“Silent Vacations”: as a phenomenon between Millennials became “worst CEO nightmare”

Employees need to ensure that their zoom funds are sufficiently blurred – the secret of “silent vacation” has been revealed. Employees, especially, are expanding the limits of remote work, according to a new study. Instead of informing their bosses that they are taking off, workers are absent or leave on their vacation on the appearance of working remotely.

According to the Harris Poll “Office Culture Report”, which interviewed 1,170 adults employed in the US, 37% of workers said they took off without informing their supervisors or managers.

“They will find out how to have a proper balance between personal and professional life, but this is happening behind the scenes,” said Libby Rodney, Harris Poll’s strategy director. “It’s not exactly a silent resignation, but more like silent holidays.”

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Those, which represent almost 40% of the workforce, were extremely absurd to give their bosses the impression that they are still working, according to the Harris Poll report. Almost 40% reported that they shook their computer mice to look active online, and the same number said they sent emails outside of working hours to create the illusion that they were doing overtime.

“Instead of facing the situation in front and worrying about whether they will bother your boss during a difficult economic quarter, they are just doing what they need to take their vacation,” Rodney told.

But the cost of not displeasing is the baggage of guilt and stress for many of these workers. The Harris Poll report indicates that most employees are pleased with the number of paid days off they receive, suggesting that the desire for silent holidays is not a matter of politics but a cultural issue. Almost half of the survey respondents, including 61% of millennials and 58% of Gen Z, said they are nervous when asking for time off. The pressure to always respond to job consultations and the blame for leaving pending work for colleagues were some of the main reasons for this.

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The desire for “silent holidays” ultimately highlights a new form of anxiety from the workers who emerged during the pandemic, said Rodney. There is an abyss between the company’s culture that young workers want and what their older managers continue to impose.

“It’s definitely not a healthy system, but it’s a system that is happening to the American worker now,” she said.

A divided workplace

Although it has been four years since the beginning of the pandemic, CEOs have been firm in their disagreement with remote work, feeling a loss of control over employee supervision and, consequently, a loss of status like bosses. Last October, 62% of CEOs were categorical about all workers to return to the office by 2026, an ambitious goal that has not realized since then. Meanwhile, 90% of employees interviewed in the same month said they were not interested in returning to a pre-covid work culture, according to a Gallup survey.

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In addition, workers’ dissatisfaction is fueled by the toxic behavior of their bosses, with 46% of employees classifying their worst boss as “incompetent” or “little sympathetic”, according to a June 2023 survey by Percepttyx employee insights. Division at the workplace resulted in a misaligned culture, where workers internalize the value of the balance between personal and professional life that the pandemic has established, while companies try to maintain the status quo.

“The office culture has not changed, even if our values ​​and the values ​​of the American worker have changed,” said Rodney. “Experience and expectations are almost as if the pandemic had never happened.”

Rodney is friendly to companies that are attached to old habits. In times of economic stress, there is a inclination to return to previous standards. For employers, this means that CEOs are imposing old practices, such as having employees working in person and discouraging clearances, because it is a model that worked in the past.

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But changes to accommodate the next generation of workers who demand flexibility are happening: most companies, even with traditional workplace values, has given way to hybrid work, and employee attitudes are also changing. For the first time since the pandemic, Americans prefer hybrid work to remote work, a change that is not the result of pizzas free given by the company, but an adaptation to new standards.

There are good incentives for companies to continue to adapt. Generation Z is about to overcome the number of their colleagues in the workforce this year, leaving companies with little choice but to give in to their moving demands.

“There will probably be another war of talent, in which companies that put the priorities of generation Z and at the top, and put the balance between personal and professional life as a priority – they will be the signs of what attracts this next talent market,” said Rodney.