The Great Remorse?

The Great Remorse?

According to Fortune.com, “The Great Remorse takes over the Great Resignation as most workers who quit their job are having a hard time finding a new one.” And so it begins…

Back on April 4th, I published the blog post “When the Pendulum Swings…” because I knew it would.

“Just as the pendulum will swing away from being an extreme sellers’ market with buyers willing to waive inspections, overbid, offer based on photos without even going to the house, etc., this will happen with the job market as well. It’s only a matter of time.”

Now here we are.

Links I discuss in this episode:

https://www.yahoo.com/video/great-remorse-takes-over-great-133000047.html

https://www.forbes.com/sites/davidmorel/2022/04/19/why-the-great-regret-is-actually-the-great-reality-check/?sh=30033ca52e3d

https://www.linkedin.com/news/story/why-employees-really-call-it-quits-6069714/

Sound Effect by Charlie_Raven from Pixabay

Need more? Email me: https://causeyconsultingllc.com/contact-causey/

 

Transcription by Otter.ai.  Please forgive any typos!

Welcome to the Causey Consulting Podcast. You can find us online anytime at CauseyConsultingLLC.com. And now, here’s your host Sara Causey. Hello. Hello. Thanks for tuning in. In today’s episode, I want to tackle the question has the great resignation turned into the great remorse, insert scary music here on Saturday, November 12 fortune.com published the article, the great remorse takes over the great resignation as most workers who quit their job are having a hard time finding a new one. Let’s read the latest workers to join the great resignation aren’t having as easy a time finding a new job as they thought it would be. And it’s leading to the great remorse. A new Harris Poll as first reported by Bloomberg surveyed over 2000 us job seekers recent experiences with the labor market, over 70% of them said it has been harder than they’d hoped to lock down a good role. It’s a confusing market for every one. among workers who intend to stay in their current role. Nearly two thirds told Harris Poll, it’s because they genuinely enjoy the work they’re doing and have no desire to leave. 1/5 of those workers admit they’re not working their dream job. But the pay and benefits are too good to give up. And the remaining 17% said they’d ideally like to switch jobs, but in an uncertain economy and looming recession. They don’t want to risk the financial security of staying put all button long enough to say, Well, yeah, to me, that makes perfect sense. Now, as I’ve said before, I can’t give anybody advice, and I can’t tell everybody what to do. Your situation is your own, you know the nuances of what’s going on? I don’t. Generally speaking, it’s a pretty tough sell in q4, especially the closer we get to the actual holidays. It’s a tough sell, to get candidates to want to make a change, or to even get on the phone, hey, let’s have a serious conversation about it. Not asking you to make a decision right now not asking you to upset the applecart with what you have going on in the holidays. But you know, January is going to be here sooner than we think. Why don’t we go ahead and talk about it, lay the groundwork. Now. Sometimes it’s very difficult to even get people to do that. They are so into what I call holiday inertia. They’ve already requested their time off. They’ve made arrangements. So they know where are we going for Thanksgiving? And then where are we going for Christmas? They don’t want to upset that situation. And I understand especially since we had to deal with the lock downs. People wanted to go see family and couldn’t a lot of people now this holiday, if they can afford the gasoline are going to attempt to go somewhere for the holidays, or at least be with family in general. They don’t want to start thinking about upsetting what’s going on in their job. They just don’t. And I don’t blame them. Just speaking for me personally, which is all that I can do. For me to think about making some big leap in the middle of economic uncertainty, not knowing exactly how bad this poopoo storm is about to get along with inflation, even though they’re telling us wink wink, nudge nudge that inflation is starting to get better. I don’t believe it. I’m not seeing any evidence of it yet. So when I personally want to upset my applecart and make some big change right now. Wow. The I’d have to I’d have to sit down and do a cost benefit analysis and really think about it. There would have to be enough to gain for me to even consider it. If it was a lateral move. Hell no. Absolutely. Hell no. If I had any negative vibes about the company, there was anything about the hiring manager that was even the slightest turn off. No. For me personally, it would be an absolute hell no. I’ll continue to read. They may have a point while businesses report robust hiring increases last month, unemployment is slowly creeping back up. Just look at the rash of layoffs, some numbering in the 10s of 1000s at companies like Mehta, peloton, Twitter and Lyft. These unstable conditions may come as a shock to the millions of workers who last year had become accustomed to having the firm upper hand. I’m gonna button again long enough to say back in April I wrote a blog post called when the pendulum swings, because I knew that it would, I could see the writing on the wall. And I knew a lot of people were going to feel pretty unprepared. And see, that’s the thing. markets don’t last forever. Whether it’s a bull market, a bear market, a market where you’re making money hand over fist, or you feel like you can’t scrape two nickels together. It’s not going to last forever. And so during the Great resignation, when candidates could, in many cases write their own check. I knew that was not going to last forever. But unfortunately, sometimes when we get into a really good run of good luck, we don’t want it to end. And that’s human nature. You know, look at the realtors who went and got themselves obligated for expensive houses, boats, expensive vehicles, they put pools in they did all kinds of cool stuff because they thought that the party would never end. Now look at the housing market, not dumpster fire. Nearly three quarters 72% of workers on the job hunt Harris poll found believe hiring managers are dropping the ball often ignoring their application submissions are failing to schedule interviews. As a result, about two thirds of those job seekers expressed regret over failing to begin their search sooner. About the same amount said they imagine their plight would have been easier last year or in 2020. Case in point, it’s been a long road sure has been over 60% of seekers say the search is dragged on for over six months. And many say they’ve applied to more than 50 roles. The frustration and the slog of the job search has led over half 51% of seekers who agree that as it stands, they will take any job offer that comes along and that’s one more sign that the great resignation might finally after nearly two years be cooling off yeah. I’ve told you before it’s toast it’s done. Now as far as white collar work goes Now could it still be going on in retail gin, labor hospitality fast food? Yes, it very well could be. But as far as white collar so called knowledge work goes Oh, the great resignation has been over with for a while. By the time some talking head in the media tells you I figure it’s cooling off. I think it’s starting to dwindle down. It’s already over with. But things haven’t been looking up for jobseekers for some time. Now, a July report from Job List found that a quarter of workers who quit during the pandemic have come to regret it. And a march 2022 Harris poll found that over a third of respondents who regretted quitting said that their new role their work life balance had declined. Their new job was different than what they were led to expect, and that they actually miss the culture of their old job. These testimonies all suggest that the power is firmly back in the hands of the employers just like Bank of America said that that’s exactly what they wanted to have happen. Whose best bet now might be to warm up to the idea of boomerang employees. So long as they agree not to say I told you so. Walker, over on forbes.com. We also find why the great regret is actually the great reality check. In that article we find after two years of crisis and working from home, many are finding it hard to react re acclimatized as COVID restrictions ease and the world opens up again. people’s attitudes towards work and what they expect from their jobs have changed irrevocably. They’ve become accustomed to a new normal where quality of life takes precedence. Except this isn’t the new normal. Isn’t that a mouthful? That’s not to say that we’ve gone back to the way things were before. On the contrary, the pandemic has left a positive legacy and made work more human. Flexible Working has gained widespread acceptance, there’s a new openness around mental health and a new recognition of employee worth. All of which bodes well for the future. However, arguably, the pandemic has also led to unrealistic expectations that there’s always something better, a more fulfilling role a higher salary, greater flexibility, which is left employees and job seekers wanting more. And it’s understandable that people should aspire to a role that is rewarding, well paid and flexible. However, sometimes jobseekers expectations are at odds with employers requirements. More and more candidates are limiting their search to fully remote jobs. Even applicants for traditional client facing roles are requesting to work from home full time, which reduces the opportunities available to them. Some people have moved out of the city during the pandemic and expect a higher salary for commuting in and even then they’re only prepared to travel to the office a few times a week. They think works would fit around the new lives and new routines they’ve carved out for themselves during the pandemic. But that isn’t always possible. With such high expectations, it is no wonder the reality doesn’t measure up here. So before I put my two cents in, I’m going to hop over to LinkedIn because they published an article titled, Why employees really call it quits. In that we find remote work seems like it’s here to stay. But so too, is the challenge of creating work life balance from the comforts of our home offices. Without it, we’re more likely to feel stressed and burned out. And we may even be compelled to quit. That’s where managers really need to step up slash step in one business expert tells the Atlantic folks don’t leave jobs, daily managers. So how can bosses help avert burnout, it’s important managers first understand when an employee is feeling burned out, and then should help set realistic parameters, whatever that means. leader should encourage r&r, it’s healthy, and employees will be more productive if they get good rest. Without a doubt, a bad manager can make an otherwise good job at a good company turned into a living nightmare. backstabby coworkers having to sit in an office space where you feel microaggressions or you feel threatened in some way, that too can suck the life out of the situation. And in some workplaces, the whole thing, the entire ball of wax is a toxic mess. A boss from hell, coworkers, you don’t get along with company culture is abysmal. It’s just not a good fit anywhere in the situation. And you feel like your best shot at sanity is leaving, I get it. I’ve been there and done that. So one question we have to ask is, Is this even true? Do people have all this remorse about quitting? Is it accurate that most people left because they had a boss from hell? And they just wanted to get away? Did they job hop to get more money? What was the real motivation? And then assuming that there is a great remorse taking over? What really fueled it? And what should these people do now? Look, the Fed has not been shy in saying they want to crash the job market. They want to see unemployment go up. As well as wages become stagnant for the people who manage to hang on to employment. None of that sounds like a fun time. Sounds awful. And I think once we’re allowed to know that unemployment is not really 3.7%. And the increase in unemployment that they want to see is going to be worse than 5.5%. It could get pretty brutal. I’ve predicted for quite some time that we have moved from the carrot to the stick, that corporate America is really at a point of like, No, you need to come on back. I mean, I think a lot of them to be honest with you would love to do what Lord Elon does come in and breeze in buy the place like Mr. bigshot. And then say, Look, your common back, work from home or work from anywhere is over. If you don’t like it, there’s the door. I think a lot of CEOs would love to implement a policy like that. And my prediction is, as we get further into whatever this economic poop storm is, as it becomes more and more obvious, to John and Jane Q Public. Oh, we’re in a mess. I feel like a lot of those companies are going to be further emboldened to do just that. So if it’s true that people are feeling remorse about quitting, and that they are on the job market longer, it’s becoming more difficult to even get a job and some of these people are saying I’ll take whatever is offered to me because I feel like I screwed up. How much worse Do you think it will get as we get further into this mess? Just some food for thought. Stay safe, stay sane, and I will see you in the next episode. Thanks for tuning in. If you enjoyed this episode, please take a quick second to subscribe to this podcast and share it with your friends. We’ll see you next time.

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