Yes, the Great Resignation is Still Happening

Is the Great Resignation fading away? Not that I've seen. In fact, according to a recent survey, more people  are considering resigning in 2022 than in 2021!

Key topics:

✔️ Job descriptions or corporate propaganda trying to convince you that the Big Quit is ebbing = not the case.
✔️ Gen Zers and Millennials might be leading the charge, but they are not the only ones participating in The Great Resignation.
✔️ People are also not keen on RTO. Most workers who have been working remotely want to continue doing so.

Links I discuss in this episode:

https://www.linkedin.com/news/story/millennials-gen-z-eye-new-jobs-4715953/

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/millennials-or-get-z-who-is-doing-the-most-job-hopping-112733374.html

https://www.fastcompany.com/90731547/microsoft-second-annual-work-trend-index-employees

https://causeyconsultingllc.com/2022/03/16/were-outta-here/


Need more? Email me: https://causeyconsultingllc.com/contact-causey/

Transcript

0:15

Welcome to the Causey Consulting Podcast. You can find us online anytime at CauseyConsultingLLC.com. And now, here's your host, Sara Causey. Hello, Hello, and thanks for tuning in. So today I want to talk about the amplification of the great resignation. Last week, there was an article published on LinkedIn titled millennials, Gen Z eye new jobs. And of course, I will drop a link to it in the write up for this podcast so that you can check it out for yourself. And initially, when I read the headline, I thought, Well, I would argue that it's not just people who are 40 and under that are doing so. But okay, and as I got into the blurb under the article title, I discovered that in fact, my hunch was correct. So the editor and I'm going to do my best with this name. Again, you guys know I hate mispronouncing somebody's name. I believe it's fewness. Bates, the editor for LinkedIn writes, younger workers have a simple message for employers we're out of here. That's the finding of a new survey by Microsoft parent company of LinkedIn, with 52% of Gen Z and Millennial employees, those under age 41, saying that they are somewhat or extremely likely to consider a job change in the coming year. Some 35% of Gen Xers and baby boomers say they are thinking of bailing on their bosses among all American workers. 43% are weighing a job change up from 41%. Last year, a majority of workers who have been doing their jobs remotely aren't eager to return to the office among hybrid workers. 51% said they may want to be remote full time and quote. Yeah, be great. If I could hit that with some echo. Let me try to do it manually. Yeah, yeah, no kidding. So it's not just the younger demographic of workers that are thinking about it. It is a fairly sizable chunk, more than 1/3 of the older generations. And I'm not saying that pejoratively, believe me, I'm a Gen X or myself, I'm in my 40s. I'm above the age range that they're talking about. But those of us who are in Gen X and the baby boomer generations, more than a third of us are considering the same thing to so no, it's not just Gen Z and millennials that are considering leaving a job that quite frankly, they probably don't like, there's a couple of things that I want to point out here. Anyone who says a great resignation isn't basically over or, you know, we think the great resignation is ebbing now really just kind of feel like it's time to fall in line and come on back to the office. They're full of it. You know, no offense meant, but I'm, I'm very blunt with you guys. And I'm telling you the truth, that is just not reality. I don't know if they're saying that out of wishful thinking, or if they're trying to deliberately spread some kind of propaganda. But it just ain't true. You see, more than a third of the older generations are thinking about leaving their jobs. And then when we look at the overall number, more people are thinking about quitting here in 2022, than they did in 2021. So that doesn't suggest to me that the great resignation is winding down. Most people have gotten themselves plugged in at a company they like and everything's sunshine and roses. And no, that doesn't match reality. And it also doesn't match what I'm seeing day in and day out in the marketplace. either. You I don't just rely on surveys and information that I find online. I'm in the market every day as a staffing and recruiting Smee. And I have found no evidence whatsoever that the great resignation is winding down. But yet I see sometimes even in job descriptions, where companies will say things like, because the great resignation is slowing down. We really want to make sure that people are coming back to the office or we really want to make sure that we're going back to pre COVID times or they'll say something like now that the COVID pandemic is winding down, we want everybody to come on back to the office and it's like, what, where are you getting your information from? But they'll just toss it out in a job description as though it's a fait accompli and it's like, well, no, not actually. You saying something repetitively because you want people to believe your propaganda just doesn't make it true. Another thing I want to point out on that note is that most rooms remote workers do not want to come home back to the office. I have seen very few people who said, you know, I miss a long commute, I miss getting up really early in the morning and downing half a pot of coffee, and putting on dress clothes and then sitting in the car trapped in traffic or sitting on the subway or on a train and a long commute. And then being sent in a cube farm under fluorescent lighting and having Carol from accounting do stop and chats once an hour or having Betty Sue from HR want to do the Welcome Wagon every time someone new comes in. And it makes me want to barf. You know, I really miss that. I just haven't heard people saying that. People who who actively want to go back to the office. And again, no offense here, I'm just being real. Maybe they have an unpleasant home life or a boring home life and they don't enjoy being wherever they are for eight to nine hours during the workday, they actively want to go back to the cubicle farm. Those people are in a small minority. And I frankly don't think it's right for that small minority of people to control the vast majority that are saying go back to the office full time. Hell no. I think most people have debunked the myth around all of that there was never really a need, especially after the proliferation of technology. You know, back when most people had a desktop, a bulky desktop computer and like floppy disks and a CD ROM, it may have been nigh on impossible to have done that type of work from home, and what are you going to do lug all that equipment home with you and then plug it into your dial up connection, that would have been pretty cumbersome and, and frustrating, I would think you know, I remember the dial up and if somebody called it would boot you off, or it would take forever to get signed on to AOL. So I get it back in the day, it just might not have been that feasible. But we're in a completely different reality now. So for the past few years, everybody having to be but insane in an office what I affectionately call the digital pan Opticon where you either are being surveilled or could be surveilled. At any given time. You really don't have any privacy, you don't feel that you have any rights as an employee, you're just sat there like cattle in a feedlot. It never really was necessary anyway, over these past few years with the proliferation of technology. Now that people have come to realize that the emperor doesn't have any clothes on he hasn't had any clothes on for the past few years. They just don't want to go back to playing pretend that the Emperor isn't naked. There's a similar article, which I will also drop a link to on Yahoo Finance, which asked the question between Millennials and Gen Zers, who's doing the most job hopping. And there was an interesting chart that was provided by CareerBuilder that showed that in 2021, the average tenure for workers 40 and younger was about two and a half years. There is very little difference between the average tenure for millennials and Gen Zers. For those of us in Gen X, it was about five years. And for the baby boomer generation, it was about eight years. So I find it really interesting that here in 2022, as some of the great resignation deniers are trying to convince us that it's completely over with and in the rearview mirror or its air being starting to subside, people want to go back to the office, and they're pretty much all happy. Even these individuals that have a tenure of five years or more are getting resignation fever in 2022. And I think part of that comes down to money. I mean, look at inflation, where God we're basically in the United States in a period of hyper inflation. And when you look at the cost of everything, I mean, just your weekly trip to the grocery store from one week to the next can be more expensive than it was the week before. You look at the cost of your basics, your rent or your mortgage payment. You're putting gasoline in your vehicle to go anywhere. I mean, just just taking care of your basics is getting more and more expensive. So we're living in some kind of fool's paradise if we think that salary doesn't matter, or that we can somehow use benefits or perks which I'm using an air quotes as a substitution for a good robust salary. Now when I say benefits, I'm not referring to things like health and dental insurance, which are very important. I'm talking about things like the jelly of the Month Club, a slide and the office of foosball table, virtual Happy Hour Margarita Mondays crap like that. You cannot package up Margarita Mondays and mail it to your mortgage company, or you can't pay rent to your landlord with a slide in the office. So wasting time on nonsense like that is not going to do anybody any good. But money is not the only factor. It's an important factor. But it's not the only factor. In a similar article that was published on Fast Company where they kind of summarize the results of this Microsoft survey, which again, I'll drop a link to in the write up, they make a really good point that employees have a new worth it equation, and I'll read a little bit from that now, workers have taken a temporary break from business as usual to reevaluate their priorities. According to the study, 53% Now put their health and well being overwork of the 18% of respondents who quit their jobs. Last year, the top three motivators were well being work life balance and flexibility with compensation, ranking seven and quote. Now again, I just want to be very clear, we can't say that salary doesn't matter very much, or that if you have a company with a pleasant management, you have a good culture. It's not punitive, everyone is respected. You really make diversity a priority. It's not a cult. Groupthink is not promoted there. You have a great environment, but you're paying subpar wages, are you going to make it? No, people are not going to stay at your company for the long run. Even if your culture is good, but your wages suck. It's not pleasant to starve. It's not pleasant to get evicted. It's not pleasant to have the car repoed. So your workers are still going to have to have enough money to cover their basics and to make ends meet. And no matter how pleasant everybody is. It's not going to matter if they can't put food on the table. On the other side of the spectrum, high wages are not going to paper over crappy companies, toxic culture managers from hell, expectations that are unrealistic. Oh, well, thank you, Jesus, we really appreciate that you turn water into wine, but you turned it into white wine and we wanted red wine. So we're just not impressed JC there are still those companies out there. And one quick note that I want to make for those of you listening to this podcast that Freelancer your own or you own your own business. Be very weary and wary of people like that. Don't let them into your practice because even if they are paying you money hand over fist, some of them have expectations that are so unrealistic and so bizarre. You will twist yourself into a human pretzel trying to please them. And at the end of the day, is it worth it? Most of the time. It's not. If you feel that you have conjured up a miracle and turn water into wine and they're not appreciative. They want to nitpick, they want to be micromanaged or cruel and rude. Find someone else to do business with, even in hyperinflation even in a recession. Not all money is good money. And if you give yourself a bleeding ulcer or migraine headaches every night you can't sleep your blood pressure is up. It just may not be worth it. And that's why I really like this idea from the Fast Company article of employees have a new worth it equation. So jobs at crappy companies with a toxic culture, bad managers subpar pay unrealistic deadlines, they want to bug you at three o'clock in the morning, they want you to camp out on a slack channel. And if you take a bathroom break that they feel is too long, they want to chew you out about it. Those places are being weighed, measured and found not worth it. And I for one think that that's fantastic. Workers should not be in these toxic environments. And if you're freelancing, or you own your own business, you shouldn't be doing business with people that want to treat you like poop either. So to sum it up, are there great resignation deniers out there? Yeah, there are. Are they correct? Nope. They're sure not. We hope you enjoyed today's episode. If you haven't already, please take a quick second to subscribe to this podcast and share it with your friends. Thanks for tuning in. We'll see you next time.