'Quiet hiring' will dominate the U.S. in 2023, says HR expert--and you need to prepare for it

[Yavin4]

Quiet hiring is when an organization acquires new skills without actually hiring new full-time employees, says Emily Rose McRae, who has led Gartner’s future of work research team since its 2019 inception, focusing on HR practices.

Sometimes, it means hiring short-term contractors. Other times, it means encouraging current employees to temporarily move into new roles within the organization, McRae says.

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/01/04/gartner-hr-expert-quiet-hiring-will-dominate-us-workplaces-in-2023.html

The old, "doing more with less", b.s. that has dominated corporate America for decades.

[brooklynite]

1. I had a title that had very little to do with my specific job responsibilities....

...which changed depending on the needs of the organization. Didn't bother me. I'd rather have varierty than work niche.

[Hortensis]

2. But also enabling employees to upgrade their skills and resumes, and

eventually earnings. Right that this is nothing new, but it also offers real chances for self advancement and higher wages.

This is indicating that opportunities for advancement within may become relatively more abundant compared to opportunities through transfers to new employers. Which can be accomplished later once they actually have additional, higher level skills to sell.

[Yavin4]

5. If it really is an "upgrade"

Sometimes, it's not.

[patphil]

6. From my experience in the Pharmaceutical Industry,

it often meant taking on more workload from employees who were at the same or lower levels.
It doesn't necessarily mean you are learning new skills, or gaining better job experience.
It just means the company wants you to do more work for the same pay...often expecting salaried employees to work longer hours for the same pay.

[Yavin4]

10. That's my experience as well.

We had several people all quit at the same time and more were leaving in the coming months. They didn't bother to post job ads until the 10th person left. They expected 6 people to do the work of 21 people.

[Hortensis]

22. Of course that's a different case, and it will be the case

in some of these situations. But not others, and there are always those who will grab positive opportunities. And those who won't.

In any case, none of this is anything new, but as a trend is something people should be able to look out for. Improving one's marketability on the job at employer's expense -- then if necessary moving to a new company that'll pay market wage for an employee trained and given experience by a competitor -- can be a highly desirable alternative to taking expensive classes to upgrade skills and then looking for a new entry job.

[WhiskeyGrinder]

3. lol good lord

[Johnny2X2X]

4. There is still a huge labor shortage

It’s not going away. Especially for highly skilled and technical workers. Wages are going to continue to rise. Big business and Republicans hate this, but it’s not going away for years or maybe decades.

[Yavin4]

13. Demographic change.

The entire boomer generation will reach retirement age in 7 years while GenXers will start reaching retirement age in 8 years. Those that can retire early largely because of asset inflation in stocks and housing over the past decade have already started to retire. There are not enough Millenials or Zoomers to fill in the gaps.

[jimfields33]

14. That's why the need to completely lift the cap on social security today!

[Yavin4]

15. This is the main reason why the Republican party has made a compact with fringe elements

They need the crazies to vote to gut, or even outright kill, SS and Medicare. They need to stop or greatly slow down the march towards retirement.

To replace retiring workers, corporations have to pay their younger replacements more money because of rising cost of living.

[Buckeyeblue]

23. Also Republicans, 20 years ago, started to require standardized testing

Which has decreased the effectiveness of education. Millennial, especially younger ones and GenZ, were not taught critical thinking skills. They aren't particularly good problem solvers. They are great coders. They are grwat at learning specific skills. But being able to write code or use their skill in ambiguous situations sometimes makes you shake your head.

As a plus, these groups have a low tolerance for dealing with bullshit. So they are quick to go find a new job. Good for them.

[Yavin4]

25. Education has become as competitive as youth sports with all of the bad things that come with that.

Over-bearing parents yelling at teachers to get their kids better grades. Private coaching to do better on tests. Avoiding learning hard subjects in order to maintain a high GPA. Involving their kids in extra curricular activities solely to impress admissions officers. Etc.

Higher education contributes to this by making admissions so selective that only a tiny fraction of students get into the top schools. All it produces is kids with a heightened sense of entitlement.

[The Third Doctor]

7. In my experience it means tacking on extra work responsibilities

For the same amount of pay.

[Straw Man]

28. Exactly.

I had a supervisor once who had a saying that I learned to dread: "For this project, I'm going to have to clone you." That was her way of saying I was going to have to do twice as much work -- generally my job and someone else's at the same time.

I managed to last a year there by judicious application of the Peter Principle. Then I got the fuck out of the private sector and went back to academia.

[bearsfootball516]

8. "encouraging current employees to temporarily move into new roles within the organization"

Sounds like "We'd like you to take on more responsibilities and stresses, but with no additional pay"

[Mad_Machine76]

9. That's

What it sounds like to me.

[Mad_Machine76]

11. Corporate America

Loves their creative euphemisms

[iemanja]

12. My employer is encouraging people to move into new roles

They are centralizing more jobs. I still don't know what that means for my position.

[Renew Deal]

19. It's better for you to eagerly move voluntarily

Than for someone else to decide for you.

[iemanja]

21. I don't have anywhere to move

not that I can think of. What I do is unique.

[MagickMuffin]

17. The new Speaker will get right on it

He’s all about the working man, it’s in his acceptance speech!

[Samrob]

18. Giant Food is already doing this. Here is how.

High numbers of uniformed folks (looking like Giant employees) walking around stocking shelves and setting up displays. I stopped one to ask where a certain item was located. His response: "Sorry, but I am not a Giant employee, we are just here to unload cargo and stock shelves. Wish I could help you but I am not familiar with the store and we can't perform employee services."

In the meantime, the self check-out line was backed up in a single aisle (16 people) waiting to check themselves out while the single cashier was facing down shoppers with carts running over. It's more like doing less with less than doing more with less. Prices still going up for no reason.

[Renew Deal]

20. Employees might like this

People want to feel like they’re learning and growing, so having the opportunity to grow into new positions might be appealing. Also, it’s better to choose to grow than for others to think you’re stagnant.

[Retrograde]

24. What other old buzz phrases are they throwing around?

Back in the day a favorite management slogan was "work smarter, not harder", which usually meant the opposite

[eppur_se_muova]

26. For "acquires new skills", read "demands new skills from current employees" ...

without providing training, natch.

[Mr.Bill]

27. I used to bartend at a country club

but now and then I would take a shift in the kitchen working alongside the chef. I really enjoyed it, but I was too old to start a new career and wouln't want to work those hours on a regular basis. I was surprised at how much I could learn in a short time.

[TheBlackAdder]

29. If the employee is a solid performer and liked by management, inter-department transfers

.

are often signs that the employee is being groomed for promotion and management wants them to be exposed to multiple aspects of the firm, especially in the division they are working.

I've had people express to me in the past that they were openly pissed off that they were being shafted by management and could not understand why. Knowing the promotional pipeline, I told them that this was a good sign. Management does not divulge the reason why they are shuffling the employee around to see how they react to on-demand changes. It's part of the promotional test.

I would tell them what's up, and sure enough in a year or two, they would move to a mid-management position.

Managers like people who relieve them of pressures, with little resistance. It's the same we all feel, would you like someone who has your back or someone who complains and causes extra demands? Now, there are quite a lot of companies that abuse employees outright, but if you are in a good firm, dutiful work with minimal direction secures your position or improves it over time. What I like to tell people in other firms, you don't have to kill yourself, just do 10% better than the rest of the people to be the top performer, and if there is a crisis, be flexible to fill the voids.

Unforeseen shit happens in most every company, whether by fluke or management error that caused an issue. When I look back at the past 40+ years of employment, the people who were discharged were the ones that were unreliable, caused friction or complained or abused company benefits. The ones who stayed, after downsizing or trimming, were those who were reliable, flexible and nice.

I remember in one company, they were going through a tough time and asked if people would take a 10% cut in pay to keep all employees working. They needed to trim about 5% of the workforce. Guess what 5% they trimmed? The people who refused to take the pay cut since they were more self-affecting than looking out for co-workers. That made management's choice easy. A year later everyone's pay was restored, with an annual raise to boot. Sure it sucked to take that kind of pay hit and required sacrifice, but most of the employees were great and that would have sucked more to see them getting laid off.

.

[Yavin4]

30. That's not what this is.

This is doing more with less. They're not "grooming" people for promotion. More than likely, they are making people do more tasks because they refuse to hire more people to replace the people that are leaving.

I'm happy for you that you had a positive experience working for companies, but that's not everyone by far, no matter what their attitude was.

[TheBlackAdder]

32. This is not new. M work experience has always been do more with less. It's just a business reality.

.

In the past, say like in the 80s things were staffed better, but mid-80s it started to change a lot.

Companies start to downsize, either by attrition or layoffs and expect the work to be picked up. As long as the work is being done, they are successful in their objectives, as the employees adapt to the increased demands up to the point of burnout. What needs to be done is to allow latent demand to creep in. Only perform what is necessary and skip the unnecessary tasks. The only way more people will be hired is if the work does not get done. The past 30 years I have been in the "Do more with Less" mode and that is the way to stop it and maintain some semblance of work sanity and quality of life.

The thing that annoys me now is that people attend these sessions to 'improve the business' and when they come back they add new tasks or record-keeping requirements--all which comes with a cost of time and labor. While these things seem nice on paper, in a theoretical business environment, they completely suck in the applied world. The only way to stop this shit is to not participate in it, especially if overloaded with core business needs.

Again, as long as the work gets done, they'll pile more work on the employees. Sure management will gripe that it should be done, b ut there has to be push-back at some point. There is the straw that breaks the camel's back.

.

[Happy Hoosier]

31. I got "stealth promoted"

I found myself running projects when I had only been the technical lead previously.

It was a bit sneaky, but my boss did give me the option to step back after doing this for a few months. I ultimately accepted it and there was a raise involved.

This was partially driven by the fact that the skills market is tight, and hiring an external person to do the job had proven very difficult.