Quiet Cutting vs. Quiet Quitting: What’s Really Going on at Work?

Every day new HR trends are turning heads around the company space, with strategies, insights, and details that interest the employees and employers just as people in the HR department when working to develop their strategy.

Just like the idea of quiet cutting which is still under discussion between professionals to discover and study its direct impacts on workers and their roles on all levels.

In this article, we will dig deeper to explore quiet cutting vs quiet quitting concepts from the perspectives of employers and employees with all the needed details.

What Is Quiet Cutting?

Quiet cutting is a workplace strategy employers use to push employees and workers to quit instead of laying them directly from their roles, with laid or reassigned roles into not desired roles. 

Which, from the employers perspective, is an attempt that help them reduce the company headcount and avoid severance costs or legal complications from a layoff.

On the other hand, human resources KPIs indicate that a quiet cutting strategy may cause other employees and workers to feel undervalued or pressured to quit from any reassigned decision. Leading to lower work morale and trust within the company.

How Is Quiet Cutting Done?

Quiet cutting strategy is applied when employers do a reassigned move of employees or workers to roles that are often lower in status, unrelated to their skills, or come with fewer responsibilities. Moreover, employers may offer these changes, in the era of quiet cutting, as a reassigned attempt to lower roles within the company.

However, the quiet cutting shift usually lacks a clear explanation strategy or opportunity for input, to indirectly encourage employees and workers to quit and resign without formal termination.

What Is Quiet Quitting?

After talking about quiet cutting, if you have a human resources career, you should also understand the new trend of quiet quitting.

On the contrary to quiet cutting, in quiet quitting employees and workers try to quit indirectly by doing only the bare minimum required in their roles, without going above and beyond, taking on extra tasks, or working overtime when employers ask for volunteers.

Based on the professional HR training courses in London, quiet quitting is in some way or another a response to burnout, feeling undervalued, poor work-life balance, well-being, and employees job satisfaction. So, it could be a result of employers' quiet cutting strategy.

How Is Quiet Quitting Done?

Usually, employees do quiet quitting by setting firm and clear boundaries at work and sticking strictly to their roles and job descriptions, furthermore, employees stop volunteering for extra duties, or late hours.

So, employees with this quit strategy focus on doing only what is required, nothing more, nothing less, with a silent and quiet attempt to resign.

What Are the Cons of Quiet Cutting and Quiet Quitting?

Whether you choose to elevate your HR career with online courses or in-classroom ones, you will get the chance to understand quiet cutting and quiet quitting better.

However, many HR studies find mutual cons between the two applied strategies by employees and employers.

Unprofessionalism in Quiet Cutting and Quitting:

Quiet cutting by employers and quiet quitting by employees reflect a work environment and standards with poor communication between employers and employees, avoidance, and lack of transparency, instead of addressing issues directly and constructively.

Bad Branding in Quiet Cutting and Quitting:

Both quit practices can harm a company's reputation as an employer and a professional environment, as they show poor management and disengaged employees and workers, which can frighten top laid talent and clients as well.

Not Cost Effective in Quiett Cutting and Quitting:

Many employers defend their use of quiet cutting with reassigned employees and workers as a way to avoid layoff problems and save severance costs, however, this cutting strategy leads to poor performance of employees and workers and higher turnover costs.

On the other hand, quiet quitting reduces productivity, impacting overall output and efficiency in the long run.

So, we can say that both strategies are not cost-effective for a company, and that is why your HR team must work to avoid them effectively.

Loss of Trust in Quiet Cutting and Quitting:

Both, quiet cutting and quiet quitting lead to a breakdown in employee-employer relationships, with unsupported feelings and weak loyalty.

Finally,

Quiet cutting or quiet quitting are both considered bad strategies for employees, employers, and the company in general, thus, make sure to explain everything, including laid and reassigned, to your employees with a high level of transparency.

Moreover, invest in good HR training and learning courses to be ready to manage and handle any workplace trend effectively.