Dhe phenomenon of “Quiet Quitting” has become known above all through the social media platform Tiktok. Ever since a – relatively unspectacular – video of a man talking about the internal resignation of jobs went viral there, it has been on everyone’s lips. No wonder: Employers are feeling the demographic change more than ever. There are problems everywhere because there is a lack of skilled workers. Internal resignations? Call of duty? It’s been around for a long time, but for a long time only a few were interested.
The consulting firm Gallup, for example, has been reporting regularly every spring on declining employee commitment and dissatisfaction with managers for many years – and this year too. This time, however, more people will probably listen than usual. Not only because more and more companies are being affected, more and more bosses and teams are feeling the dwindling commitment, but also because the proportion of those who have internally resigned has not been as high since 2012 was like in the moment. And of course also: because employers are openly concerned; it was certainly no coincidence that employer boss Steffen Kampeter recently called for “more keen on work”.
The new Gallup numbers, which have been on the market since Wednesday, play into the hands of those who are concerned: 18 percent of employees in Germany stated in the survey that they no longer felt any emotional connection to their company and had already quit internally. For comparison: last year it was only 14 percent. If companies had placed a stronger focus on the emotional bond between their employees during the pandemic, the study authors believe that this effect would have melted away. At the same time, the proportion of employees with a high level of commitment to their company is as small as ever and is only 13 percent. All the great rest more or less work to rule; their emotional attachment to the company is neither particularly high nor particularly low.
Willingness to change has increased significantly
“It seems that over the past year, leaders have been more concerned with managing crises than with their employees. After Corona, these have disappeared a bit from the attention radar,” said Marco Nink from Gallup. According to his study, the willingness to change jobs is high – especially when you compare the numbers with those five years ago. In 2018, 78 percent of those surveyed still fully intended to still be with their current employer in a year, but by 2022 the figure has shrunk to 55 percent.
The survey also seems to confirm that employees’ demands for what is known as work-life balance are increasing. Among those surveyed, 38 percent said they would be willing to change jobs if their new employer offered them a four-day work week. The question was not even about reducing the working hours, but purely about a different distribution of working hours in order to “work out” one more day off per week. In any case, the home office has apparently firmly established itself in everyday working life. 75 percent of the study participants stated that they could work as well or better at home than in the office.
Incidentally, according to the survey, trust in one’s own company and satisfaction with one’s own manager is quite low among employees in Germany. Less than half, 42 percent of respondents, said they had unreserved confidence in their company’s financial future. And the employees don’t give the managers good references either. Only a quarter of those surveyed stated that they were completely satisfied with their own manager, and just over a third felt that they had sufficient support. Only 14 percent are inspired.
For the Gallup Engagement Index, the consulting firm surveys around 1,500 employees every year. This time, the representative survey took place between November 14 and December 21, 2022. The participants were selected at random, and the survey was carried out using computer-aided interviews.