Quiet Quitting Isn’t Laziness—It’s Leadership Failure.

Redefining responsibility: from blaming workers to fixing leadership gaps.

Author

Glenda Carnate
August 31, 2025

Read time: 2.5 minutes

Quiet quitting doesn’t happen because employees stop caring. It happens because leaders stop leading.

When managers glorify long hours, skipped weekends, and stolen holidays as signs of commitment, they fail to protect the very balance that sustains performance. The message is clear: personal time has no value.

At first, employees comply. But over time, boundary erosion turns effort into resentment, loyalty into detachment, and silence into withdrawal. That’s not laziness… it’s leadership failure.

In fact, in 2025, a staggering 66% of employees reported feeling burned out, a record high, shedding light on how the “always on” culture is pushing people to disengage. (Forbes, 2025)

How Leadership Failure Fuels Quiet Quitting?

  • Encroaching boundaries: Leaders normalize emails and calls on weekends and holidays.

  • Flawed recognition: Managers praise long hours instead of meaningful outcomes.

  • Exploited commitment: “Always on” expectations get disguised as loyalty.

  • Inevitable burnout: High performers drain out, while disengaged employees quietly coast.

Key Takeaways:

  • Respect boundaries or lose engagement: Quiet quitting begins when personal time is treated as expendable.

  • Value impact, not hours: Recognize results, not just visible effort.

  • Stop masking exploitation as culture: Constant availability isn’t commitment; it’s a leadership failure.

  • Own the burnout problem: Disengagement is the symptom; leadership practices are the cause.

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