I was always good with words. I loved the English language as a child and was a voracious reader. But I was shocking at math.

Numbers scared me—and frankly, they still do—but let me share a terrifying number with you: 100 million dollars.

This outrageous sum is the estimated cost to large companies of holding unnecessary work meetings, according to 

 from Steven G. Rogelberg, a UNC Charlotte professor and expert on meeting strategy.

Rogelberg’s research found that employees all over the world are wasting valuable time each day in pointless meetings. (Sounds relatable, doesn’t it?) In this study, respondents said that their attendance was not required at up to 30% of the meetings they attended.

If we worked to reduce these unnecessary meetings, it would increase productivity, decrease employee frustration and cut costs. In companies with 100 employees, reducing meetings could save $2.5 million a year. In larger businesses with 5,000 employees, they could save $100 million a year by finding ways to communicate other than through meetings.

The monetary investment in this level of face-to-face synchronous communication is enormous. Let’s look at an example.

Say you have eight people in a weekly meeting. The meeting runs for an hour every Tuesday and the average salary of the attendees is $50,000. The cost of attendees’ time is $12,000 a year. Just for that one meeting alone. Man alive, this is an expensive way to communicate.

Why does this behavior persist, even in the face of clear data to show the loss of productivity in the business? Well, mostly because meetings are easy. People default to meetings because they don’t really require any effort or preparation. You just call a meeting, people show up, and maybe you achieve something or maybe you don’t. But, sure, you had the meeting.

But there are other and better ways to communicate in the workplace. You need to take an intentional, deliberate approach to create a system of communication in work that includes both synchronous, real-time channels such as meetings, and also asynchronous channels.

You can’t simply replicate the office environment in a virtual world; it leads to zoom fatigue, frustration, and disengagement.

This need for an asynchronous approach to workplace communication is going to become increasingly important in the coming years. Hybrid work is here to stay, and the more daring companies in the world are embracing remote work with all its benefits.

In a hybrid and remote work environment, particularly one that spans multiple time zones, meetings are more than just expensive; they are simply impractical.

So, what’s the alternative? Start with purpose. If you’re inviting someone to a meeting, are you clear on the purpose? If the purpose is just to share information, then you don’t need a meeting for that.

Information can be shared asynchronously. Send an email. Record a video. Create a Loom. Use your collaborative project management tool. Send a homing pigeon, if you have one. But don’t take up an hour of people’s time when they could simply read your content in five minutes.

Identify the tools and tactics available to you in your organization. Modern communication tools like 

are ideal for embracing asynchronous flows of communication throughout your organization.

This type of digital technology can be used to send smart, targeted communications within/ across teams, to the wider organization, and to a select number of leaders… the options are endless.

You can also look at video-sharing tools like Loom, in which you can record yourself giving a presentation and send it to your stakeholders to view in their own time. This can save you from calling a meeting—particularly if your presentation is just sharing information.

The Multi-Million Dollar Impact of Communication on Employee & Customer Experience

Other new tools like Fellow are interesting; these enable you to hold asynchronous team meetings instead of having real-time catch-ups each day.

In an async team meeting, all team members complete a shared document in the morning to outline their priorities for the week and any concerns and ideas they have. You can then review it in the afternoon to get a quick overview of what the whole team is working on and whether you need to collaborate with anyone. All without calling a meeting!

Some organizations are async by default, which is certainly unusual but not unheard of. GitLab and Zapier are both fully-remote companies with dispersed workers all over the world. They run their companies on asynchronous communication, using sync time in a limited and purposeful way.

Both organizations are very transparent about how they work; you can find lots of documentation on their websites about how to run a remote company and how to shift towards async communication. 

I recommend having a look—there’s good material there. (Spoiler alert: they don't hold many meetings.)

Now in saying all this, meetings have a place, of course. There are certain situations where communication should be synchronous and real-time. Performance reviews, for example, should be real-time conversations. If you are working on a significant change and you need to influence a key stakeholder, then yes, I would suggest a conversation is required.

The point is to stop and think: what’s the purpose of this meeting? Do I really need to call a meeting, or are there other ways I could communicate more efficiently?

And the killer question: what is this meeting costing me and what is it costing the business? Because remember, if you’re in a large organization that could be as terrifying as 100 million dollars!

Needless Meetings Could Be Killing Your Company. Fact. 

The availability of Artificial Intelligence (AI) content and AI image generators has recently exploded. 

I’ve found myself playing with all sorts of crazy word prompts in AI-driven photo editing apps and AI content generators like the incredible, new Chat GPT.

Above: an AI-generated image by Photoleap from the word prompt: "Colourful cat surfing in sky with fish."

These tools are a game changer; Clear, sophisticated content can now be created at lightning speed. How Professional Communicators make use of AI could set us apart in significant and exciting new ways. But there are also some risks—the impact will depend on how it is implemented and used.

Should Communicators be concerned about AI taking our jobs? I don’t think so. Effective communication is more than just writing—we’ve always rallied against this idea. 

I do think we’ll have to get better at demonstrating how we deliver strategic business value over producing tactical output. AI could well be our ticket: making the tactical more efficient, freeing up time for more strategic efforts, and enabling creativity in a way we’ve never seen before. 

What are AI content and AI image generators?

Based on inputting keywords, phrases, and topics, AI content generators can automatically create copy for blogs, marketing materials, news articles, social media posts, and product descriptions.

Some examples are Jasper, CopyAI, Peppertype, and the more recently launched ChatGPT, which is creating a lot of buzz. You can input anything from “Explain Quantum computing in simple terms to “Creative ideas for a 10-year-old’s birthday.” And it can even write code. 

Similarly, AI image generators turn text into original images in a range of styles; from highly realistic to more stylized or abstract images. Some examples are DALL-E 2, Midjourney, Craiyon, and Dream Studio. 

These tools put design in the hands of everyone and could save hours searching for the perfect image to accompany a story. Significantly, the images generated are all original, avoiding any copyright or IP issues. You can even turn your image into an 

The quality of the generated content can vary widely depending on the specific system and the amount of data it has been exposed to. 

AI-driven tools have many potential benefits that Professional Communicators can leverage: 

 AI is significantly faster because computers can handle enormous volumes of data in much less time than humans can. Tasks such as answering customer inquiries or providing information to employees can be done much more efficiently.

For example, many companies are using AI-powered chatbots, voice bots and virtual assistants to handle customer inquiries. These tools can quickly and efficiently respond to common questions, freeing up human customer service representatives to focus on more complex issues. This not only improves customer satisfaction, but also reduces the workload of employees.

 Many companies are now using AI-powered tools to automatically sort and prioritize emails, calendar invites, and generate responses to customer inquiries. This allows employees to focus on the most important messages and improves their ability to respond quickly to time-sensitive information.

 AI tools can also help managers track and analyze employee engagement, sentiment, and productivity in real time. This provides valuable insights into how employees are feeling about the company and its culture, and can help managers identify and address any issues that may be affecting employee morale.

 AI tools, such as virtual assistants and project management software can help to facilitate collaboration and communication among team members, even if they are located in different parts of the world.

: AI can be used to customize communication based on an individual's preferences and needs. For example, AI-powered email systems can prioritize and suggest responses to messages based on the content of the email and the user's past behavior.

Of course, we should also be aware of the risks of using these tools:

 AI is only as unbiased as the data it is trained on. If the data used to train an AI system is biased, the system will also be biased. This can lead to biased decision-making and communication within an organization. 

 AI systems often operate in ways that are difficult for humans to comprehend, making it difficult to understand how decisions are being made and how communication is being affected.

The automation of certain tasks through AI can lead to job loss in some cases. Of course, the potential for new job creation is also compelling and a reason for all of us to keep learning and developing our skills.

 AI systems can be vulnerable to hacking and other security breaches, which can compromise sensitive communication within an organization.

There is a risk that AI systems may be used for malicious purposes, such as spreading misinformation or manipulating communication within an organization.

It is important to carefully consider these risks when implementing AI in communication processes, and to put measures in place to mitigate potential negative consequences.

And in case you haven’t already guessed it, this article was written with the help of an AI content generator, Chat GPT. Some editing was required but the key points on benefits and risks above were all auto generated from a few different prompts. It’s more formal than my usual writing style but overall, I was very impressed.

As clever as it is, the most effective communication must come from a deep understanding of context and connection to your audience. It’s unlikely AI will ever understand the complexities of organizational culture, politics, and belonging that enables a good communication strategy.

It doesn’t understand body language, emotion, or the nuances of human communication. Nor can it draw on engaging personal anecdotes to bring authenticity, color, and meaning to company goals. 

Like any new technology, it’s just a tool. I don’t think we need to vacate our jobs for the robots any time soon.

I think a bigger issue right now is ensuring the ethical application of AI. For example, 

universities are now having to spring in to action

 to deal with students cheating by using AI to write their essays. 

 Chat GPT is even capable of passing medical licensing exams. Of course, representing someone else’s work as your own is not ok, and all content must be attributed to its correct source. To help address plagiarism concerns, 

 has already created an app that can detect AI-generated content. 

One of the constant challenges for professional Communicators is keeping up with the ever-evolving landscape of communication. But I do think it’s important we stay on top of these emerging technologies so we can use them to our advantage, influence how they are dopted and ensure their ethical application. I highly recommend everyone has a play!

Above, an AI generated image by Photoleap from the word prompt: “Woman writing a colorful article about the benefits and risks of AI content generation.”

Forget About AI Taking Our Comms Jobs—It's a Ticket to Show Our Strategic Value

The Metaverse will be the most talked about technology in 2023 yet, for many, it remains obscure. 

It is the next generation of the internet that is user-driven and controlled, and combines the physical and digital worlds, bringing new experiences and opportunities. 

In business, it will offer a virtual space for people to interact and communicate freely and securely. It can exist either as a virtual reality (VR) or 

Internal communicators of the future will need to understand how the Metaverse will change internal communications and how they can harness this technology to deliver higher-impact communication strategies.

The most significant change will be in the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI), Machine Learning (ML), and Natural Language Processing (NLP), which are quickly taking over content development. 

A perfect example is how I used ChatGPT to create most of this article. If you haven’t heard of it, ChatGPT is one of the most advanced AI tools on the market and Microsoft is in talks to buy and integrate it within its Office and Bing products.

These kinds of developments mean that internal communication specialists will shift focus from content creation to content design and management.

Future-focused internal comms practitioners will be masters in defining the prompts needed for AI to produce high-quality content, with minimal editing needed. 

This will allow for more content creation and will require better planning and management of content distribution.AI, ML, and NLP technologies also will allow for the collection and analysis of large amounts of data, which will enable internal communication teams to better understand their employees’ needs and preferences. 

This will enable them to create more effective internal communication strategies and plans.

(Note that I spent 27 seconds writing the ChatGPT prompt needed to produce this article and approximately 45 minutes editing and enhancing it. When using an AI system to write content, be sure to look up references as sometimes the machine gets it wrong. This is why I included links in the text below to back up examples provided by ChatGPT.)

In the future, internal comms teams will need to interact and communicate with employees in both physical and digital worlds. The use of virtual and augmented reality technology in the Metaverse will force internal communication teams to reach out to employees in new, innovative ways as companies create virtual versions of their offices and host digitally immersive events and conferences.

Therefore, you will need to design multiverse communication strategies: purely physical, physical with Augmented Reality (think of the movie Minority Report), and 100% virtual. For all of these, the experience, employee preferences, and possibilities will be completely different and will require different approaches.

Those who can learn how best to maximize each approach will become true business partners within their organizations. Think about how VR and AR will help in onboarding and training. 

 has implemented the use of VR headsets to train their employees. The headsets allow Walmart employees to experience a virtual store environment and learn customer service skills in a realistic, safe, and cost-effective way.

Furthermore, the Metaverse offers new opportunities to communicate with employees in a more interactive and engaging way. By creating digital avatars, employees can benefit from informal conversations and interactions, and get a better understanding of their colleagues through how they choose to express themselves via their avatar design. 

 s upgrading its platforms to deliver new experiences called Mesh, meaning these experiences will become mainstream very quickly.

Finally, the use of virtual and augmented reality technology will revolutionize the way internal communication teams deliver company events, while at the same time saving on costs associated with physical events. 

From virtual conferences to virtual town halls, these technologies will allow employees to participate in events without having to travel. Furthermore, you will be able to design unique experiences better tailored to your audience. 

 is using this technology to increase engagement with their employees and customers.

The Metaverse will be ubiquitous before you know it. The speed in which the technology is advancing is unprecedented. It might appear overwhelming at times but the most important thing to remember are the principles that define the Metaverse: co-creation, community, and decentralization. 

If you incorporate these principles into your internal communications strategy, then you will see that the Metaverse is simply a tool, like all technology, to deliver the best for your colleagues. 

*This is the original copy written in seconds by ChatGPT in response to my question, what is the Metaverse, and what it will mean for the future of Internal Communications?

What is the Metaverse? The Metaverse is an immersive, digital world, similar to the real world, but enhanced with capabilities made possible through technology. 

It is a collective, shared virtual space where people can interact and collaborate in real time. It can exist either as a virtual reality (VR) or augmented reality (AR) environment. 

The Metaverse is a combination of the physical world with the digital world, offering a virtual space for people to interact and communicate freely and securely. 

Internal communicators of the future will need to understand how to effectively interact and communicate with employees in both physical and digital offices. 

Artificial Intelligence (AI), Machine Learning (ML), and Natural Language Processing (NLP) are quickly taking over content development and internal communication specialists will become more of content managers, using these technologies to facilitate communication.

The use of virtual and augmented reality technology in the Metaverse will revolutionize the way in which internal communication teams deliver company events. 

From virtual conferences to virtual town halls, these technologies will allow employees to participate in events without having to leave the comfort of their own homes. 

Companies are already using this technology to increase engagement with their employees and customers. For example, Walmart has implemented the use of VR headsets to train their employees. 

The headsets allow Walmart employees to experience a virtual store environment and learn customer service skills in a realistic, safe, and cost-effective way. 

The Metaverse also offers new opportunities for internal communication teams to communicate with their employees in a more interactive and engaging way.

By creating digital avatars, employees can interact in virtual spaces and join virtual meetings. This will allow for more informal conversations and a better understanding of their colleagues’ thoughts and feelings. 

Companies such as Google and Microsoft are already using avatars in their communications and have reported improvements in engagement and collaboration. 

The use of virtual and augmented reality technology in the Metaverse will also allow internal communication teams to reach out to employees in new, innovative ways. 

Companies can create virtual versions of their offices and host virtual events and conferences. By doing so, companies can not only reach more people, but also save on costs associated with physical events such as travel and accommodation.

Companies such as Deloitte are already using this technology to host virtual events and conferences to reach out to their employees. The Metaverse will also have a positive impact on internal communications as it will provide easy access to data and analytics. AI, ML, and NLP technologies will allow for the collection and analysis of large amounts of data, which will enable internal communication teams to better understand their employees’ needs and preferences. 

This will allow them to create more effective internal communication strategies and plans. In conclusion, the Metaverse will completely revolutionize the way in which internal communication teams communicate with their employees. AI, ML, and NLP technologies will take over content development and internal communication specialists will become content managers. 

The use of virtual and augmented reality technology will completely change how internal communication teams deliver company events. Companies are already using this technology to increase engagement with their employees and customers. 

The Metaverse will also provide easy access to data and analytics, which will allow internal communication teams to create more effective strategies and plans.

ChatGPT

ChatGPT, the Metaverse and the Future of Internal Communications

The upheaval of the past three years—first the turmoil of COVID-19, then the war in Ukraine and its global fallout—has been unsettling, to say the least. 

The workplace is equally unpredictable with changes due to hybrid work, employee attrition, and depression of real wages due to inflation.

 This is a tough time to make organizational change happen. Employees feel like there’s so much out of control in the outside world that internal company changes are just unwanted. 

Whether it be a business transformation or a simple process change, any kind of change can bring up feelings of doubt, fear, and ‘enough already.’

The Ultimate Guide to Change Management Communication

Inspiring people to make changes has never been harder. It’s time to rethink how we communicate change for 2023 and beyond. Here’s what rings true for me:

      1. Seeing the same big picture is more important than ever.

The big picture holds meaning in peoples’ minds and hearts, and it must be congruent with a company’s purpose and values. A recent Gallup survey found that burnout drops 58% when leaders connect organizational purpose to employees’ individual work.

The big picture can’t be only about what’s good for the company. It must help employees envision a positive future with the company. There must be absolute clarity about how people and teams will benefit from this change. Employees are leaving jobs in record numbers for 

If the big picture doesn’t link to better working lives for employees, it’s unlikely to rally anyone to change for the cause.

     2. Hybrid work makes communicating change much harder.

Hybrid work can be tough on employees. When employees solely connect over video meetings and messaging channels, the work becomes more transactional. Relationships are harder to establish and personal connections are dimmed. 

Employees that feel disconnected from their colleagues and teams will also feel disconnected to change. The social pressure to adopt change is lessened in remote environments. 

Hybrid work is stressful to many employees because they feel isolated and uncertain about what’s really going on in the company. 

 show that people under stress become good at processing the bad news, while ignoring the good news.

When it comes to communications, employees become frustrated when they don’t get quick replies to questions they have. And, it’s harder to find reliable sources of truth when two years after the pandemic, connections have become dispersed, and influencers are harder to reach.

Employees are yearning for predictable, succinct communications that tell the story of what’s going on throughout the company ranks.

Asynchronous communications are more important than ever because teams are increasingly comprised of people in different time zones. 

Good communicators will take the time to go beyond messaging platforms and craft complete, detailed communications that can be delivered via email and posted on company intranet sites. 

Don’t be afraid of a long message, as long as it’s relevant. Employees don’t have the same context for messages if they’re not in the office every day. Take your time, carefully review before you publish, and make your intent clear. Any actions that need to be taken must explicit. 

Give employees adequate time to respond, as global teams can be working 20 hours ahead or behind the message posting.

Create some commonsense rules for communications and stick to them. Any brainstorming session, strategy meeting, or decision-making session needs to be documented, made available to everyone involved, and archived on a platform that team members can easily access, regardless of where they work. 

Don’t become sloppy with your communications and inconsistently document the important decisions. You’ll quickly lose credibility with your employee audience.

There’s a golden opportunity for change communicators to break through this stress fest that hybrid workers are feeling right now and become the single source of truth in a company. 

Communicators can gain the trust of hybrid workers if their messages are clear, delivered consistently through the right channels, and spoken with unabashed truth.

     3. The tone of voice must resonate with employee sentiment now.

Change needs its own voice. Communicators must shift their voice to reflect what’s important right now to employees. While most employees welcome the autonomy of hybrid work, what’s missing is feeling connected to their co-workers and the company itself. 

Communicators must squash the fluff and speak with candor and an instinctual, heartfelt humanity to establish an emotional connection with employees.

 Executives are not used to communicating from their hearts. It’s critical that executives speak with an empathic, unfeigned voice that emotionally resonates with employees to gain trust. 

Trust is fragile, hard to gain, and easy to break. Leaders who communicate consistently with an openness that may at first seem unnatural to them, can quickly become the leader to trust. 

As leaders are being asked upon to open up and show their true feelings more often, tone of voice is critical.

Tone of voice is often misunderstood. Tone of voice includes both the words you choose to describe a situation or a feeling, and the effect in your voice as you deliver these words. 

When you’re writing messages, the tone of voice is limited to the words you choose which can convey a depth of emotions. Imagine you are speaking to your audience, or pick a person in your audience to speak to as you write. It helps to convey the emotion, and the meaning, behind your words.

Leaders are now routinely called upon to deliver their messages personally in a video format to remote employees. There was a famous study done in the ‘70s by UCLA Professor Albert Mehrabian about how people weigh the importance of spoken and unspoken language in deducing meaning from personal messages. 

He developed a messaging meaning pie chart, called the 7/38/55% rule for speakers talking about feelings. When someone is talking about their feelings, 7% of the meaning is deduced from the words, 38% from the tone of voice (inflection versus word choice), and 55% from body language.

Mehrabian’s findings are highly relevant for leaders delivering messages about change. In later years, he further clarified his findings to reiterate that the 7/38/55% equation was derived from experiments dealings with communications of feelings and attitudes, like and dislike. He described his equation this way:

Total Liking = 7% Verbal Liking + 38% Vocal Liking + 55% Facial Liking.

 As remote employees seek to unravel the meaning behind video presentations given by their leaders, body language is the critical clue to understanding. Not all body language is overt. Even eye contact can have a huge impact on how a message is received. Here’s 

10 tips for improving video body language

    4. Leaders must be storytellers and story gatherers

People bring their own stories, experiences, and feelings to any organizational change. An emotionally connected narrative helps build trust and establish a shared vision of what the future change holds for everybody. 

Relatable stories are important because they demonstrate to people that they’re not alone in what they’re experiencing. As employees are seeking more connection in a hybrid work world, memorable stories help draw the big picture and build connection.

 Change communications must be supported by engaged, visible leaders who are visible working in, not just on, the change. Leaders can be powerful storytellers when they talk about their own experiences and exhibit vulnerability.

Leadership storytelling can reinforce the purpose of the change being considered and connect it to an individual’s work, answering the question ‘why am I working here?’

The most effective storytellers truly understand and care about their audiences. Leaders can get to know their employees better by listening to their stories. 

Empathy is a two-way street. Most companies have a version of a virtual Ask Me Anything meeting in which employees ask execs questions in real time. The ridesharing company Lyft recently turned the tables on this format and introduced Flip it Fridays where executives get to ask people questions instead of just answering them. 

Bidirectional communications help create those interpersonal relationships that employees need to feel connected to a company and its purpose. 

Change is uncertain by its very nature and the course it takes always has twists and turns. In the fragmented environment of hybrid work, change initiatives are bound to take longer. 

The key is sticking with it for the long haul with a connected storyline. As change progresses, make sure the big picture remains intact.

Take an agile approach to communicating change. Listen to employee feedback and adjust your communications accordingly. People hear things differently and what you think may be crystal clear isn’t. 

Communicators may feel like broken records framing and reframing the big picture, but it’s essential because the same audience won’t be intact throughout the journey. A recent 

 found that nearly half (43%) of employees plan to leave their employers this year.

Organizational changes can add stress to already stressed-out employees. What’s important is to be persistent and bring people into the change proposition versus taking the attitude of it happening to them. 

Don’t just communicate milestones, give people insight on what’s being worked on now, the progress that’s being made, and what still needs to be worked on. Don’t over-rationalize what didn’t work. Be realistic about the proposed change, the risks, and what the future holds.

 The good news is that employees are ready for change right now. People want to be happy at work. The outside world seems hard to grasp. Perhaps that’s one reason. trust has shifted from governments to organizations in the past two years. 

Companies that prioritize people right now and have a promising vision for the future will win in this tight job marketplace.

The best communicators will recognize the opportunity to create positive, lasting change and help make it happen. Go for it!

Rethinking Change Communications for 2023

Quiet quitting signals the death of office culture.

Quiet quitting is passive-aggressively checking out.

Quiet quitters will be the first to be let go when the labor market cools.

Your LinkedIn feed is probably humming right now with the noise of various opinions on the “Gen Z workplace trend” that swept through the latter half of 2022, and shows no let-up in 2023.

There’s nothing we love more than a new catchy buzzword–even if it’s applied to a phenomenon that’s been in existence since the year dot.

Quiet quitting refers to the practice of employees doing the bare minimum in their jobs. They perform the tasks necessary to maintain their jobs but never go above and beyond. Some believe this is essentially being a disengaged worker, while others argue that quiet quitters are perfectly content in their work life—just not emotionally invested.

The use of the term quiet quitting is relatively new. It first emerged in March 2022 when a video describing quiet quitting trended on TikTok. A Gallup survey released in September 2022 revealed that at least 50% of American workers are quiet quitters.

While the COVID-19 pandemic itself didn’t spawn quiet quitting, it did arguably kickstart a movement where employees questioned their dedication to work. 

More specifically, they now had the time and the inclination to ask themselves why exactly they prioritized their work above their home life. This new arrangement of “working from home” highlighted how they could achieve a better work-life balance.

In effect, workers were presented with a golden opportunity to completely reassess their lifestyles.

Another by-product of the pandemic, “the Great Resignation,” saw many workers leave their jobs to pursue other opportunities. This mass resignation meant many organizations faced staff shortages, making it more important than ever to retain current employees. 

“It’s a worker’s market” became a common refrain. Employees, feeling more secure in their roles, perhaps decided they could take their foot off the pedal without the risk of losing their jobs.

For others, it became essential to maintain those new pandemic habits, such as not answering emails or phone calls outside of work hours, downing tools at exactly end-of-play, or taking their full allocation of holidays and sick days.

Regardless of your own viewpoint on the ethics of quiet quitting, we must acknowledge that it is a practice that is trending globally.

You’d be forgiven for thinking that quiet quitting isn’t a particular problem. Workers are doing their jobs, right? Well yes. But for organizations to thrive, they need their people to buy in, to get actively involved, and to put their hands up. In short—be fully engaged.

The growth in the trend of quiet quitting coincides with a record drop in productivity rates in the US during the first two quarters of 2022. A drop in productivity has several implications. It can hamstring an organization, and cause it to cede advantage to its competitors. 

Of course, it can also dramatically impact an organization’s bottom line. The drop in productivity in 2022 cost the world $7.8 trillion, which equates to 11% of global GDP!

More worrying for the long term, the Gallup survey revealed that the engagement levels of workers under the age of 35 dropped by six percentage points between 2019 and 2022. 

This suggests that work ennui is becoming more prevalent among the Gen Z and younger millennials demographic. This does not bode well for the future of work.

So how can organizations reduce quiet quitting and encourage more engagement among their people? Let’s have a look at some of the tactics for improving worker engagement.

How to manage quiet quitting in your organization


We’ve written at length about the importance of employee engagement. It simply cannot be overstated. Engaged employees are more enthusiastic about their work, and will be more likely to go that extra mile. Organizations need to work on making people feel valued, but also, and this is crucial, showing them that their work has value.

Traditionally, organizations focused on offering high salaries and excellent benefits in a bid to boost engagement, but that alone doesn’t impress the Gen Z cohort. They need to feel a sense of purpose in their job. Here are some ways to foster that sense of purpose:


● Create an open and transparent workplace

● Clearly communicate all relevant company decisions

● Personalize and tailor communications to boost readership

● Encourage employee feedback and two-way conversation ● Invest in employee well-being and development

● Consult employees—they are experts in their area—to offer key insights

● Set up peer-to-peer groups where workers can train each other

The Great Resignation forced organizations to re-evaluate their internal culture and their relationship with their employees. To improve staff retention, many promised to introduce programs aimed at improving employee conditions, including well-being, work-life balance, and flexible work schedules. 

These promises re-invigorated workers, who saw them as proof that organizations listened to and valued their people. Now is the time for organizations to stand by those assurances. 

Half-heartedly enacting stated promises, or not keeping them at all, is a recipe for disaster—and a fast track to quiet quitting.

What does your culture say about your organization? Is it employee-centric and inclusive? Does it value worker feedback? Does it have staff well-being at its core?

HARMONY PLATFORM

HARMONY PLATFORM

PRODUCTS

HOW IT WORKS

SOLUTIONS

ACHIEVE MORE IN HARMONY

SOLUTIONS

USE CASES

FEATURED CASE STUDIES

Pax 8

Maximus

Valley Health

INDUSTRIES

INDUSTRY OVERVIEW

INDUSTRIES

FEATURED CASE STUDY

CDK Global

OUR COMPANY

OUR COMPANY OVERVIEW

OUR COMPANY

FEATURED CASE STUDY

CDK Global

RESOURCES

RESOUCES OVERVIEW

RESOURCES

FEATURED CONTENT

The Ultimate Guide to Internal Comms Strategy

The Multi-Million Dollar Impact of Communication on Employee & Customer Experience

Blog category

All

The best on communications delivered weekly to your inbox.