Is Ambition Dead?
Last week, we took a deep dive into the trending phrase, “quiet quitting” and recommended that we stop its use because of its misleading and unhelpful nature. “Quiet quitting” demonizes the unengaged in an organization—a population that’s often referred to as the moveable middle—which comprises roughly 50 percent of the employment population. Many in the moveable middle show up every day, do their jobs to the best of their ability, and then “unplug” when they go home, choosing to focus their energy and passion on family, hobbies, or philanthropic pursuits. The quiet quitting debate infers that doing one’s job as determined in a job description is a bad thing, when in actuality, these are the “steady Eddies” that ensure the wheels of business keep turning.
Instead of focusing on this misleading phrase, recent data from Gallup indicates a more complicated set of issues surround today’s employment markets—specifically that engagement is declining and active disengagement is increasing by roughly the same amount. Therefore, the moveable middle is not the problem. In my assessment the issue is that a small, but meaningful proportion of the “engaged” are questioning their relationship with work and wonder if there are better ways to utilize their energy to improve work-life balance and life satisfaction (happiness). In addition, a small, but meaningful proportion of the moveable middle has slipped into the category of the actively disengaged. Of the two issues, the latter is the most pressing and potentially damaging to businesses and institutions. Remember that the actively disengaged are, as the title suggests, actively working to subvert your operations and/or customer relationships. They hate their jobs and have no incentive to support you or the business. Active disengagement is toxic to your workplace culture and should not be tolerated.
Another Important Question We Should Be Asking
Reading between the lines of the current debate around workplace engagement, the question I believe many managers are asking themselves is, “is ambition dead?” Digging deeper, managers are wondering “where did all the people go who climbed over themselves to get ahead?” Or put differently, “where are the employees who would blindly follow my every order in hopes of ingratiating themselves to me so they could move up the ladder more quickly than their peers?”
To cut right to the chase, it pains me greatly when I hear managers say things like this. Why? Because those who utter these phrases out loud or under their breath are yearning for a return to a past that is receding in the rear view mirror. It’s as if these managers have been living under a rock or are in purposeful denial regarding the dramatic shift in attitudes toward work that have occurred over the last decade and were exacerbated by the SARS CoV-2 pandemic. Put simply, it appears that many managers have refused to learn the lessons that their employees are trying to teach them (with actions more than words) and instead hope to backslide to pre-pandemic norms.
Note that I purposefully use the word “manager” in my description above in lieu of “leader.” A leader understands the importance of embracing change, leads with compassion, is constructively vulnerable, and helps their team members navigate toward an inclusive, mutually beneficial future state for both the engaged and the moveable middle. A leader promotes organizational clarity, encourages their teams to continuously improve, and understands that allowing the actively disengaged to continue to roam the physical or virtual halls of the business is poisonous to organizational culture. They understand that “you are what you allow.”
In my book, Balancing Act, I refer to managers who strive to maintain the status quo and resist change as the “clay layer,” or “organizational permafrost.” In the conclusion to my forthcoming book, The Balanced Business, I stress that members of the clay layer are not bad people. They simply have not committed to lifelong learning and nurturing what some would call a “growth mindset.” Please also note that you can be a front-line manager who leads a team of four on the front lines of a gigantic business and still be a “leader.” The distinction between leader and manager has everything to do with mindset and nothing to do with how many people are under a box in an org chart.
Is Ambition Dead?
So is ambition dead? The answer depends on one’s perspective. If your definition of ambition bends more toward blind ambition to climb a ladder at any cost and show a “boss” that you’re willing to do whatever it takes to get ahead, then I say that this type of ambition is on the way out and should peacefully fade away. I bid this kind of ambition good riddance because it doesn’t take long to recall myriad historical (and present state) examples of the trouble we get into both personally and professionally when we seek power, money, and influence for the sake of power, money, and influence. I can certainly look back on my life at the price I paid for not thinking more carefully about how my work-life balance choices might manifest themselves in unproductive ways.
If instead, we’re talking about measured, thoughtful ambition to pursue one’s dreams with liberty (considering the impact of an ambitious pursuit on the self and society), then I say ambition is alive and should be supported by leaders at all organizational levels. This version of ambition may look starkly different from what we’ve become accustom to—especially those workforce participants who are gen Xers or Boomer IIs like me. We must accept that new(er) entrants into the workforce are rightfully questioning the cost-benefit of their work-life choices and are deciding that diving deeper into the rat race in pursuit of power or a bigger piece of the economic pie just isn’t worth it.
If leaders want to grow the proportion of the engaged in their organizations, last week’s Muse contains a list of actions they can take now to grow that population. However, it’s important to note that re-engaging those who have slipped into the moveable middle will not happen overnight. Doing so will take time, patience, and hard work. The “Great Reset” will take time to play out.
Barking orders and telling people to get back to work and back in the office will only force a wedge deeper into the conversation. This behavior will alienate even more of the engaged and cause more of the moveable middle to become actively disengaged.
