Stuck in your job? You can still advocate within your role

While feeling “stuck” in their current jobs or positions, a growing amount of US workers are staying put rather than brave the front of the labor market. Culture Partners chief scientist of workplace culture Jessica Kriegel shares her interpretation of recent JOLTS data (Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey).

“The music is stopping. And in the game of musical chairs, you want to have a seat, which is why we’re seeing the quit rates slow down. Because ultimately, we have to be able to pay our rent and pay our mortgage, and the opportunities are not as out there as they used to be,” Kriegel says, also explaining workers can still advocate for equitable pay and shift office culture in roles they feel “stuck” in.

Kriegel comments on why employers and CEOs should be considerate of the worker experience if they want to drive productivity and foster a positive work culture.

For more expert insight and the latest market action, click here to watch this full episode of Asking for a Trend.

This post was written by Luke Carberry Mogan.

Video Transcript

First we saw the great resignation.

Now workers are staying put.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, jolts report, the number of quits was down 500,000 in May compared to a year ago.

The quits rate typically serves a signal for how willing workers are to test the labor market waters and voluntarily making the leap to a new role.

Joining me now is Jessica Kriegel, chief scientist of workplace Culture at Culture Partners, Jessica.

It is good to see you and you know, on this trend, Jessica, there was this this very good smart article in in the journal which talked about how uh increasingly people feel stuck in their jobs, you know, the labor markets cooling, uh declining turnover, fewer internal moves.

People feel stuck if viewers are watching this Jessica and they feel stuck.

Um Any advice for them, Jessica, what what could they do?

What should they do?

Well, the music is stopping and in the game of musical chairs, you want to have a seat, which is why we’re seeing the quip rates uh slow down because ultimately we have to be able to pay our rent and pay our mortgage and the opportunities are not as out there as they used to be.

So, what does that mean for you to answer your question?

If your listener is feeling stuck, I mean, you may be stuck.

Acceptance is perhaps the first step in allowing yourself to be OK with being stuck because sometimes that is the nature of the cycle that we’re in and, and that’s where you are.

There’s also something that you can do as an employee when it comes to advocating for yourself.

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If you’re not being paid fair wages, you can show your value to your manager and ask for that increase.

If the culture on your team doesn’t feel very good, you can influence the culture yourself.

We’re all co creating culture together.

This isn’t just a CEO L thing.

So you can take initiative to make that better internally, but the reality is some people are stuck and we might just have to be OK with that.

Are there all you know, Jessica, I would also think, um are there moves though an employer can make, you know, an employer doesn’t want people feeling stuck?

I mean, that just leads to people feeling disengaged?

I mean, are there things employers could do?

Can they get more creative, you know, can they, you know, have people move to different cities or, you know, experiment on different teams?

Yeah, I mean, I think all of those kind of perks and benefits are things that CEO S are trying right now.

But if you want to get to the core of a culture of accountability where people are taking initiative, where they’re driving results and they’re passionate about it, you have to think about how people are, what they believe in the workplace, right?

So many leaders are focusing on what can we do?

Maybe we move people, maybe we let them work from home, maybe we give them this benefit.

But what is it that they believe about the value that they’re creating their importance in the workplace, whether or not they’re on a team that really cares about what you’re doing.

And the way that you influence beliefs at work is through the experiences that you core for each other.

So I would dig deeper as a leader if I were trying to motivate my employees and think about the employee experience that they’re having every single day and what experiences I can improve to drive the right belief so that they really care.

Because if I’m a CEO, I want a team of people who deeply care if I wanna drive shareholder value.

Are there, there may be some employers, Jessica, I’m just, you know, spitballing here who are listening and saying, you know, the economy is slowing, you can see that in all kinds of data.

Now the labor market is cooling frankly, you know, they may say you should just be thankful you have a job.

Is that, is that the right attitude the wrong attitude.

How do you think about it?

I mean, it’s not the attitude that I would want to have as a CEO, but it’s not necessarily ineffective.

Right?

I mean, at time that is the problem with these economic cycles is that we invest in people when we can and then we divest when we can.

And so if you have short term thinking and you’re just trying to get to the end of the quarter, end of the year, then yeah, let people be, let them be.

I mean, sometimes leaders actually do this intentionally that their employees will go, they want to increase attrition and you’re seeing also increased layoffs right now.

So, I mean, that is because people are trying to weed out all of the people who aren’t putting in that extra effort as an employee show value, show your worth and you’ll be able to hold on to that job a little bit longer, big important trend in theme Jessica.

Thank you for helping us walk through it.

Appreciate it.

Thanks for having me.