With the rise of new work-lingo such as quiet quitting, loud quitting, bare minimum Mondays, rage applying, quiet hiring, quiet firing, chaotic working, boomerang employees and career cushioning – who can really keep up with all these new work terms and what they all mean?
With the onset of the pandemic, the world of work was turned upside down on its head. With many office workers having to work remotely (where possible), the flexibility of this arrangement, has since proved greatly beneficial for many, with no drops in productivity and often increases in productivity due to less distractions, less time spent on commuting resulting in more free time with family and friends, less sick days and mental health gains.
Girlboss work culture
As a Millennial growing up in the 2000s, the big and popular TV shows and movies of that time were Ugly Betty, The devil wears Prada, Legally blonde, Grey’s anatomy, Ally McBeal etc. They featured hard-working “girlbosses” such as Betty Suarez, Miranda Priestly, Elle Woods, Christina Yang etc, who aspired to climb the corporate ladder, often working long hours and “went the extra mile” to gain the right experience, meet and know the right people to get the next promotion.
As Millennials entered the workforce, we inherited the mindset from our Boomer parents, that if you worked hard, you would be rewarded, but reality tells us, this is just not the case anymore. Our Boomer parents may have stayed loyal to the 1 company for the bulk of their working lives, but there were also many beneficial market conditions and government policies in place during their working decades that gave this group of people a big leg up (free university education – so they graduated without a huge HECS debt, cheap housing (2-3x annual wage), wages were high enough so that a single income could support the whole family with young kids, generous welfare and pensions just to name a few), so now they’re sitting pretty in their multi-million dollar standalone homes due to the booming property market with multiple investment properties to boot and generally financially very well off. Whereas Millennials and Gen Zers are told we’re lazy and should eat less avocado toast when wage growth has been stagnant and property now costs at least 10x one’s annual salary. (More on this later).
Women can have it all, so Hollywood tells us…
Our capitalistic society and Hollywood media feed us the lie, that “women can have it all”. Full family lives, full work lives, full social lives! (If you’re already rich maybe, but for the majority of people: hello burnout!) When you first meet a new person, it’s not uncommon after asking their name, what do they do (job-wise). Current societal norms places a big sense of importance on one’s career and it’s intrinsic link to identity and values of self worth. But the danger with tying one’s identity to career is that it narrows our horizons and perspective, makes us more susceptible to burnout and poor mental health and less resilient in the face of professional setbacks (looked over for promotion, made redundant etc).
Knowing this, why do we gear most of our lives towards success in career? From a young age, we’re taught to study hard to get good grades at school, so that we can get into a good course and a reputable university. We work hard at university, get good grades to get a good job. Once we get a good job, we’re expected to work hard at this job, to get the next promotion and the next promotion, until eventually, we become the big boss. But what if, we do not want to follow this linear, cookie cutter route?
Furthermore, how does wanting to start a family or achieving other life goals fit into this picture? Clearly, with finite time, income and energy, we cannot “have it all.” Although on average, we spend 8 hours a day, 5 days a week, 40 hours a week at work (obviously some people spend more time than this and others may spend less at work), we, as a human being, are so much more than just our job or career. What if we chose to not link our identity to our jobs but to other things, such as values, relationships, passions, hobbies etc?
Working to live, not living to work
Typically we have to work to live and many of us, do not live to work. Although work can be exciting and fulfilling at times, I bet, this is not the case for the majority of the time. A job is something you do, and not something you are. If you’re an accountant, are you really that excited about pivot tables, graphs and spreadsheets in general? If you’re a lawyer, are you really that excited about reading through contracts? If you’re a dentist, are you really that excited about routine teeth cleaning? I didn’t think so. For a lot of us, work is to earn a pay check, to fund your lifestyle. Some money goes towards the essentials such as housing, food, utilities, savings/investments and a bit for the fun stuff like eating out, holidays and hobbies.
Although our capitalistic society tells us you should work hard and long hours to climb up the corporate ladder, to reach the next promotion and so on, if you take on more responsibility outside of your current job description and prove to your boss you’re more than capable, you can only hope that you’ll earn the next promotion. Earning that promotion should (though not always) involve earning more money and a fancier title. But what is the purpose of earning more money and getting a fancier title? To pay for things you don’t need and to impress people you don’t even like? It’s ironic, in that if you’re capable of doing your job and you agree to take on more work and do someone else’s work too, you only get dangled the promise of a future reward. The promotion and fancy title is never a guarantee.
Although you might’ve taken on projects and responsibilities outside of your current scope of responsibilities with the hope or promise of a promotion and an improved job title, you could still get made redundant due to a restructuring change at any time. You could get overlooked for someone else for the promotion. At the end of the day, everyone is dispensable. The employer has no loyalty to you, so is it worth so much of your time, mental and physical energy to pursue this relentless upward climb?
You are dispensable
Job losses in tech this year have been an absolute bloodbath. Just look at the tech sector this year and the number of job losses. The running total of layoffs for 2023 based on full months to date is 224,503, according to Layoffs.fyi.
- January: 89,554 employees laid off
- February: 40,021 employees laid off
- March: 37,823 employees laid off
- April: 20,014 employees laid off
- May: 14,928 employees laid off
- June: 10,958 employees laid off
- July: 10,589 employees laid off
- August: 9,545 employees laid off
Public companies have shareholders and other stakeholders to answer to. If profit projections do not look rosy, investors will send the share price down by dumping the stock. Guess what? Many executive bonuses are tied to key performance indicators (KPIs) like increases in the share price so what will the executive team do if their personal bonuses are at risk or if they fail to reach their KPIs? Guess what? They’re going to be looking elsewhere for cost savings to make the ultimate profit figure look better (or less dire) and your job may be on the chopping block.
So what do you do, if you do not want to live that kind of life and not be a slave as a cog in this capitalistic machine? What if you were content with an average job earning an average salary that has regular standard hours and not do more than expected? You want to reclaim your identify, sense of self-worth, time, physical, emotional and mental energy, so that you can focus on things that matter to you more. Your relationships with your friends, family and partner. Your pets. Your hobbies, travel and other interests. How can you reset your view of work and relationship to it when our society tells us otherwise and ditch the idea that we are just our jobs?
Momentum in the “anti-overwork” movement
Recently there’s been an increase in momentum in the “anti-overwork” movement led by Gen Zers as they have entered the workforce just prior to the onset of the pandemic and during the pandemic.
Starting full time work during this period would have been so bizarre as most office workers would’ve worked exclusively from home. This seismic shift in how we work, has proved to employers that workers can keep up productivity (or even improve productivity in some cases). Many established workers said goodbye to long commutes! There was suddenly more free time to spend with family and friends. Flexibility was possible! Although many positives came from this shift, for others, working from home meant no separation of work and home life, encouraging one to unnecessarily work longer hours. With the proliferation of tech in recent years, having your work email on your personal phone is not unusual and answering “urgent” phone calls outside of business hours may leave some employees feeling they can never switch off completely from work. Clearly, the other end of the
As pandemic restrictions eased and more employers wanted their employees to return to the office, understandably, many employees are unhappy about this arrangement especially since this new way of working has proven to be so successful and productive in the last few years. With this massive upheaval in work culture and the way in which we work, it has lead many people to re-evaluate their relationship to work. To get off the unrelenting work treadmill, what kind of job does one pursue if they want to untether their identity away from what capitalism says and what Hollywood media portrays as having a “success” career?
The lazy girl’s job has entered the room
Enter Gabrielle Judge who has been credited coining the term, “lazy girl’s job.” Gen Zer, Gabrielle Judge describes this type of job, as a job where its not very stressful, hours are stable, the work is easy, with not many key performance indicators (KPIs) (if any) to hit, earning between $60-$80k and good work/life balance. (To clarify, the adjective lazy in this case does not mean you’re slacking off on the job. This term is not against “working hard”, but rather working smarter. This term refers to jobs that are less demanding compared to other jobs in the hustle and grind work culture, society glorifies. These sorts of jobs are also not just exclusively for women only, men can also perform these roles.) Examples of such jobs Judge cites are ones that are flexible and remote, such as in admin support, data entry, transcription/typist and virtual assistant to name a few.
When there is no guarantee for reward for hard work, why work so hard and sacrifice so much, when you don’t want to, nor need to? What if you chose to live below your means, so that you didn’t need to work such a demanding job? There is no shame and should be no shame for doing exactly what is asked for you (no more, no less), in a not so demanding job. Millennial burnout is rife and a very real issue. Workers, especially Gen Zers have witnessed this and are re-defining their relationship to work.
The top 5 regrets of the dying
As per “The top five regrets of the dying” by Bronnie Ware, this book explores a series of conversations with older people on their deathbed as they recount their life’s regrets. In none of the conversations did anyone say they regret not working more. More often than not, people regret not spending more time with loved ones, or not pursuing other hobbies and dreams and wished they did not live their lives in conformation to what others wanted or expected.
Good luck on your journey to redefining your identity away from your profession and recalibrating your relationship with work! It’ll be an ongoing journey, but with every journey, it involves taking a first step.
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