By Umaimah Mendhro, founder & president of One League and VIDA, both California-based public benefit corporations.
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“‘Quiet Quitters’ make up at least 50% of the U.S. workforce—probably more,” found Gallup in September 2022. “The overall decline [in worker engagement] was especially related to clarity of expectations, opportunities to learn and grow, feeling cared about, and a connection to the organization’s mission or purpose—signaling a growing disconnect between employees and their employers.”
Despite companies’ increasing consciousness and desire to attract and motivate the best talent, employees today are feeling more and more disenfranchised. Today, more than ever before, while companies speak of “changing the world” for the good, employees are feeling uninspired and disconnected. Why?
The Covid lockdown offered workers a moment to reassess many of the truisms of work (e.g., does productivity depend on working in an office?) as well as what they had been missing out on (spending time with family, in nature, pursuing a passion or focusing on personal well-being). Many realized that life is more than toiling away at the office desk. In a 2021 Harvard Business Review article, reporting on the Great Resignation, the authors note that 36% of Americans would leave their job and search for an alternative if not given a hybrid or remote option.
The disconnect between employees and employers must also be aggravated by the growing disparity between CEO and worker salaries. According to the AFL-CIO and its annual Executive Paywatch report, a comprehensive database tracking CEO-to-worker pay ratios for over 20 years, S&P 500 CEOs averaged $18.3 million in compensation for 2021—324x the median worker’s pay. With this enormous discrepancy already in place, S&P noted that CEO salaries increased by nearly 20% compared to 2020, while workers’ real wages fell 2.4%.
The explanation that CEOs are creating jobs and opportunities for others below them, in light of the hugely disproportionate take-home incomes, hardly gives the feeling of a rising tide lifting all boats. Although they may work for the same company, workers and upper management often belong to completely different worlds. (Thanks to Mark Rennella, editor at Harvard Business Publishing, for the insight).
For many executives, the goal is growth and advancement. For those who have successfully climbed the ladder, it’s difficult to separate personal worth from professional success, and professional success from their company’s performance and growth. Thus self-identification and self-worth get tied up in growing one’s net worth.
For many down the company ranks, the goal, and reality, is mere survival. According to a September 2022 study by LendingClub, three in five Americans live paycheck to paycheck. In fact, “the share of consumers living paycheck to paycheck has trended upward over time … and the rise has been strongest across high-income consumers,” noted the study. That is, it’s not just those with lower incomes who are struggling—more than half of Americans earning between $100,000 to $150,000 also live paycheck to paycheck.
Now if we think back to the 50% of employees who are quietly quitting, if the paycheck received only gets one by, and no more, then employees may believe it’s only fair to “act their wage”—i.e., do the bare minimum to keep their job—and no more.
Additionally, it’s not unreasonable to presume that quiet quitting may create a reduction in productivity and output. According to a study by the Peterson Institute for International Economics and Harvard Kennedy School, the United States observed a record productivity slump in the first half of 2022. The authors state, “although productivity growth is very volatile and poorly measured at high frequencies, these declines are larger than the largest two-quarter declines since the data began to be collected in 1947—with the official estimate nearly twice as large as the largest previous decline.”
So in this moment in history, when the mega-rich are getting mega-richer, the middle class is merely surviving paycheck to paycheck, productivity may be at an all-time low and half of our workforce is disenfranchised and disconnected, we must ask ourselves, is unfettered growth really helping our companies succeed over the long run?
If we were to effectively lose 50% of our workforce because they simply won’t and can’t get on board with growing the company coffers, is growth for growth’s sake even beneficial for growth itself? Or will it all unravel one day in the midst of the growing schisms, the burgeoning inequities and the ever-proliferating cynicism and disconnect?
And can we do anything about it all?
Gallup tells us that to address quiet quitting, we must first address manager engagement—only 1 in 3 managers are engaged—and that the best “habit to develop for successful managers is having one meaningful conversation per week with each team member.”
The Harvard Business Review study quoted above gives this advice in addressing the Great Resignation: “Companies best able to attract and retain talent will be those offering benefits that address the changing needs of workers… [C]ompanies that demonstrate a commitment to improving their employees’ long-term career prospects will garner greater loyalty and gain in stature with prospective employees.”
What I see in all this is a need to go back to the basics—the need to care and connect with our fellow team members at a human level. Lift the blinders of self-aggrandizement, of lofty goals of “changing the world” without a firm foundation, of false yet convenient beliefs that our success leads to everyone’s success. We should all take a closer look at our own compensation in comparison to our teams’. Advocate for those with great potential and promise and minimal power and privilege.
What I see is the need to check in on our own fear of failure and our own definitions of success. We should question why we’re doing what we’re doing and the true impact of our actions. As unpleasant and inconvenient as it may be, I see in all this the need to face the truth and do something about the wrongs that eventually hurt our companies and, in turn, our societies and ourselves.