‘Laptop class’ in Finance, Technology & Professional Services lead the trend for ‘quiet quitting’.

Interesting to read the latest LSE research which provides some more robust data to support the headline ‘noise’ around the ‘quiet quitting’ phenomenon.

The UK labour market has been hit by widespread “quiet quitting” among younger employees looking for a better work/life balance after the pandemic.

Younger employees are now working up to seven days fewer a year as they scale back to delivering on the minimum terms of their employment contracts, according to research by the 英国伦敦政治经济学院

The UK labour market lost more than 55 million hours of work last year to the quiet quitting trend and almost half of these were accounted for by millennials.

Younger, degree-educated workers belonging to the 'laptop class', who enjoy the ability to work from home, are leading the ‘quiet quitting’ trend, researchers found, suggesting that remote-working is enabling it.

Researchers say this could possibly be problematic for UK economic growth because unpaid overtime has been a key contributor to business productivity since the 2008 global financial crisis.?Equally, they recognise the potential for employees being better able to focus away from the unproductive distractions of office life.

While ‘quiet quitting’ trends were generally consistent across industries, there was stronger evidence for it in finance, technology and professional services – with men more likely to ‘quiet quit’ than women.

This is the first study to show evidence of the ‘quiet quitting’ phenomenon in the UK and complements similar findings from the National Bureau of Economic Research in the US, although the decline in hours worked in the UK is even more notable - exceeding declines in the US by more than 50%.

This chimes with PeopleScout’s research amongst younger workers which highlights that work is an element of who they are but, unlike previous generations, not the defining factor. Younger professional workers are placing greater priority on leisure, work-life balance, and wellbeing than previous generations – which employers need to accept and work with as they frame their employee value proposition (EVP). Discover the best strategies on how to frame your EVP in our white paper, "How to Build a Compelling Employer Brand". Download it here.

By Robert Peasnell .