"Hustle culture" is all about making the most of any opportunity to get ahead, but at what cost?
Exhausted by the go-getter mentality, some employees have decided doing the bare minimum is more than enough to get the job done. This idea of "quiet quitting" is gaining momentum.
"It's all part of the great resignation trend and people wanting more work/life balance," BusinessDesk NZ's Frances Cook told The Project. "It's about reinstating boundaries and saying, 'I'll turn up and do a great job for you, but when I'm out of work that's my time'."
"Quiet quitting" is making headlines worldwide as overworked staff cut the extra duties and do just what their job requires. In a new survey out of the US, 21 percent of workers admitted they are "quiet quitters".
However, professor of human resource management Jarrod Haar said that designation doesn't mean you don't do the job you got hired to do.
"If someone is just rolling into work and eating their lunch, then that's actually a performance management issue and HR needs to be called in," Haar told The Project Thursday Night. "The important thing here is that workers are still doing their day job. What they're quitting is the unpaid work, the hustle and bustle of trying to do all the extra stuff, which most workers do after hours or on the weekend."
Harr believes some of the problems started during the pandemic. So many people were working at home on their devices that when they went back to the office, that work-at-home culture continued. Now, they're feeling the strain and pushing back.
"They're probably just really tired and exhausted and starting to burn out," Haar told The Project. "This quiet quitting is making the rest of the year more manageable."
From another perspective, the trend may be a wake-up call to businesses, but Haar said that shouldn't worry employers.
"It's just workers recharging their batteries. It'll be something that'll pick up again in the future."
