’d love to connect. Let’s talk.
📧 hello@keystonetrainingltd.co.uk
Esther Patrick is a Client Accounts Director at Keystone and a member of the Senior Leadership Team. An experienced consultant and management author, she has nearly 20 years’ experience leading client partnerships across sectors from construction to healthcare and designing leadership, culture, and team development programmes aligned with their strategic goals and values. Esther is passionate about creative, human-centred learning.
