#time to learn

Every four weeks I encourage my team to protect some time for learning. As we settle into our new sales year here at Reed, I wanted to take myself out of my comfort zone and as part of #timetolearn start to stretch myself by posting a blog giving my views of things happening in the HR world, and also seek thoughts and opinions of others in my network.

To start myself off, I have dived into a new phrase which I have heard quite a lot over the last few weeks being "quietly quitting". I do appreciate I am slightly late to the party on this one!!!! After some research, I established this was a relatively new TikTok trend popularised in July 2022 in a video that has now had over 3.5M views! However, to me this is not a new thing and is instead a non-HR term for what I would consider “coasting”. Coasting is certainly not new, and in my experience is not something I only associate with a certain age group, therefore lets not over segment this and place this at the door of Gen Z – everyone can coast or quietly quit.

?What is quietly quitting?

Let me start by saying I don’t believe that it is slacking off of work, but I do believe that:

• it is doing what you need to do to be considered performing in role
• it is not going above and beyond for the company or yourself
• it is not having the motivation or desire to want to better yourself in your current role
• it is not broadening your thinking
• it is not building out your expertise
• it is not advancing your career

Quietly quitting appears to be an active choice not to do the things listed above, which is great, as it should be easy for any good manager to spot. More dangerous to me is those who quietly quit, or coast, subconsciously i.e., they have not made a conscious decision. This is harder to spot, as it may peak and trough and be less consistent.

?Why are workers quietly quitting?

So, if this isn’t a new thing, why has it raised its head now? I believe this is another Covid-induced hangover. In the UK, for lengthy periods of 2020 and 2021 employees (unless in key roles) were forced to work from home, were on various forms of furlough, or lost their job. Socially there wasn’t much we could do outside of home, therefore those in work used it as a crutch, indeed many that were or weren’t furloughed felt lucky to still have a job.?This may be over-simplistic, but I think there are two main things going on in tandem;

1. Some employers became used to increased performance outputs and then when the world reverted back on its axis,?a "new normal" needed to be established. For some employers this transformation has been bigger than others, dependent on their pre-Covid start point. Many employers are still wading their way through what this looks like in terms of hybrid working, connectedness, communication & culture, work life balance and mental health & wellbeing. All these factors are incredibly important to employee’s right now,
2. Covid was a huge societal shock and many of us as individuals were forced to reassess what’s important to us. Our relationship with work and who we work for may have changed, and all of those things that employers are still unpicking in our “new normal” are things that we are considering ourselves, and are really important to us.

?What can be done?

There is a golden thread that runs through hybrid working, connectedness, communication & culture, work life balance, mental health & wellbeing - this is the employee/manager relationship. I believe this is the key to combating those considering quietly quitting. Having a great manager, who gets you as the employee, where there are joint aspirations and goals, where there is open and honest conversation, where input and output is valued and appreciated, where there is true care in the relationship and more importantly trust, this is where the?magic happens. I truly don't believe that anyone would quietly quit if they had this relationship with their line manager. None of this is new, but I do believe it is more important than ever. People work for people, organisations should recognise this and put the onus on managers building meaningful relationships with their teams.

?For years people have worked in different ways; some work to live and others live to work, some like to be emotionally connected to the organisation and its values and others do not. There is no right or wrong here, they are just different, and leaders and managers need to be able to navigate these different outlooks within their teams. The job market is buoyant at the moment, and if someone does not like aspects of their role or organisation, they can make a conscious decision to find a new job and if they are good at their job, it is highly likely they will be successful in their search. I believe that if they choose to remain in their role, they need to own that decision. Managers should work with them to identify if there are bits of the role that do not work for them, face into that and have a conversation about it rather than "quietly quitting". Have a conversation and owning this could make the world of difference on how you feel at work on a day to day basis.

?What makes for a good leader/manager?

As managers how do we do this whilst also acknowledging that everyone is our team is different and therefore what is fantastic for one employee could enrage another. This is where I am going to enlist the help of another, Graham Wilson . In his book, Leadership Laid Bare, he talks about the naked truth of what great leaders/managers do:

1. ?They understand themselves and have a story to tell
2. They inspire action
3. They create high performing teams
4. They unleash innovation
5. They manage ambiguity and kill risk
6. They educate
7. They deliver with pace

?I love these naked truths and I believe they are the necessary ingredients for making a great manager/leader of people. Get these right and employees will be engaged. There will be no quiet quitting or coasting – whatever you want to call it. There will be honest conversations, there will be challenge, there will be conflict, there will be results, there will be a great team to be part of. So instead on focusing on the problem, let’s focus on the solution. Let's start having those honest conversations with our teams to understand how they feel we stack up against these seven leadership/management truths. I know I could do some further development and focus on some of them.??What do you think?