Tackle the problem and avoid high costs with DiSC Assessments
A simple search on Google Trends reveals that the internet’s interest in the term ‘Quiet Quitting’ skyrocketed from 0 to 79 (popularity index score) in August 2022. This term is doing the rounds these days and the buzzword seems to be a recent one. Before discussing ways to get rid of it, let’s first see what exactly is quiet quitting.
What is Quiet Quitting?
Quiet quitting is when an employee decides to stop investing their energy at work. They haven’t handed in her resignation, but they have resigned internally and now are coming to work every day only for their own needs, like the paycheck or a social obligation.
But is it really a new concept? The moniker ‘quiet quitting’ came up recently but this idea is a very old one. Here are only a few related constructs that have been discussed by management thinkers for decades:
- Employee engagement
- Organizational Citizenship Behaviors (OCB)
- Job Withdrawal Behaviors, and
- Organizational Commitment
If you take a closer look at each of these concepts, you’ll see a list of behaviors that are a close match with the behaviors of a quiet quitter.
A Typical Quiet Quitting Process
1. An employee is perceived to be mistreated by their employer despite best efforts to deliver results beyond her job scope.
2. They start questioning whether this place is worth all these efforts or not.
3. This disengagement leads to them realizing that work is only a part of life.
4. Since it’s not possible to switch jobs immediately, they decide to quit quietly, putting in the minimum possible effort to fulfill their job description.
5. After this decision, they start planning moves to leave that job. It could be actively applying to open jobs, improving career prospects through self-development, or building a side hustle.
You can tell an employee has quit quietly if:
- They started to turn down any requests that they used to do previously
- They don’t respond to messages/emails after working hours or take longer to respond than previously
- They stopped sharing ideas and becoming actively involved in meetings or discussions
- They stopped attending optional office events like the happy hour trips after work
Perceived injustice at the workplace is one of the leading causes of quiet quitting. Whenever an employee feels that they haven’t received something owed to him, a feeling of unfairness will arise. This perception of injustice results in counterproductive emotions like:
- Burnout
- Shift in priorities
- Disengagement
- Unfair compensation
The Hazards of Quitting but Staying
So what’s all this fuss about quiet quitting? Why is it the talk of the town these days and why should businesses bother to think about doing something?
Well, quiet quitting is expensive. It can mean the difference between exponential growth and premature death of a business. Below are just a few aspects of organizational success that are negatively affected by quiet quitting:
Employer brand – Your attractiveness as an employer gives you the luxury of choosing from the best talent on the market. But if your workplace is rife with quiet quitters, the word reaches the job market without fail. Now you’re left only with candidates who don’t plan to put in their 100%.
Innovation – Innovation is not only limited to Apple and Tesla. Every organization needs incremental and radical innovations to take a lead in the market. Withdrawn employees are unlikely to put in the effort needed to contribute to your organization’s innovation.
Customer support – Disengaged employees are less likey to provide top-notch customer service. Recall an unpleasant experience dealing with any customer service—that’s what your customers will face if your customer support people have quit quietly.
Turnover – Sooner or later, your employees who have withdrawn quietly will leave the job. And frequent resignations will soon hit your bottom lines as you’re faced with recruiting and training new talent.
Skillset – Internally withdrawn employees rarely make any effort to learn a new skill or stay abreast of the latest industry knowledge. Soon they’ll become dinosaurs. With an organizational inventory of outdated skills, it’ll be a miracle if you can pull anything innovative to gain market share.
Curbing Quiet Quitting Using DiSC Assessments
DiSC assessments are a reliable tool that can help you create an anti-quiet quitting environment and also bring back those who are at risk. DiSC’s four personality types are Dominance (D), Influence (i), Steadiness (S), and Conscientiousness (C). Each of these types has distinct traits.
As a manager, you can determine the personality type of all your employees by having them respond to a short assessment that’ll give you their personalized Everything DiSC Workplace profile. Once their DiSC styles are known to you, you can easily tailor your strategies according to the individual so that they remain engaged and involved in the role – eliminating the chance to slip towards quiet quitting.
Below is a basic guideline on how to design personalized engagement strategies for all your four personality types.
Engaging your ‘D’ style employees
These are doers and love action. Try to keep their jobs challenging by letting them solve problems. Keep them away from monotony and they’ll stay tuned in at all times.
Engaging your ‘i’ employees
To keep these people engaged, try to assign them tasks that involve collaboration and working with others. They’ll thrive in socially active settings. When they do a good job, praise them in front of the others and they’ll feel ecstatic. Check in with them frequently to make sure they aren’t lost.
Engaging your ‘S’ employees
Design tasks for them that require working in a group but leave some contemplation space as well. Never criticize your S people in public. That’ll push them to the edge of quiet quitting.
Engaging your ‘C’ employees
Give them time and space and they’ll do wonders for you. Cs don’t like social interactions a lot. Hand over all the heavy thinking work to them and they’ll put their analytical powers to good use.
Conclusion
Quiet Quitting is just a new name for an old concept. Don’t let it intimidate you. Instead, use this opportunity as a reminder that employee engagement is key to their as well as the organization’s success The DiSC assessment system is based on solid research and years of feedback from users all over the world. Use this robust tool to quickly grab your employees’ attention and win their commitment to their roles.
Head over to the Everything DiSC Workplace assessment and explore all the powerful options you have to ensure that your employees are engaged and happily contributing to your success.
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