tl;dr
Quiet quitting refers to employees who meet basic job requirements but withdraw discretionary effort, often as a response to burnout, lack of recognition, or unmet expectations. While outward performance may remain stable, engagement and motivation decline beneath the surface. Luppa helps organizations detect early signs of this trend through data-driven insights from Deep Dive and Pulse surveys. Proactive responses — including setting clear expectations, fostering psychological safety, ensuring fair recognition and workloads and strengthening leadership are essential to preventing disengagement and promoting a culture of commitment.
Introduction
Employees don’t always leave with a resignation letter — sometimes, they quietly check out and stay.
When that happens, productivity stalls, team spirit fades and innovation slows to a crawl. This phenomenon, known as quiet quitting, is becoming increasingly common. Quiet quitting isn’t about walking away from a job — it’s about walking away from extra effort, emotional investment and personal initiative. On the surface, everything might seem fine: deadlines are met, tasks are completed but under the surface, motivation is eroding.
In this blog, we’ll explore what quiet quitting really means, why it happens, how to spot the signs early and what organizations can do to turn quiet disengagement into renewed commitment.
What is quiet quitting?
Quiet quitting doesn't mean leaving the job - it means leaving behind discretionary effort. It's when employees stop going above and beyond and start doing only what’s strictly required. While performance may still appear "acceptable" on the surface, motivation, initiative and emotional investment have quietly faded.
Employees in this state often:
- Avoid extra responsibilities
- Withdraw socially and avoid team events
- Stay silent in meetings or surveys
- Decline tasks that fall outside their official job description
- Set strict work-life boundaries, avoiding after-hours communication
- Show signs of absenteeism, such as increased sick days
Quiet quitting is rarely about laziness. It’s often a rational response to unmet expectations, broken trust, or emotional burnout. Recognizing this helps organizations focus on creating supportive environments that address these deeper challenges.
Theories that explain quiet quitting
There are several psychological theories that help explain the phenomenon of quiet quitting and why employees emotionally withdraw or reduce their discretionary effort at work. These theories offer insights into the various factors and motivations behind this behavior. Among them, three key theories are especially useful in understanding quiet quitting:
1. Social exchange theory (SET)
This theory suggests workplace relationships are based on reciprocal exchanges. When employees feel they are giving more (effort, time, energy) than they receive (recognition, growth, respect), they scale back their contributions. Quiet quitting is a form of rebalancing the perceived "inequity" in the exchange.
2. Psychological contract theory
This theory posits that employees have unwritten expectations about how they should be treated. When these are violated — for example, when promised development doesn’t materialize, or management doesn’t act on feedback — employees feel betrayed. Quiet quitting becomes a way of mentally withdrawing from a broken relationship.
3. Equity theory
Equity theory focuses on fairness. Employees compare their input/output ratio to peers. If they perceive they’re doing more for the same (or less) reward, resentment can lead to disengagement. This perception is particularly sensitive to issues of recognition, promotions and workload.
The quiet quitting in Croatia
Our recent data suggests that 42.43% of Croatian employees fall into the quiet quitting category. That’s almost every second employee operating in a state of minimal engagement — a number that should concern any organization striving for productivity, innovation, or strong team culture.
In addition, it is important to consider our broader engagement data, which supports these findings: 24% of employees are actively engaged, 29% remain neutral and a significant 47% feel demotivated.
Together, these insights highlight widespread emotional withdrawal and low motivation in the workforce. Therefore, it is recommended that organizations focus on promoting supportive and inclusive work environments to address quiet quitting and strengthen workplace culture.
What might cause quiet quitting?
According to a recent scoping review and employee behavior studies, the most common underlying causes of quiet quitting include:
- Unclear job expectations: When goals are vague and roles are ambiguous, employees feel disconnected from purpose and performance.
- Poor leadership and management: Micromanagement, indifference or lack of support from supervisors consistently correlates with disengagement.
- Inadequate reward and recognition: When people feel their efforts are overlooked or undervalued, motivation quickly declines.
- Challenging work environments: Unkind interactions, gossip, subtle exclusion and passive-aggressive dynamics cause employees to emotionally withdraw.
- Burnout: Sustained overwork without recovery leads to burnout - a proven gateway to quiet quitting.
Quiet quitting is not just an individual reaction - it is often a systemic response to a work environment that violates psychological or emotional contracts.
How can Luppa help detect quiet quitting?
Through its comprehensive annual surveys, Luppa helps identify quiet quitting tendencies before they spiral into full disengagement.
Luppa’s predictive analytics offer deep insight into employee behavior and workplace dynamics, highlighting trends that might otherwise go unnoticed. By analyzing a wide range of engagement and satisfaction indicators, Luppa helps organizations detect early signs of disengagement — including quiet quitting — and understand the underlying factors behind them.
Luppa’s quiet quitting analysis:
One of the key features of Luppa’s predictive analytics is a Quiet Quitting analysis, that segments employees into two key groups:
- Quiet Quitters:
These employees are not fully disengaged, but they operate at a minimal level — completing basic tasks without any additional effort. Often, they feel disconnected, underchallenged or burned out. - Committed Employees:
Employees who go beyond the minimum requirements, contributing more actively to the company’s success. They are showing initiative, collaboration and proactive effort.
Although all results in Luppa are anonymous and individual responses cannot be traced back, making it impossible to identify quiet quitters by name, Luppa’s segmentation filters allow organizations to identify patterns across specific teams, departments, seniority levels or other relevant groups. This enables leaders to spot where disengagement is concentrated, understand which segments may be at higher risk and tailor interventions accordingly.
By gaining this level of insight, companies can take data-informed action — whether that means supporting overwhelmed teams, investing in leadership development, revisiting workload distribution, or addressing culture issues — all while maintaining employee confidentiality and trust.
How to respond to and prevent quiet quitting
Responding effectively means creating an environment where employees feel heard, supported and valued. Here’s how:
- Regular Pulse surveys
Frequent check-ins help track disengagement trends in real time. - Close the loop on surveys
Acknowledge the feedback openly and share what will happen next. Transparent communication is key to building trust and engagement. - Psychological safety
Promote an environment where concerns and ideas can be voiced without fear. - Clarify roles and expectations
Ambiguity breeds disengagement. Make sure employees understand what’s expected of them and how their work contributes to the broader company’s goals and direction. Clear guidance builds confidence and accountability. - Recognition culture
Consistently acknowledging contributions - even small ones - reinforces a sense of purpose and value. Quiet quitting often stems from feeling invisible or taken for granted. - Ensure balanced workloads
Overload and constant pressure are major triggers of disengagement. Respecting work-life boundaries and promoting realistic expectations helps prevent burnout before it starts. - Invest in leadership
Support your leaders in developing emotional intelligence, giving feedback and fostering open communication. Their role is key in re-engaging quiet quitters. - Create opportunities for growth
When people feel stagnant, they check out. Offering development paths, new challenges and opportunities to shape their roles gives employees a reason to lean back in.
Responding to quiet quitting isn’t about demanding more - it’s about understanding what’s missing and creating the conditions for people to re-engage on their own terms.
Conclusion
Quiet quitting doesn’t happen overnight - it’s the result of repeated unmet needs and or unspoken dissatisfaction.
Responding to quiet quitting isn’t about pushing people to do more — it’s about listening better, acting faster and creating a work environment where people genuinely want to contribute. That means investing in leadership development, clarifying expectations, recognizing effort and prioritizing psychological safety.
The sooner organizations start listening and acting, the sooner they can move from silent disengagement to renewed commitment. With tools like Luppa, it’s possible to spot the signs early and take meaningful, data-driven steps toward stronger engagement.
Quiet quitting may be silent, but its message is loud and clear: people want to be heard, valued and supported. The organizations that respond to that message with empathy and intention will be the ones that thrive.
Want to create a feedback culture where employees feel heard and engaged? Continue reading our blogs to learn more—or contact us to see how Luppa can help you drive participation, track sentiment, and turn insights into action.