DeepDive: The Great Resignation
Whether or not you have heard of ‘The Great Resignation’ it is rapidly becoming a very real phenomenon. Now with 2.7% of the US workforce quitting their jobs in April 2021(US Bureau of Labor Statistics), marking the highest quit rate within the last 20 years. Many economists think that this is only the beginning, with recent surveys showing that 41% of employees are planning to leave their current employer (Microsoft).
As the number of workers resigning from their jobs increases rapidly, the overarching question becomes: Why are they quitting?
There have been a variety of reasons mentioned, most of which could be true. All of the different reasons boil down to one common fact. The pandemic has given everyone a very unique period that has demanded extreme reflection and introspection. Over the last year and a half we had an abundance of time to ask questions like:
- Do I want to commute during morning traffic again?
- Was the dull desk at the office crushing my soul?
- Will I be able to tolerate my boss’s condescending demeanor?
- Is the monotony ever going to end?
- Or the general: How am I going to continue working for a company that I genuinely despise?
University of Michigan Economist Betsey Stevenson talked on the shift of attitudes that enabled people everywhere to start posing these sorts of questions as published in a recent Axios article. If you were one of those people, you were certainly not alone. Hopefully, you began coming up with solutions to enhance the quality of your life, by seeking a form of work that promoted the work-life balance you desired.
What we do for work resembles who we are. Which is why before the pandemic, you subconsciously associated your entire identity with your job, and got used to that reality. But now that we had the chance to get a breath of fresh air, it may be obvious that the grass is in fact greener.
It has been a long time coming, but the pandemic has given us an opportunity to redefine what it means to work. The old 9 to 5 routine is not only obsolete and controlling, but also inefficient.
This generational shift signals a change in how our entire workforce can operate. We are now armed with the understanding that flexibility and freedom are achievable in unison with increased productivity. Settling for anything less is laughable.
Naturally this change will hit hardest at the companies that refuse to adapt to the new standard. While their employees have had plenty of time to contemplate their satisfaction within their current position, they are now fleeing from the restrictive arms of the employer. And should we be surprised at all? Of course not.
This shift of how we define work and consequently quitting the jobs that don’t fit our new definition can result in a variety of outcomes for employees. For the majority of the dissatisfied workers the change was simply a new job; something with more excitement, opportunity for advancement, flexibility, and hopefully better pay.
For others, the change takes the form of something much Grander. Coming to the conclusion that working for someone else, taking orders, and giving up control in their own damn life, was simply not an option anymore. For these people, the shift was not from one job to another, but from one life to another. By becoming their own boss, and shifting from employee to entrepreneur.
Leaving a job is a big step, but luckily the pandemic made that step a lot less steep. After that, the next steps toward starting your own business are right in front of you. Quitting is basically burning the bridge, but the ship you joined has no captain, so you get to take the wheel. With that newfound freedom and the endless opportunity that comes with it. The race for exploration has been replenished.
‘The Great Resignation’ of employees becomes ‘The Enormous Expedition’ of entrepreneurs
