Along with HR buzzwords like the Great Resignation, Metaverse, Emotional Intelligence, and others, quiet quitting gained a lot of traction in 2022.
Instead of employees physically quitting their jobs, many confined their responsibilities ONLY to what employers outlined in the job description, a.k.a. the bare minimum. With employees taking a step back and refusing to go above and beyond, we must wonder why. Then, we can figure out what employers can do to keep employees engaged.
What Makes an Employee Disengage?
Thanks to the pandemic and the Great Resignation, companies' workforces and environments have been flipped upside down. As a result, the days of "work is life" culture is long gone, especially if employees don't feel rewarded for their achievements. According to a poll conducted by the Pew Research Center in 2021, lack of promotion prospects, low income, and feeling disrespected were the leading reasons why Americans left their professions.
Burnout and employee dissatisfaction are real. As these lingering effects transitioned into (and through) 2022, we've seen that many Gen Z and Millennial workers are beginning to prioritize their health and well-being. Employees' first coping mechanism has been to resort to quitting quietly to achieve a better work-life balance. This means refusing to do more than required, especially if it interferes with their work-life balance.
How Can I Keep my Employees Engaged?
As employees are taking quiet quitting by storm, employers must begin brainstorming ways to keep employees engaged. Engagement shouldn't just be viewed as a means to an end. Instead, engagement reflects how much your employees find purpose and happiness in the workplace. If you force employees to be engaged, your strategies won't be successful. So, it's necessary to find ways to engage your workforce organically. Some questions to ask yourself when evaluating employee engagement are:
Are your organization's objectives and ambitions concise?
Are there tangible connections between an employee's job and the company's objectives?
Can workers perceive how their labor adds value?
Is the organization's leadership present and encouraging?
Are your managers and supervisors trained to maintain a healthy workforce?
Before implementing the tips below, you should re-evaluate the health of your organization with the questions above. Doing an honest assessment will help lead you toward organic engagement.
3 Tips to Increase Employee Engagement
Create a Culture of Fearlessness
Many businesses and organizations function in a performance-driven environment. This type of climate neglects the growth process. Instead of stressing steady improvements that continue to meet goals, employees will have an obsession with hitting the target. While a significant focus on performance ensures clear goals and milestones, a performance-driven culture can be dangerous and lead to higher levels of burnout.
I mean, face it. Performance-driven cultures are primarily concerned with hitting milestones. If you aren't hitting those milestones, you aren't accomplishing anything. As a result, many employees operate out of fear, causing unhealthy competition with coworkers, skipping through the growth process, and making other poor decisions to reach an end. This type of environment is not sustainable if you want to increase retention and prevent quiet quitting.
This is not to say that you can't focus on performance. Performance is a cornerstone of productivity. But to focus on performance, you must acknowledge and reward all phases of the growth process, not just the result. Encourage your employees to learn, make mistakes, and mentor each other. That way, you create a competitive workforce that thrives on taking risks, being innovative, and engaging with each other.
Provide the Right Resources
As a manager or employer, you control many aspects of the company, including your workforce. It's okay to demand your employees' highest potential, but what's not okay is not providing the resources to help.
Look at it this way. Imagine you are demanding a 5-page written report about a product's marketing potential to a specific demographic. Your employee must have this to you by the end of the week. It's Wednesday, and your organization only has five laptops, but none are available until Thursday after work. This employee will have to stay up all night Thursday researching and writing the report. Or, they can go to the local library 20 minutes away from their house.
Either way, getting this report done negatively affects your employee's work-life balance. Maybe one time of having to do this is okay, but when you constantly strain your employees, you reduce the likelihood that they will stay engaged. So, review your employees' tasks and be sure that you provide everything they need to be successful.
Listen to Your Employees' Needs
Listening to customers is essential to marketing and sales, right?
So why not listen to your employees, as it is equally vital for engagement and productivity? Frequent meetings or employee feedback help assess your work environment, management style, and organizational structure. Additionally, knowing why an employee stays and what would make them leave is a proactive way to ensure your employees are taken care of.
If people are aware that management cares and listens to their problems, they will retain a high level of involvement rather than get discouraged and disengaged.
Even though quiet quitting has been around for years, it is now regaining traction. Some say it's a result of recent events. Others say that people are only now admitting it. Either way, quiet quitting is dangerous to work environments and organizational growth. The only way to fight it is to keep employees genuinely engaged. So, utilize these three tips to prioritize your workforce and create a relationship that gives them purpose, opportunities for growth, and a voice.